Valentine Ackland

English poet of twentieth-century Great Britain

Valentine Ackland (born Mary Kathleen Macrory Ackland; 20 May 1906 – 9 November 1969) was an English poet, and life partner of novelist Sylvia Townsend Warner.

Their relationship was strained by Ackland’s infidelities and alcoholism, but survived for nearly forty years.Both were closely involved with communism, remaining under continued scrutiny by the authorities.

Ackland’s poetry did not become widely noticed until after her death, when her reflective, confessional style was more in vogue, and left-wing writers of the 1930s had become a popular topic.

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