Assoc ProfessorNerys Williams

Modern and Contemporary American Poetry and Poetics; relationship between poetic practice and theory; recent Welsh poetry in English. My monograph study of contemporary American Poetry and Poetics (with a sustained focus of language writing) - Reading Error was published by Peter Lang in 2007. This work examined the poetry of Charles Bernstein, Michael Palmer, Lyn Hejinian and Jennifer Moxley.

My book length study, Contemporary Poetry (Edinburgh University Press, 2011) considers the work of more than sixty poets from the US, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand and the Caribbean. Contemporary Poetry examines how poetry represents and addresses issues of subjectivity, politics, performance, ideas of space and environment, multilingualism and the impact of information technologies on the texture, form and dissemination of poetry.

My first volume of poetry Sound Archive (Seren, 2011) was shortlisted for two international prizes (the Michael Murphy and Felix Dennis Forward first volume awards). It won the National Rupert and Eithne Strong First Volume Award in 2012. My second volume of poetry Cabaret was published by New Dublin Press in 2017. My latest volume Republic was published by seren in 2023 and one of its poems longlisted for the Forward single poem prize Personal Website- http://www.neryswilliams.com

My third academic book, Poets on Air: Producing Poetry at the BBC 1950-66  forthcoming from Palgrave-Macmillan investigates the relationship between modern poets and BBC Radio producers  D. G .Bridson, Douglas Cleverdon and George MacBeth.  The monograph considers material broadcast on The Third Programme. Poets featured nclude: Laura Riding, Sylvia Plath, Dylan Thomas, Langston Hughes, David Gascoyne, Rosemary Tonks, Bob Cobbing and Anne Waldman. 

I have recently completed  a new  annotated edition of Dylan Thomas's Under Milk Wood for Penguin Classics - December 2025.

I have mentored two IRC funded postdoctoral projects on poetics (2018-2021):

Dr Jonathan Creasy 'Poetics in Public Space: Performing Histories & Identities in The Poets' Theatre, 1950 - 2004'
Dr João Guimarães 'Old Pioneers: Representations of Old Age in Recent Experimental American Poetry'

Supervised an IRC funded PhD (2017-2021) with Prof John Brannigan: 
Andrew McEneff A Prolonged Derangement of the Senses: A Critical Study of the Work of Anna Kavan


Research interests include: the relationship between contemporary poetry and war; poetry and ideas of document and data; the relationship between poetic performance, sound studies and radio broadcasting.