James Stephens (9 February 1880 - 26 December 1950) was an Irish novelist and poet.
Video James Stephens (author)
Life
Early life
James' mother worked in the home of the Collins family of Dublin and was adopted by them. James was committed to the Meath Protestant Industrial School for Boys as a small child and spent his childhood there. He attended school with his adopted brothers Thomas and Richard (Tom and Dick) before graduating as a solicitor's clerk. They competed and won several athletic competitions despite James' tiny stature (he stood 4'10" in his socks). He was known affectionately as 'Tiny Tim'. He was much enthralled by the tales of military valour of his adoptive family and would have become a soldier except for his height.
Career and nationalism
By the early 1900s James was increasingly inclined to socialism and the Irish language (he spoke and wrote Irish) and by 1912 was a dedicated Irish Republican. He was a close friend of the 1916 leader Thomas MacDonagh, who was then editor of "The Irish Review" and deputy headmaster in St Enda's, the radical bilingual school run by PH Pearse and would be manager of the Irish Theatre, and spent much time with MacDonagh in 1911. His growing nationalism brought a schism with his adopted family, but probably won him his job as registrar in the National Gallery of Ireland, where he worked between 1915 and 1925, having previously had an ill-paid job with the Mecredy solicitors' firm.
Literary career
James Stephens produced many retellings of Irish myths and fairy tales. His retellings are marked by a rare combination of humour and lyricism (Deirdre, and Irish Fairy Tales are often especially praised). He also wrote several original novels (The Crock of Gold, Etched in Moonlight, Demi-Gods) based loosely on Irish fairy tales. The Crock of Gold in particular has achieved enduring popularity and has often been reprinted.
Stephens began his career as a poet under the tutelage of "Æ" (George William Russell). Stephens's first book of poems, Insurrections, was published in 1909. His last book, Kings and the Moon (1938), was also a volume of verse.
Stephens's influential account of the 1916 Easter Rising, Insurrection in Dublin, describes the effect of the deaths by execution of his friend Thomas MacDonagh and others as being "like watching blood oozing from under a door". Of MacDonagh he wrote:
No person living is the worse off for having known Thomas MacDonagh, and I, at least, have never heard MacDonagh speak unkindly or even harshly of anything that lived. It has been said of him that his lyrics were epical ; in a measure it is true, and it is true in the same measure that his death was epical. He was the first of the leaders who was tried and shot.
James Joyce
Stephens lived between Paris, London and Dublin. During the 1930s he was a friend of James Joyce, and they mistakenly believed that they shared a birthday. Joyce, who was concerned about his ability to finish what later became Finnegans Wake, proposed that Stephens assist him, with the authorship credited to JJ & S (for "Jameses Joyce & Stephens", but also a pun on the popular Irish whiskey made by John Jameson & Sons). The plan was never implemented, as Joyce was able to complete the work on his own.
Late life
During the last decade of his life Stephens found a new audience through a series of broadcasts on the BBC.
Maps James Stephens (author)
Timeline
1880 (9 February) Possible date of birth of James Stephens in Dublin.
1882 (2 February) Date of birth used by Stephens.
1886-96 Attended Meath Protestant Industrial School for Boys.
1896 Employed as a clerk by a Dublin solicitor, a Mr Wallace.
1901 Member of a gymnastic team that won the Irish Shield. Employed by Reddington & Sainsbury, solicitors.
1906 Employed as a clerk-typist in the office of TT Mecredy & Son, solicitors.
1907 Began making regular contributions to Sinn Féin magazine. Birth of stepdaughter, Iris, on 14 June; soon afterwards he announced that he had a wife, "Cynthia" (Millicent Josephine Gardiner Kavanagh, 22 May 1882 - 18 December 1960). Discovered by George W Russell (Æ).
1909 Published poetry collection Insurrections. Acted in the Theatre of Ireland's two productions of Seumas O'Kelly's play The Shuiler's Child. Birth of son James Naoise on 26 October.
1910 Acted in the Theatre of Ireland's production of Gerald Macnamara's The Spurious Sovereign. Became associated with David Houston, Thomas MacDonagh and Padraic Colum in founding and editing the Irish Review (published from March 1911 to November 1914).
1911 Acted in Pádraic Ó Conaire's Bairbre Ruadh; his own play, The Marriage of Julia Elizabeth, produced by the Theatre of Ireland.
1912 Published novels The Charwoman's Daughter and The Crock of Gold and poetry collection The Hill of Vision.
1913 Published Here Are Ladies and Five New Poems; received a commission from The Nation (London) to write a series of short stories; moved to Paris; another production of The Marriage of Julia Elizabeth at the Hardwicke Street Theatre; The Crock of Gold awarded the Polignac Prize.
1914 Published The Demi-Gods.
1915 Published Songs from the Clay and The Adventures of Seumas Beg/The Rocky Road to Dublin; elected Unestablished Registrar of the National Gallery of Ireland.
1916 Published Green Branches and The Insurrection in Dublin.
1918-24 Registrar of the National Gallery of Ireland.
1918 Published Reincarnations.
1919 Married "Cynthia" (by now a widow) in London on 14 May.
1920 Published Irish Fairy Tales; his play The Wooing of Julia Elizabeth (identical to The Marriage of Julia Elizabeth) produced at the Abbey Theatre by the Dublin Drama League; underwent one of a series of operations for gastric ulcers.
1922 Published Arthur Griffith: Journalist and Statesman.
1923 Published Deirdre.
1924 Published Little Things and In the Land of Youth; Deirdre received the medal for fiction at the Aonach Tailteann festival; resigned from the National Gallery.
1925 Published A Poetry Recital, Danny Murphy and Christmas in Freelands; went on two separate lecture tours in the United States; settled in Kingsbury, a suburb of London.
1926 Published Collected Poems.
1927 Made friends with James Joyce.
1928 Published Etched in Moonlight and On Prose and Verse; made first BBC broadcaster; lectured at the Third International Book Fair in Florence.
1929 Published Julia Elizabeth: A Comedy, in One Act, The Optimist and The Outcast (the latter one of Faber's Ariel pamphlets); Joyce suggested that Stephens complete Finnegans Wake if Joyce was unable to do so; visited Romania and met Queen Marie; made the first of several visits to WTH Howe in the United States.
1930 Published Theme and Variations.
1931 Published How St Patrick Saves the Irish, Stars Do Not Make a Noise andStrict Joy.
1937 Began regular series of BBC broadcasts; accidental death of his son James Naoise on 24 December.
1938 Published Kings and the Moon.
1940 Moved to Woodside Chapel in Gloucestershire.
1942 Awarded a British Civil List Pension.
1945 Returned to London.
1947 Awarded honorary DLitt by Trinity College, Dublin.
1950 Made final BBC broadcast; died at Eversleigh on St Stephen's Day.
References
External links
- Works by James Stephens at Project Gutenberg
- Georgian Poetry 1911 - 12 at Project Gutenberg
- Georgian Poetry 1913 - 15 at Project Gutenberg
- Georgian Poetry 1916 - 17 at Project Gutenberg
- Works by or about James Stephens at Internet Archive
- Works by James Stephens at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)
- James Stephens at Library of Congress Authorities, with 79 catalogue records
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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