Born in Regina in 1938, John Newlove was raised in various small Saskatchewan towns, mainly Kamsack. He attended the University of Saskatchewan for one year before embarking on an extensive tour around Canada. Prior to this, he had worked briefly as a high school teacher in Birtle, Manitoba, as a social worker in Yorkton, Saskatchewan, in radio in Weyburn and Regina, and in various labouring jobs in British Columbia and Saskatchewan. Between 1970 and 1980, he occupied the position of editor at McClelland and Stewart in Toronto and writer-in-residence at various universities including Loyola College Montreal and the University of Toronto. Newlove also taught for a year at David Thompson University Centre, B.C. in 1982. After 1986, he worked for the federal government in Ottawa. He won the Governor General's award for poetry in 1972, the Saskatchewan Writers' Guild Founders Award in 1984, and the Literary Press Group Award in 1986. His poetry has been published in journals, magazines and literary anthologies in Canada and the United States and in several countries abroad. Newlove's poetry was most popular in the 1960s and 1970s when he and Eli Mandel were considered to be among the dominant voices of Canadian prairie poetry. John Newlove died in Ottawa on December 23, 2003 at the age of 65.