{{Short description|New Zealand poet}} {{Other people}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}} {{Infobox Author |name=Sarah Broom | image=Sarah_Broom.jpg |birth_date=1972 |birth_place=Dunedin |death_date=2013 |occupation=Poet |nationality=New Zealand}}
'''Sarah Broom''' (1972–2013) was a New Zealand poet and university lecturer. Her work included two books of poetry, ''Tigers at Awhitu'' (published jointly in England and New Zealand) and ''Gleam.'' After her early death from lung cancer, the Sarah Broom Poetry Prize, was established to remember and celebrate her life and work.
== Biography == Sarah Kathryn Broom was born in 1972 in Dunedin.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|url=https://www.sarahbroom.co.nz/about.html|title=About Sarah|website=Sarah Broom: the life and work of a New Zealand poet|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref> She grew up in Christchurch and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in English and psychology from the University of Canterbury.<ref name=":9" /> She then completed an MA in English Literature at Leeds and DPhil at Oxford University,<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.press.auckland.ac.nz/en/browse-books/authors-a-z/sarah-broom.html|title=Sarah Broom: Poet and literary editor|website=Auckland University Press|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref> studying contemporary British and Irish poetry. She lectured at Somerville College, Oxford.<ref name=":0" />
In 1999, in Oxford, she married Michael Gleissner whom she had first met on a Lions Club scholarship to Japan.<ref name=":1">{{Cite web|url=http://www.ericjames.co.nz/in-memory-of-sarah/|title=In Memory of Sarah|date=28 June 2014|website=Eric James & Associates|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref> They returned to New Zealand in 2000. She took up a post-doctoral fellowship at Massey University in Albany and then lectured in English at the University of Otago.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":5" /> She and her family later lived in Glendowie, Auckland.<ref name=":6">{{Cite web|url=https://www.thebigidea.nz/news/industry-news/2010/mar/67618-poet-defies-the-odds|title=Poet defies the odds|date=25 March 2010|website=The Big Idea|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref>
Her poetry was published both in New Zealand, in journals such as ''Bravado'', ''Landfall'', ''Poetry New Zealand'' and ''Takahe'', and in England in ''Acumen'', ''Metre'', ''Orbis'' and ''Oxford Magazine''.<ref name=":0" />
She was diagnosed with stage-four lung cancer in February 2008, while pregnant with her third child. Her daughter was born safely at 30 weeks gestation soon after the diagnosis.<ref name=":6" />
''Tigers at Awhitu'' which dwelt on themes of relationships, illness and motherhood<ref name=":1" /> was published simultaneously in England and New Zealand in 2010.<ref name=":6" /> The book was accepted on the strength of its first section, and the poems in the second section of the book were all written after her cancer diagnosis.<ref name=":7" />
She continued to write poetry throughout her treatment over the next few years, which involved participation in experimental drug trials in Australia.<ref name=":9">{{Cite web|url=http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/3585363/Poetry-a-saviour|title=Poetry a saviour|last=Moyes|first=Sarah|date=16 April 2010|website=Stuff |access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://outlivinglungcancer.com/2013/04/23/the-world-loses-a-very-bright-light-sarah-broom/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130630100956/http://outlivinglungcancer.com/2013/04/23/the-world-loses-a-very-bright-light-sarah-broom/|url-status=usurped|archive-date=30 June 2013|title=The world loses a very bright light: Sarah Broom|date=23 April 2013|website=life and breath: outliving lung cancer|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref>
Sarah Broom was married and had three children.<ref name=":0" /> She died on 18 April 2013.<ref name=":7">{{Cite web|url=http://helenlowe.info/blog/2013/04/23/tuesday-poem-in-memory-of-sarah-broom-1972-2013/|title=Tuesday Poem: In Memory of Sarah Broom, 1972-2013|last=Lowe|first=Helen|date=23 April 2013|website=Helen Lowe... on anything, really|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://beattiesbookblog.blogspot.com/2013/04/sarah-broom-in-memoriam.html|title=Sarah Broom - In memoriam|last=Harvey|first=Siobhan|date=21 April 2013|website=Beattie's Book Blog|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref><ref name=":5">{{Cite web|url=http://mairangibay.blogspot.com/2013/04/dreamtigers-im-sarah-broom.html|title=Dreamtigers: i.m. Sarah Broom|last=Ross|first=Jack|date=20 April 2013|website=The Imaginary Museum|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref>
== Awards and prizes == After her death, and at the posthumous launch of her poetry collection ''Gleam'', the Sarah Broom Poetry Prize was announced. This prize was established by her husband and friends to celebrate poetry in New Zealand and to encourage and support the recipient to complete a manuscript of poems.<ref name=":8">{{Cite web|url=http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/CU1308/S00032/sarah-broom-poetry-prize-established-to-recognise-nz-poets.htm?from-mobile=bottom-link-01|title=Sarah Broom Poetry Prize Established to Recognise NZ Poets|date=2 August 2013|website=Scoop culture|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref>
The judging panel for the first award included Paula Green, Sarah Ross, Jennifer Crawford, Pat Palmer and Michael Gleissner. The guest judge, poet Sam Hunt, awarded the inaugural prize to winner C.K. Stead<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.stuff.co.nz/entertainment/10057599/C-K-Stead-wins-poetry-prize|title=C.K. Stead wins poetry prize|last=Dastgheib|first=Shabnam|date=18 May 2014|website=Stuff |access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref> on 17 May 2014 at the Auckland Writers & Readers Festival.<ref name=":1" /><ref name=":8" />
== Bibliography== *''Contemporary British and Irish Poetry: an introduction'' (Palgrave Macmillan, 2006) *''Tigers at Awhitu'' (Carcanet Press and Auckland University Press, 2010)<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=10636861|title=Review: Tigers At Awhitu|last=Green|first=Paula|date=7 April 2010|website=The New Zealand Herald |access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.carcanet.co.uk/cgi-bin/indexer?owner_id=916|title=Sarah Broom|website=Carcanet Press|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref> *''Gleam'' (Auckland University Press, 2013)<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.noted.co.nz/archive/listener-nz-2013/poetry-review-gleam-by-sarah-broom/|title=Poetry review: Gleam, by Sarah Broom|last=Upperton|first=Tim|date=17 October 2013|website=NZ Listener|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.odt.co.nz/entertainment/books/poems-full-surprise-confidence-and-intimacy|title=Poems full of surprise, confidence and intimacy|last=Wyatt|first=Hamesh|date=5 September 2013|website=Otago Daily Times |access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://nzbooks.org.nz/2014/literature/finding-the-poetry-michael-hulse/|title=Finding the poetry|last=Hulse|first=Michael|date=27 February 2014|website=NZ Books Pukapuka Aotearoa|access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref>
== See also ==
* List of New Zealand literary awards * Sarah Broom Poetry Prize
== References == {{Reflist}}
== External links ==
* "All my life" by Sarah Broom: [http://tuesdaypoem.blogspot.com/2012/12/all-my-life-by-sarah-broom.html Tuesday poem] 18 December 2012 * Scottish Poetry Library [http://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/podcast/sarah-broom/ podcast interview with Sarah Broom], November 2011. {{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Broom, Sarah}} Category:21st-century New Zealand poets Category:21st-century New Zealand women poets Category:1972 births Category:2013 deaths Category:Writers from Dunedin Category:Alumni of the University of Oxford Category:Fellows of Somerville College, Oxford Category:Deaths from lung cancer in New Zealand Category:University of Canterbury alumni Category:Academic staff of the University of Otago