Richard Barnfield
Date of Birth: 1574
Place of Birth: Norbury, Staffordshire, England
Date of Death: 1620
Place of Death: England
Genres: Queer poetry, love poetry, human poetry
Life Summary
Richard Barnfield, born in Staffordshire, England, was a gifted poet of the Elizabethan age whose voice, though brief, resonated with boldness and lyric beauty. Raised by his maternal aunt after his mother died in childbirth, Barnfield found early inspiration in Virgil and Sidney’s Astrophel and Stella, graduating from Oxford in 1592. By the age of 21, he had published The Affectionate Shepherd and Cynthia, sonnet-rich volumes steeped in classical influence and rare for their open homoeroticism—making him, alongside Shakespeare, the only known male Elizabethan poet to direct love poems to a man. His final work, The Encomion of Lady Pecunia, appeared in 1598, after which his poetic voice fell silent, leaving behind a slender but daring legacy in English verse.
A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature