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Rhys was one of a number of British socialists who visited [[Walt Whitman]];<ref>{{cite book |last1=Harris |first1=Kirsten |title=Walt Whitman and British Socialism: "The Love of Comrades" |date=2016 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=9781317634805 |page=13 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=A0Z-CwAAQBAJ&pg=PT13 |language=en}}</ref> it followed a postal introduction in 1885 by [[William Michael Rossetti]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=DeSpain |first1=Jessica |title=Nineteenth-Century Transatlantic Reprinting and the Embodied Book |date=2016 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=9781317087250 |page=157 note 37 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=JiIfDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA157 |language=en}}</ref> The American journey on which this meeting occurred, is described in ''Everyman Remembers'', Rhys's autobiography, was also the occasion of his encounter with [[Edmund Clarence Stedman]] in New York, and dates to 1888. They became correspondents.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Nelson |first1=James G. |title=The Early Nineties: A View from the Bodley Head |date=1971 |publisher=Harvard University Press |page=158 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Sealts |first1=Merton M. |last2=Jr |first2=Professor Merton M. Sealts |title=Pursuing Melville, 1940-1980: Chapters and Essays |date=1982 |publisher=Univ of Wisconsin Press |isbn=9780299088705 |page=198 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=wZc2w7JJqy4C&pg=PA198 |language=en}}</ref>
Rhys was one of a number of British socialists who visited [[Walt Whitman]];<ref>{{cite book |last1=Harris |first1=Kirsten |title=Walt Whitman and British Socialism: "The Love of Comrades" |date=2016 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=9781317634805 |page=13 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=A0Z-CwAAQBAJ&pg=PT13 |language=en}}</ref> it followed a postal introduction in 1885 by [[William Michael Rossetti]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=DeSpain |first1=Jessica |title=Nineteenth-Century Transatlantic Reprinting and the Embodied Book |date=2016 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=9781317087250 |page=157 note 37 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=JiIfDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA157 |language=en}}</ref> The American journey on which this meeting occurred, is described in ''Everyman Remembers'', Rhys's autobiography, was also the occasion of his encounter with [[Edmund Clarence Stedman]] in New York, and dates to 1888. They became correspondents.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Nelson |first1=James G. |title=The Early Nineties: A View from the Bodley Head |date=1971 |publisher=Harvard University Press |page=158 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Sealts |first1=Merton M. |last2=Jr |first2=Professor Merton M. Sealts |title=Pursuing Melville, 1940-1980: Chapters and Essays |date=1982 |publisher=Univ of Wisconsin Press |isbn=9780299088705 |page=198 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=wZc2w7JJqy4C&pg=PA198 |language=en}}</ref>


In February 1890 Rhys was a founder member of the [[Rhymers' Club]] in London.<ref name="ODNB"/> In June of that year he met the poet [[John Davidson (poet)|John Davidson]] at a Sunday gathering in Hampstead held by [[William Sharp (writer)|William Sharp]]. Davidson became a recruit to the Rhymers' Club.<ref name="Sloan">{{cite book |last1=Sloan |first1=John |title=John Davidson, First of the Moderns: A Literary Biography |date=1995 |publisher=Clarendon Press |isbn=9780198182481 |pages=58–9 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=2HQQ_aNP2iAC&pg=PA58 |language=en}}</ref> In its early form, the Club was for "Celtic" poets.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Gardner |first1=Joann |title=Yeats and the Rhymers' Club: A Nineties' Perspective |date=1989 |publisher=P. Lang |isbn=9780820407692 |page=9 |language=en}}</ref> That restriction changed in January 1891, with a meeting at the base of the [[Century Guild of Artists]] in [[Fitzrovia|Fitzroy Street]].<ref name="Sloan"/>
In February 1890 Rhys was a founder member of the [[Rhymers' Club]] in London.<ref name="ODNB"/> In June of that year he met the poet [[John Davidson (poet)|John Davidson]] at a Sunday gathering in Hampstead held by [[William Sharp (writer)|William Sharp]]. Davidson became a recruit to the Rhymers' Club.<ref name="Sloan">{{cite book |last1=Sloan |first1=John |title=John Davidson, First of the Moderns: A Literary Biography |date=1995 |publisher=Clarendon Press |isbn=9780198182481 |pages=58–9 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=2HQQ_aNP2iAC&pg=PA58 |language=en}}</ref> In its early form, the Club was for "Celtic" poets.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Gardner |first1=Joann |title=Yeats and the Rhymers' Club: A Nineties' Perspective |date=1989 |publisher=P. Lang |isbn=9780820407692 |page=9 |language=en}}</ref> That restriction changed in January 1891, with a meeting at the base of the [[Century Guild of Artists]] in [[Fitzrovia|Fitzroy Street]].<ref name="Sloan"/> Rhys also attended Yeats's evenings in the Woburn Buildings, St. Pancras, meeting there [[Maud Gonne]] and the young [[Rupert Brooke]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Mikhail |first1=E. H. |title=W- B- Yeats: Interviews and Recollections |date=1977 |publisher=Macmillan International Higher Education |isbn=9781349029921 |page=38 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=UDBdDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA38 |language=en}}</ref>


Chapter XIX of ''Everyman Remembers'' describes an occasion at Rhys's home attended by Yeats, Davidson, [[Ezra Pound]], [[Ford Madox Hueffer]] and [[D. H. Lawrence]]. It has been argued that this gathering, dated to 1909, must be a conflation of events, since chronology makes it implausible that Davidson and Lawrence were both there.<ref>Kim Herzinger, ''The Night Pound ate the Tulips: An Evening at the Ernest Rhys's'', Journal of Modern Literature Vol. 8, No. 1 (1980), pp. 153–155. Published by: Indiana University Press. {{jstor|3831316}}</ref> That year, Rhys and [[Ernest Radford]] were 1890s figures invited to the founding meeting of the poets' club set up by [[F. S. Flint]] and [[T. E. Hulme]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Pondrom |first1=Cyrena N. |title=The Road from Paris: French Influence on English Poetry 1900-1920 |date=1974 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=9780521086813 |pages=9-10 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=lEq-geDlukgC&pg=PA9 |language=en}}</ref>
Chapter XIX of ''Everyman Remembers'' describes an occasion at Rhys's home attended by Yeats, Davidson, [[Ezra Pound]], [[Ford Madox Hueffer]] and [[D. H. Lawrence]]. It has been argued that this gathering, dated to 1909, must be a conflation of events, since chronology makes it implausible that Davidson and Lawrence were both there.<ref>Kim Herzinger, ''The Night Pound ate the Tulips: An Evening at the Ernest Rhys's'', Journal of Modern Literature Vol. 8, No. 1 (1980), pp. 153–155. Published by: Indiana University Press. {{jstor|3831316}}</ref> That year, Rhys and [[Ernest Radford]] were 1890s figures invited to the founding meeting of the poets' club set up by [[F. S. Flint]] and [[T. E. Hulme]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Pondrom |first1=Cyrena N. |title=The Road from Paris: French Influence on English Poetry 1900-1920 |date=1974 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=9780521086813 |pages=9-10 |url=https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=lEq-geDlukgC&pg=PA9 |language=en}}</ref>

Revision as of 11:45, 14 April 2019

Ernest Percival Rhys (/riːs/; 17 July 1859 – 25 May 1946) was a Welsh-English writer, best known for his role as founding editor of the Everyman's Library series of affordable classics. He wrote essays, stories, poetry, novels and plays.[1]

Life

Rhys was born in Islington in north London, the son of John Rhys, then in the retail book trade and later a wine merchant, and his wife Emma Percival of Hockerill. He was brought up in Carmarthen and Newcastle-upon-Tyne.[2] He worked in the Durham coalfield, as a mining engineer.[3][4] At this period he lived in a pit village, where he set up a library and a programme of lectures. He wrote about the miners' life in his story collection Black Horse Pit (1925).[3]

Turning to writing in London as a profession from 1886, Rhys built up a steady reputation as a reviewer for periodicals.[2] He was employed by the Walter Scott Publishing Co. doing editorial work on its Camelot Series, of reprints and translations. Rhys later wrote that the approach was based on the mistaken idea that he was the academic John Rhys.[4] He had in fact already worked for the company, editing the works for George Herbert for its Canterbury Poets series.[5] On his own account, he owed that commission, and his interest in poetry, to Joseph Skipsey, whom he knew in Newcastle in the early 1880s.[6]

In 1890, Rhys was sharing rooms in Hampstead with Arthur Symons.[7] He married his wife Grace in 1891.[2]

In 1906, Rhys persuaded J. M. Dent the publisher to start out on the ambitious Everyman's Library project. When Rhys died in 1946, 983 Everyman titles had been produced.[2]

Associations

Rhys had connections to the Fabian Society, and the Socialist League led by William Morris, though he did not join the League.[8] In 1887 Rhys met W. B. Yeats at a Sunday gathering called by Morris; he later introduced Yeats to the duo Michael Field.[9]

Rhys was one of a number of British socialists who visited Walt Whitman;[10] it followed a postal introduction in 1885 by William Michael Rossetti.[11] The American journey on which this meeting occurred, is described in Everyman Remembers, Rhys's autobiography, was also the occasion of his encounter with Edmund Clarence Stedman in New York, and dates to 1888. They became correspondents.[12][13]

In February 1890 Rhys was a founder member of the Rhymers' Club in London.[2] In June of that year he met the poet John Davidson at a Sunday gathering in Hampstead held by William Sharp. Davidson became a recruit to the Rhymers' Club.[14] In its early form, the Club was for "Celtic" poets.[15] That restriction changed in January 1891, with a meeting at the base of the Century Guild of Artists in Fitzroy Street.[14] Rhys also attended Yeats's evenings in the Woburn Buildings, St. Pancras, meeting there Maud Gonne and the young Rupert Brooke.[16]

Chapter XIX of Everyman Remembers describes an occasion at Rhys's home attended by Yeats, Davidson, Ezra Pound, Ford Madox Hueffer and D. H. Lawrence. It has been argued that this gathering, dated to 1909, must be a conflation of events, since chronology makes it implausible that Davidson and Lawrence were both there.[17] That year, Rhys and Ernest Radford were 1890s figures invited to the founding meeting of the poets' club set up by F. S. Flint and T. E. Hulme.[18]

Works

  • The Great Cockney Tragedy (1891)
  • A London Rose: and other rhymes (1894) poems
  • The Fiddler of Carne (1896) Prose
  • Welsh Ballads (1898) poems
  • Gwenevere: Lyric Play (1905)
  • Lays of the Round Table (1905) poems
  • The Masque of the Grail (1908)
  • Enid: a lyric play written for music (1908)
  • London: The Story of the City (1909)
  • Lyric Poetry (1913) criticism
  • English Fairy Tales (1913) with Grace Little Rhys
  • The Leaf-Burners (1918) poems
  • The Growth of Political Liberty (1921)
  • Lost in France (1924) poems
  • Blackhorse Pit (1925) novel
  • Everyman Remembers (1931) autobiography
  • Rhymes for Everyman (1933) poems
  • Letters from Limbo (1936)
  • Song of the Sun (1937) poems

As editor

  • with John Gwenogvryn Evans, The Text of the Bruts from the Red Book of Hergest (1890) editors
  • Fairy Gold: A book of Old English Fairy Tales (1906) editor
  • The New Golden Treasury of Songs and Lyrics (1914) editor
  • The Haunters and the Haunted: Ghost Stories and Tales of the Supernatural (1921) editor
  • Volume 8 of Library of World’s Best Literature Ancient and Modern, Thirty Volumes, edited by Charles Dudley Warner, R. S. Peale and J. A. Hill, publishers, 1897, contains a rather long section (47 pages, pp. 3403–3450), devoted comprehensively to Celtic literature, written by William Sharp and Rhys.

References

  1. ^ "RHYS, Ernest". The International Who's Who in the World. 1912. p. 893.
  2. ^ a b c d e Chubbuck, Katharine. "Rhys, Ernest Percival". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/35733. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  3. ^ a b Thomas, M. Wynn (2009). Transatlantic Connections: Whitman U.S., Whitman U.K. University of Iowa Press. p. 232. ISBN 9781587295997.
  4. ^ a b Williams, Daniel G. (2005). Ethnicity and Cultural Authority: From Arnold to Du Bois. Edinburgh University Press. p. 160. ISBN 9780748626274.
  5. ^ Halloran, William F. (2018). The Life and Letters of William Sharp and "Fiona Macleod". Volume 1: 1855-1894. Open Book Publishers. p. 92. ISBN 9781783745036.
  6. ^ James, Henry (2013). The Aspern Papers and Other Stories. OUP Oxford. p. xxi. ISBN 9780191637919.
  7. ^ Sloan, John (1995). John Davidson, First of the Moderns: A Literary Biography. Clarendon Press. p. 62. ISBN 9780198182481.
  8. ^ DeSpain, Jessica (2016). Nineteenth-Century Transatlantic Reprinting and the Embodied Book. Routledge. p. 155. ISBN 9781317087250.
  9. ^ Foster, Robert Fitzroy (1998). W. B. Yeats: A Life. Oxford University Press. p. 63. ISBN 9780192880857.
  10. ^ Harris, Kirsten (2016). Walt Whitman and British Socialism: "The Love of Comrades". Routledge. p. 13. ISBN 9781317634805.
  11. ^ DeSpain, Jessica (2016). Nineteenth-Century Transatlantic Reprinting and the Embodied Book. Routledge. p. 157 note 37. ISBN 9781317087250.
  12. ^ Nelson, James G. (1971). The Early Nineties: A View from the Bodley Head. Harvard University Press. p. 158.
  13. ^ Sealts, Merton M.; Jr, Professor Merton M. Sealts (1982). Pursuing Melville, 1940-1980: Chapters and Essays. Univ of Wisconsin Press. p. 198. ISBN 9780299088705.
  14. ^ a b Sloan, John (1995). John Davidson, First of the Moderns: A Literary Biography. Clarendon Press. pp. 58–9. ISBN 9780198182481.
  15. ^ Gardner, Joann (1989). Yeats and the Rhymers' Club: A Nineties' Perspective. P. Lang. p. 9. ISBN 9780820407692.
  16. ^ Mikhail, E. H. (1977). W- B- Yeats: Interviews and Recollections. Macmillan International Higher Education. p. 38. ISBN 9781349029921.
  17. ^ Kim Herzinger, The Night Pound ate the Tulips: An Evening at the Ernest Rhys's, Journal of Modern Literature Vol. 8, No. 1 (1980), pp. 153–155. Published by: Indiana University Press. JSTOR 3831316
  18. ^ Pondrom, Cyrena N. (1974). The Road from Paris: French Influence on English Poetry 1900-1920. Cambridge University Press. pp. 9–10. ISBN 9780521086813.


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