Frances Horovitz Biography

British poet, born in London, educated at the University of Bristol and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. In 1964 she married Michael Horovitz. She became a noted reader of poetry on radio and worked widely as a teacher of creative writing. Poems (1967) and The High Tower (1970), pamphlet editions of her verse, were followed in 1980 by Water Over Stone, a substantial collection drawing much of its imagery from the remote part of the Cotswold Hills where she lived from 1971. Snow Light, Water Light (1983) reflects the topography and history of the Irthing Valley in Northumbria, where she went in 1980 to work on Wall (1981), a collaborative treatment of Hadrian's Wall by a group of writers and graphic artists. Anne Stevenson's remark on Horovitz's ‘effortless synthesis of self and nature’ indicates the imaginative fusions of mood and closely observed particulars of landscape which characterize her best work. The rhythms and diction of her verse frequently produce effects of great delicacy. Collected Poems (1985) was edited by Roger Garfitt, whom she married shortly before her death from cancer.