Allen Upward was a British educator, lawyer, politician, author, and poet. He published more than twenty books.
Background
Allen Upward was born on September 20, 1863 in Worcester, England, United Kingdom. He was a son of George and Mary Upward. His father was a British Judge of Probate. Allen had a sister, Edith Upward. His parents moved often, so Upward was raised in Plymouth, Camberwell, London, and finally Dublin.
Education
In 1882 Allen Upward began to attend the Royal University of Ireland (now University College Dublin).
Career
In 1887 Allen Upward was called to the bar and began the legal work that would absorb him for much of his life. Just one year after becoming a barrister, Upward published his only book of poems, Songs in Ziklag (1888). The poems did not sell well. During the 1890s, Upward worked in Cardiff, speaking out about Welsh nationalism as he wrote for the South Wales Echo under the alias Ebenezer Lobb. Upward did win some recognition for his mystery and romance novels, but he rejected that approval, counting those works as unworthy. He apparently wrote quickly and prolifically: he published five books in the year 1900 alone, and between 1900 and 1910 he published twenty books.
After serving as a deputy county court judge in Torquay (circa 1899 to 1901), Upward spent two years in Nigeria setting up legal and administrative policies. Once he returned to London, he again began to pursue the chimera of literary recognition, finally opening his own publishing house for the express purpose of winning the Nobel prize. Upward was working on his book, The New Word (1908), which addresses the question of the meaning of the word idealist. In it, Upward delves into anthropology and etymology. He published this book at his own expense and in it tried to make a case for himself as Nobel’s natural legatee. But at this time he was also producing books that were most definitely not of an idealist tendency - more popular novels such as High Treason (1903), several spy novels, Lord Alistair's Rebellion (1909), along with numerous articles and short stories.
Lord Alistair's Rebellion, one of Upward’s popular books, tells the story of a rebel lord, a genius who goes unrecognized by the world. He tries to set up a little camp for geniuses, but he finally is sacrificed to the savage instincts of the masses. In some of Upward’s books, this sense of mankind’s generally despicable character supports his pet theme - how genius is always ignored. Again, however, Upward’s ideals contradict themselves: a man who worked throughout his life to aid the masses, Upward also held some contempt for them.
Upward’s high ideals and confused purposes in life made him a natural friend for Ezra Pound, who encouraged Upward to publish in the avant-garde journals Poetry and The Egoist. Upward continued to pursue his high aims, but his efforts were continually denied; meanwhile, his mysteries achieved a measure of success. Reviewers found his final mystery novels charming, particularly in the case of The Club of Masks (1926) and The Venetian Key (1927). Upward committed suicide on November 12, 1926 at the age of sixty-three, reportedly after hearing of George Bernard Shaw's Nobel Prize award, according to his friend Ezra Pound.
Religion
Allen Upward was brought up as a member of the Plymouth Brethren.
Politics
Allen Upward ran for election as a Libiral-Labour candidate, taking 659 votes in Merthyr at the 1895 general election.