John Barrington Wain (1925-1994), author and poet, grew up in Staffordshire before going on to read English at St John's College, Oxford, in 1943. He recieved teaching from C.S. Lewis and attended Inklings meetings, founded the literary magazine 'Mandrake', and had amongst his peers Philip Larkin and Kingsley Amis. After recieving a first, he was awarded a Fereday Research Fellowship at the college.

In 1947 he married Marianne Uffenheimer and began teaching at the University of Reading. Between 1951 and 1953, Wain published his first collection of poetry, Mixed Feelings, his first novel Hurry on Down, and a scholarly work Contemporary Reviews of Romantic Poetry. In 1955 Wain gave up lecturing to become a full-time author, and was associated with the 'Movement', a set of nine poets, as well as being labelled as one of the 'Angry Young Men' of the period.

Wain married twice more after divorcing his first wife in 1956, and continued to publish both novels and poetry. His attempt at writing for the theatre failed, but he did have some success with radio plays, and he continued to lecuture at various universities in France, Canada and the US. John Wain was awarded a CBE in 1984, and made an honourary fellow of St John's the following year.