Mary Colum

June 13, 1884 (age 73)

Collooney, County Sligo, Ireland

She was active with Thomas MacDonagh and others in national and cultural causes. She co-founded The Irish Review (1911-1914) with David Houston, Thomas MacDonagh et al. She was encouraged by Yeats to specialise in French literary criticism and to translate Paul Claudel. In middle age she was encouraged to return to writing, and became established as a literary generalist in American journals, including Poetry, Scribner"s, The Nation, The New Republic, Freeman, the New York Times Review of Books, The Saturday Review of Books, and The Tribune. She associated with James Joyce in Paris, and discouraged him from duping enquirers about the origins of the interior monologue in the example of Edouard Dujardin. She accepted Joyce"s very ill daughter Lucia for a week in their Paris flat at the height of her "hebephrenic" attack, while herself preparing for an operation in May 1932. She served as the literary editor of The Forum magazine from 1933-1941, commenced teaching comparative literature with Padraic at Columbia University in 1941. She rebutted Oliver Saint John Gogarty"s intemperate remarks about Joyce in the Saturday Review of Literature in 1941. She was the author of several books, including the autobiographical Life and the Dream, and From These Roots, a collection of her criticism.

Mary Colum

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editor literary critic author

Background

Mary Gunning Maguire was born in Collooney, County Sligo, daughter of Charles Maguire and Catherine Gunning. Her mother died in 1895, leaving her to be reared by her grandmother Catherine in Ballisodare, County Sligo.

Education

She attended boarding school in Saint Louis" Convent, Monaghan. She regularly attended the Abbey Theatre and was a frequent visitor amongst the salons, readings and debates there.

Career

She was active with Thomas MacDonagh and others in national and cultural causes. She co-founded The Irish Review (1911-1914) with David Houston, Thomas MacDonagh et al. She was encouraged by Yeats to specialise in French literary criticism and to translate Paul Claudel.

In middle age she was encouraged to return to writing, and became established as a literary generalist in American journals, including Poetry, Scribner"s, The Nation, The New Republic, Freeman, the New York Times Review of Books, The Saturday Review of Books, and The Tribune.

She associated with James Joyce in Paris, and discouraged him from duping enquirers about the origins of the interior monologue in the example of Edouard Dujardin. She accepted Joyce"s very ill daughter Lucia for a week in their Paris flat at the height of her "hebephrenic" attack, while herself preparing for an operation in May 1932.

She served as the literary editor of The Forum magazine from 1933-1941, commenced teaching comparative literature with Padraic at Columbia University in 1941. She rebutted Oliver Saint John Gogarty"s intemperate remarks about Joyce in the Saturday Review of Literature in 1941.

She was the author of several books, including the autobiographical Life and the Dream, and From These Roots, a collection of her criticism.

Achievements

Educated at Royal University, Trinity she was founder of the Twilight Literary Society which led her to meet W. B. Yeats.

Works

From These Roots: The Ideas That Have Made Modern Literature From These Roots: The Ideas That Have Made Modern Literature

book

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companion:: Louise Gavan Duffy

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book

From These Roots: The Ideas That Have Made Modern Literature

From These Roots: The Ideas That Have Made Modern Literature

Mary Colum

Background

Education

Career

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Works

book

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Awards

Guggenheim Fellowship