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Anne Beresford

British poet, playwright

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 25, 2026
Entity authorityQ75601092
Source-derived summary

Anne Ellen File (10 September 1928 – 14 July 2023) known by her pen-name Anne Beresford, was a British poet. Her poetry explored themes of spirituality, mortality, and the fragility of daily life.

Early life and education

Anne Beresford was born in Redhill, Surrey, England. Her father, Richmond File, was a travelling salesman who sold films, while her mother, Margaret (née Kent), played piano for silent films and trombone in ladies' orchestras. As a child, Beresford modelled for advertisements for soap products such as Persil. She developed a love of reading early on, particularly enjoying Tales from Shakespeare by Charles and Mary Lamb.

At the age of 15, she was accepted to the Central School of Speech Training and Dramatic Art, then based at the Royal Albert Hall. There she discovered the poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins and Wilfred Owen, and her interest in acting waned as her attention to poetry grew.

Career

Her first collection of poetry was published in 1967 under the title Walking without Moving. Over the next four decades, she published fourteen collections culminating with Collected Poems 1967–2006.

Editorial summary

“Anne Beresford” enters the record as british poet, playwright. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Anne, Beresford and British can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA useful biographical orientation record, particularly for establishing names, roles and a first chronology. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1928, 2023, 1967, 2006—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1928-09-10. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Anne, Beresford and British.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Anne Beresford” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Anne, Beresford and British provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 25, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q75601092. VIAF identifies the subject as 91255004. The Library of Congress control number is n50006852. 6 of 6 selected statements include explicit references; 4 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1928, 2023, 1967 and 2006.

Critical limits

A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
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Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Anne Beresford”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Anne Beresford primary sources, Anne Beresford archive and Anne research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Anne Beresford”?
  2. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
  3. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Anne Beresford” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.