Janine is a writer, poet, critic, and academic. Her wide-ranging work on contemporary literature and culture (including publications about Grace Jones, Toni Morrison, comedy, passing-for-white, and professional wrestling) has been published by Bloomsbury, Palgrave Macmillan, Routledge, the Guardian, the Young Vic Theatre and others. Her poems appear in Blood & Cord: Writers on Early Parenthood (The Emma Press, 2023), Oxford Poetry, and Magma. Janine has been a repeat guest on BBC Radio 4 (Woman’s Hour and Great Lives). Her most recent work explores the relationship between love, feeling, and reading. Her debut poetry pamphlet, Sometimes Real Love Comes Quick & Easy, is available from ignitionpress. She is Senior Lecturer in Contemporary Writing and Culture at the University of York. She has a PhD in African American women’s writing, is an alumna of the University of Sheffield and the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. An experienced academic, she’s been teaching in higher education for over fifteen years.
Sometimes Real Love Comes Quick & Easy
ignitionpress (2024)
In this audacious pamphlet, Janine Bradbury casts her piercing gaze towards questions of form and feeling. Moments of transition — adolescence, motherhood, loss — become intertwined with contemporary culture and the complexities of heritage. Professional wrestling, pop lyrics, fast food, and family ties become talismanic. Stylistically vibrant, playfully ambivalent, these are poems that both recognise and resist the trappings of sentimentality.
“This is an exciting debut. (How to resist a collection that includes wrestling, Amy Winehouse, and jellyfish?) These are tender and astute poems that grapple with love, grief, ghosts, and motherhood, and Bradbury’s voice is original and clear'“
— Rachel Long
“…a deft, wise & exciting new voice in British poetry.”
— Rebecca Tamás
“Janine’s poetry is full of beauty and ache and humour.”
— Charlotte Shevchenko Knight
