Robert Southwell

Robert Southwell (1561–1595) was an English Jesuit priest and poet whose writings became central to late Elizabethan Catholic devotional literature. Ordained after joining the Society of Jesus, he returned to England as a missionary during a period of intense persecution of Catholics. He worked clandestinely, offering pastoral care and writing prose and verse intended to strengthen faith under pressure. Southwell is best known for poems such as “The Burning Babe” and the long devotional work “Saint Peter’s Complaint,” noted for vivid imagery and spiritual intensity. Arrested and imprisoned, he was tried and executed under Elizabeth I, and is remembered as a Catholic martyr.