Poet: study area University put foremost (5)
I believe the answer is:
auden
'poet' is the definition.
(Auden is an example)
'area university put foremost' is the wordplay.
'area' becomes 'a' (maths abbreviation).
'university' becomes 'u'.
'put foremost' becomes 'den' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'a'+'u'+'den'='AUDEN'
'study' acts as a link.
This may not be right. It may be part of another bit of the clue.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for auden that I've seen before include "W. H. ... (British poet)" , "W.H. --, English poet" , "US poet born in Britain" , "W. H. -, English-born poet" , "W. H. -, English poet" .)