Edward Dowden

Edward Dowden (3 May 1843 - 4 April 1913), was an Irish poet, academic, and literary critic.

Edward Dowden (1843-1913), circa 1874, from Fragments from Old Letters, 1914. Courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Life

Youth and education

Dowden was born 3 May 1843, 2nd son of Alicia (Bennett) and John Wheeler Dowden; his elder brother was John Dowden, who became bishop of Edinburgh in 1886..

Edward was educated privately for the most part, though he attended classes in Latin and Greek at Queen's College Cork for a year before entering Trinity College, Dublin (TCD).

At TCD, he studied under the tutelage of George Salmon. He won prizes for English verse and prose writing. In 1863 he earned a B.A. in logics and ethics, placing 1st in the list.

Career

Despite completing his studies at the divinity school, Dowden did not take holy orders; his initial ambition was to pursue the life of a poet, but he taught English for a year in Alexandra College, Dublin, 1866-1867.

He married on 23 October 1866 Mary (died 1892), daughter of David Clerke of Skibbereen (possibly a relative of Agnes Clerke and Ellen Clerke). She was 7 years Dowden's senior, and the marriage, originally opposed and delayed by Dowden's parents, turned out to be not particularly happy; they had a son and 2 daughters, as well as a son who died young. The family lived at Rockdale, Orwell Road, Rathgar, Dublin. A daughter, Hester Meredith Dowden (1868–1949), born 3 May 1868 (the same birthday as her father), became a famous spiritualist medium of the 20th century.

Early in 1867 he was appointed to the newly created chair of English literature at TCD (1867–1913). He quickly established a reputation as an internationally respected and authoritative literary critic with the publication of Shakespeare, his mind and art (1875). This was followed by a collection of his own poems (1876), Shakspere (1877), Studies in literature (1878), Transcripts and studies (1888), New studies in literature (1895), and Essays modern and Elizabethan (1910).

Such was his reputation that in 1884 Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore offered to create a chair for him, but he declined this offer, preferring to stay at TCD. He established his name as an international authority on Percy Bysshe Shelley with his Life of Shelley (1886). He also wrote short biographies of Robert Southey (1880), Robert Browning (1904), and Michel de Montaigne (1905), as well as editing and introducing many editions of Shakespeare's plays.

Dowden developed a deep hostility to Irish nationalism, and perhaps as a consequence was unable to view the Irish literary revival as anything other than repugnantly provincial and opposed to the European and English cultural traditions which he had admired all his life. Not surprisingly, despite a long-standing family friendship, he became for the young W.B. Yeats the apotheosis of the narrow-minded, respectable unionist who chose to be blind to Ireland's Celtic heritage. Dowden lived long enough to see his former protégé attempt in 1909–1910 to succeed him in the chair of poetry at TCD, and undoubtedly enjoyed the opportunity to take some sly revenge in an ironical warning, telling his old friend, Yeats's father, that the job with its burden of teaching would indeed crush poetic impulses, and pointing out that the younger man might not have quite the required scholarship.

A founding and leading member of the Irish Loyal and Patriotic Union, Dowden was subsequently president and vice-chairman of the Irish Unionist Alliance. Such was his enthusiasm for the unionist cause that he undertook numerous public-speaking engagements and committed himself to membership of a number of unionist committees and groups.

He was president of the English Goethe Society (1888–1911), Taylorian lecturer at Oxford, Clark lecturer in English literature (1893–1896) at Trinity College, Cambridge, and a visiting lecturer (1896) at Princeton. He was a commissioner of national education, Ireland (1896–1901).

He married in December 1895 Elizabeth Dickinson, daughter of John West, dean of St Patrick's cathedral. Dowden had kept in touch with her throughout his earlier marriage, ever since she had been his student in Alexandra College in 1866, and love letters and poems addressed to her were published posthumously.

He edited the Correspondence of Sir Henry Taylor (1888); Southey's Correspondence with Caroline Bowles (1881), and the Select Poems of Southey (1895); Wordsworth's Poetical Works (1892), and Wordsworth and Coleridge's Lyrical Ballads (1890). In 1900 he edited an edition of Shelley's complete works.

Dowden died 4 April 1913 in Dublin, having suffered insomnia and failing health for some years. His estate was valued at £7,591.

Writing

Criticism

Dowden's earliest book, Shakespeare: His mind and art (1875), resulted from a revision of a course of lectures, and made him widely known as a critic: translations appeared in German and Russian. His Shakespeare Primer (1877) was translated into Italian and German.

Later works by Dowden on Shakespeare included: Shakespeare's Sonnets (1881), Passionate Pilgrim (1883), Introduction to Shakespeare (1893), Hamlet (1899), Romeo and Juliet (1900), Cymbeline (1903), and his article (in the National Review, July 1902) on "Shakespeare as a Man of Science", criticizing T.E. Webb's Mystery of William Shakespeare.

His critical essays Studies in Literature (1878), Transcripts and Studies (1888), and New Studies in Literature (1895) showed a profound knowledge of the currents and tendencies of thought in various ages and countries; but his Life of Shelley (1886) made him best known to the public at large.

Other books by him which indicate his interests in literature include: Robert Southey (in the "English Men of Letters" series, 1880), his French Revolution and English Literature (1897; lectures given at Princeton University in 1896), History of French Literature (1897), Puritan and Anglican (1900), Robert Browning (1904) and Michel de Montaigne (1905).

Dowden's wide interests and scholarly methods made his influence on criticism both sound and stimulating. His critical approach was psychological and involved the analyzing of authors rather than texts. He saw literary criticism in moral terms, and his treatment elevated morality and ethics above aesthetics. His ideals are well described in his essay on The Interpretation of Literature in his Transcripts and Studies.

Poetry

Dowden's Poems (1876) went into a 2nd edition.

Recognition

Dowden was awarded the Cunningham gold medal by the Royal Irish Academy in 1878.

He was a member of the academic committee of the Royal Society of Literature.

He received honorary degrees from Oxford, Edinburgh, and Princeton universities.

In popular culture

Dowden's biographical/critical concepts, particularly in connection with Shakespeare, are played with by Stephen Dedalus in the library chapter of James Joyce's Ulysses. Leslie Fiedler was to play with them again in The Stranger in Shakespeare.

Publications

Poetry

• Poems. London: Henry S. King, 1876.
• A Woman's Reliquary. Churchtown, Dundrum: Cuala Press, 1913.
• Poems (edited by Elizabeth Dickinson West Dowden). London, Toronto: J.M. Dent, 1914.

Non-fiction

• Shakspere: A critical study of his mind and art. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1875.
  • reissued by Cambridge University Press, 2009. ISBN 978-1-108-00076-5
• Studies in Literature: 1789-1877. London: C.K. Paul, 1878.
• Southey. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1880.
• Introduction to Shakespeare. London: Blackie & Son, 1893; New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1895.
• A History of French Literature. New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1897.
• Puritan and Anglican: studies in literature. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner, 1900.
• New Studies in Literature. London, K. Paul, Trench, Trübner, 1902.
• Robert Browning. London: Dent / New York: E.P. Dutton & Co., 1904.
• Michel de Montaigne. Philadelphia, London: J.B. Lippincott, 1905.
• Essays Modern and Elizabethan. London: J.M. Dent, 1910.

Edited

• Percy Bysshe Shelley, Poetical Works. New York, Boston: T.Y. Crowell & Co., 1893.
• William Shakespeare, Cymbeline. London: Methuen, 1903.

Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.

See also

Leonardo's Mona Lisa by Edward Dowden

• List of Irish poets
• List of literary critics

References

•  Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). "Dowden, Edward". Encyclopædia Britannica. 8 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 456. . Wikisource, Web, Jul. 30, 2022.
• Lunney, Linde & Dempsey, Pauric J. "Dowden, Edward," Dictionary of Irish Biography, October 2009. Web, Jul. 30, 2022.
• William M. Murphy. "Prodigal Father: The life of John Butler Yeats, 1839-1922". Ithaca, NY, & London: Cornell University Press, 1978; paperback edition, 1979; revised paperback edition, Syracuse University Press, 2001.)
• William M. Murphy, "Yeats, Quinn, and Edward Dowden," in John Quinn: Selected Irish writers from his library (edited by Janis & Richard Londraville). Locust Hill Press, 2001.

External links

Poems

• "Jubilate"
• 2 poems by Dowden: "In July," "In September"
• Dowden in A Victorian Anthology, 1837-1895: "Renuncints," "Leonardo's 'Monna Lisa'," "Two Infinities"
• Dowden in the Oxford Book of English Mystical Verse: "Awakening," "By the Window," "Communion," "New Hymn for Solitude," "The Secret of the Universe," "The Initiation," "Love's Lord"
• Edward Dowden at PoemHunter (23 poems)
• Edward Dowden at AllPoetry (23 poems)

Books

• Works by Edward Dowden at Project Gutenberg
• Edward Dowden at Amazon.com

About

• Dowden, Edward in the Dictionary of National Biography
• In Defense of Harriet Shelley - comments on Dowden's Life of Shelley by Mark Twain

This article incorporates text from the Dictionary of Irish Biography, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 4.0 International license. Original article is at: Dowden, Edward
 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, the 1911 Edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica. Original article is at Dowden, Edward