William Barnes was born in 1801 near Sturminster Newton in Dorset, of a farming family. He learned Greek, Latin and Music, taught himself wood-engraving, and in 1823 became a schoolmaster in Mere. Among his best-known books of poetry are "Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect" (1844) a...

William Barnes was born in 1801 near Sturminster Newton in Dorset, of a farming family. He learned Greek, Latin and Music, taught himself wood-engraving, and in 1823 became a schoolmaster in Mere. Among his best-known books of poetry are "Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect" (1844) and "Hwomely Rhymes" (1859).