Buchanan, Robert Williams (1841–1901)

English poet, novelist, and dramatist. His verse includes London Poems (1866). Two of his reviews, ‘The Fleshly School of Poetry’ (1871), attacking the Pre-Raphaelite painter and poet Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and ‘The Voice of the Hooligan’ (1899), dealing with the writer Rudyard Kipling, roused much critical opposition.

Buchanan was born in Caverswall, Staffordshire, and studied at Glasgow University. He took up journalism in London.

His first collection of poems, Undertones 1863, was followed in 1865 by Idylls and Legends of Inverburn. The London Poems, dealing with the life of the London poor, were highly successful. His chief dramatic success was Sophia, an adaptation of Henry Fielding's Tom Jones. Lady Clare and Joseph's Sweetheart were also well received. His novels once had a considerable reputation and include The Shadow of the Sword (1876) and The New Rome (1899).