{{Short description|Australian poet and teacher|bot=PearBOT 5}} {{Use Australian English|date=December 2013}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2026}} {{Infobox person | name = John Foulcher | image = Johnfoulcher.jpg | image_size = 200px | caption = John Foulcher, 2011 | birth_name = | birth_date = 7 December 1952 | birth_place = [[Ryde, New South Wales]] | death_date = | death_place = | death_cause = | other_names = | known_for = Poetry | education = | employer = | occupation = Poet and teacher | title = | spouse = | partner = | children = | parents = | relatives = | signature = | website = http://johnfoulcher.com/ | footnotes = }}
'''John Foulcher''' (born 7 December 1952) is an Australian poet and teacher.<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=yBpVHywjoVUC&pg=PA82 ''Bibliography of Australian Literature''], pg. 82-83 (Univ. of Queensland Press)</ref>
==Education== Foulcher graduated from [[Macquarie University]] with a [[Bachelor of Arts]] with Honours and a [[Diploma of Education]]. He has been a teacher in New South Wales, Victoria, [[Australian Capital Territory]] and taught at [[Radford College]]<ref>[https://radfordcollegians.com.au/collegian/john-foulcher/ ''Life beyond Radford''], Radford Collegians</ref> until 2011 followed by Burgmann Anglican School in the Canberra suburb of [[Gungahlin, Australian Capital Territory|Gungahlin]] until retiring in June 2016.
==Literary career== His work has been widely anthologised and published in national newspapers and journals including The Age, The Australian, [[The Sydney Morning Herald]], The Bulletin, Quadrant, Heat, Poetry Australia, Meanjin and the [[New Oxford Book of Australian Verse]].
From 1986 to 1994, his poetry was set for study on the New South Wales Higher School Certificate syllabus.<ref name=..>{{cite web|title="HSC Exams 2000" |publisher= Board of Studies NSW|url=http://www.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/hsc_exams/hsc2000exams/hsc00_english/95EN_ENG.PDF|access-date= 9 May 2024}}</ref> He has been the poetry editor of both ''The Canberra Times''<ref>{{cite web|title=Oxford Reference - John Foulcher |publisher= Oxford Reference|url=https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803095830792|access-date= 9 May 2024}}</ref> and the Voices,<ref name="Austlit">{{cite web|title= Austlit — John Foulcher |publisher= Austlit|url=https://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/A11226|access-date= 9 May 2024}}</ref> the magazine of the National Library. In 2010, he was awarded a writer in residency in Paris at the [[Cité internationale des arts]]<ref>[http://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/grants/amr/literature2/pages/literature_-_july_2009 Cité Internationale des Arts] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111003063037/http://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/grants/amr/literature2/pages/literature_-_july_2009 |date= 3 October 2011 }}</ref> by the Literature Board of the [[Creative Australia|Australia Council]].
In 2012, he joined forces with the Sydney-based poetry imprint [[Pitt Street Poetry]] who republished his first collection from 1983 ''Light Pressure'' in a pocket format, and followed up with his new book of poetry ''The Sunset Assumption'' written during his Australia Council residency in Paris. This new book was published as an e-book, a paperback and a signed and numbered limited hardbound collector's edition with illustrations by Swiss artist [http://www.juditvilliger.ch/ Judit Villiger].
==Awards== * Prime Minister's Award for Poetry, 2022: shortlisted for ''Dancing with Stephen Hawking'' * ACU Prize for Poetry, 2019: winner for 'Revising Casuarinas' * Australia Council Residency at the Keesing Studio, Paris 2010–11 * Australia Council Grant for Established Writers, 2003 * [[ACT Book of the Year]], 1994: winner for New and Selected Poems * National Library Poetry Competition, 1988: joint winner for 'Kosciusko in Summer'<ref>[http://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/v281 National Library Poetry Competition, 1988]</ref> * Australia Council Young Writer's Fellowship, 1980 * Australia Council General Writing Grant, 1977
==Works== * ''Light Pressure'' (Angus & Robertson 1983, Pitt Street Poetry 2012) * ''Pictures from the War'' (Angus & Robertson 1987) * ''Paper Weight'' (Angus & Robertson 1991) * ''New and Selected Poems'' (Angus & Robertson 1993)<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=iXZDAQAAIAAJ&q=John+Foulcher ''Southerly: A Review of Australian Literature'', Volume 54] (book review of "New and Selected Poems")</ref> * ''The Honeymoon Snaps'' (Angus & Robertson 1996)<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=KFzlAAAAMAAJ ''Australian Book Review'', Issues 187-197] (book review of "The Honeymoon Snap")</ref> * ''Convertible'' (Ginninderra Press 2000) * ''The Learning Curve'' (Brandl & Schlesinger, 2002) * ''What on Earth Possessed You'' (Halstead Press 2008) * ''The Sunset Assumption'' (Pitt Street Poetry 2012) * ''101 Poems'' - selected poetry from nine previous collections (Pitt Street Poetry 2015) * ''A Casual Penance'' (Pitt Street Poetry 2017) * ''Dancing with Stephen Hawking'' (Pitt Street Poetry 2021) * ''The Night Stair'' (Pitt Street Poetry 2025)
==Critical response== 'Foulcher's ''The Sunset Assumption'' confirms his status as a thoughtful, melodious poet, one of seriously investigated religious beliefs, one morally attuned to the need for and the compromises of such beliefs.' Peter Pierce review in ''[[The Canberra Times]]''<ref>[http://www.canberratimes.com.au/entertainment/another-planet-other-places-20120824-24pj7.html Canberra Times 25 August 2012]</ref>
'Lovely in its poetic balance, ''The Sunset Assumption'' is well-crafted with its deep and subtle ‘voice’ and a unique imagination. I fell in love with this book because there is so much questioning and rich beauty within it.' Robyn Rowland in ''Cordite Poetry Review''<ref>[http://cordite.org.au/guncotton/robyn-rowland-launches-john-foulcher/3/ Cordite Poetry Review 8 August 2012]</ref>
'Foulcher has always been a subtle (and non-dogmatic) religious poet. Even to an agnostic or atheist the poems here will almost certainly evoke a powerful sense of strangeness, of something quite-conceivably real but not reducible to words' [[Geoff Page]] reviews ''The Sunset Assumption'' in ''[[Southerly (journal)]]''<ref>[http://southerlyjournal.com.au/2013/03/04/true-crime/ Southerly Vol 72 No 2 2012 p 197]</ref>
'...technically skilled and careful, in the service of precise notations of scenes from the poet's emotional life.' Commentary on ''Light Pressure'' in the ''Oxford Companion to 20th Century Poetry''<ref>Ian Hamilton (ed) ''Oxford Companion to Twentieth Century Poetry in English'' OUP 1994 p171</ref>
'Foulcher is not a poet of dramatic gestures or strident convictions; rather, he is a poet of implications, implications that come from closely observed and imaginatively recreated particulars; ones that readers will almost certainly recognise as part of their own lives'. Geoff Page (ed) ''A Reader's Guide to Contemporary Australian Poetry'' UQP 1995.<ref>Geoff Page (ed) ''A Reader's Guide to Contemporary Australian Poetry'' UQP 1995.</ref>
'Simple, direct and convincing, Foulcher's poetry reflects common human experiences - joy in the present, regret for the errors and omissions of the past and faith, mixed with a dash of apprehension, for the future'. Wilde, Hooton and Andrews (eds) ''The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature'' OUP 1995<ref>Wilde, Hooton and Andrews (eds) ''The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature'' OUP 1995.</ref>
==See also== {{portal|Poetry}} *[[List of Australian poets]] *[https://web.archive.org/web/20120330231818/http://johnfoulcher.com/ JohnFoulcher.com] *[http://www.austlit.edu.au/run?ex=ShowAgent&agentId=A%23tm John Foulcher on AustLit] *Excel Studies in Literature: ''The Poetry of John Foulcher'' (Dr Barry Spurr, Pascal Press 1993) {{ISBN|9781875312641}} *Get Smart Study Guide: ''John Foulcher'' (Margaret Berg, Science Press, 1996) {{ISBN|9780855832599}}
==Notes== {{Reflist}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Foulcher, John}} [[Category:1952 births]] [[Category:Living people]] [[Category:Australian poets]] [[Category:Anthologists]] [[Category:Macquarie University alumni]]