Robert Graves
Overview
Robert von Ranke Graves (also known as Robert Ranke Graves and most commonly Robert Graves) 24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985 was an English poet, translator and novelist. During his long life he produced more than 140 works. Graves' poems—together with his translations and innovative interpretations of the Greek myths
, his memoir of his early life, including his role in the First World War
, Goodbye to All That
, and his historical study of poetic inspiration, The White Goddess
—have never been out of print.
He earned his living from writing, particularly popular historical novels such as I, Claudius
, King Jesus
, The Golden Fleece, and Count Belisarius
.
Greek mythology
Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...
, his memoir of his early life, including his role in the First World War
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, Goodbye to All That
Goodbye to All That
Good-Bye to All That, an autobiography by Robert Graves, first appeared in 1929, when the author was thirty-four. "It was my bitter leave-taking of England," he wrote in a prologue to the revised second edition of 1957, "where I had recently broken a good many conventions"...
, and his historical study of poetic inspiration, The White Goddess
The White Goddess
The White Goddess: a Historical Grammar of Poetic Myth is a book-length essay on the nature of poetic myth-making by author and poet Robert Graves. First published in 1948, based on earlier articles published in Wales magazine, corrected, revised and enlarged editions appeared in 1948, 1952 and 1961...
—have never been out of print.
He earned his living from writing, particularly popular historical novels such as I, Claudius
I, Claudius
I, Claudius is a novel by English writer Robert Graves, written in the form of an autobiography of the Roman Emperor Claudius. As such, it includes history of the Julio-Claudian Dynasty and Roman Empire, from Julius Caesar's assassination in 44 BC to Caligula's assassination in AD 41...
, King Jesus
King Jesus
King Jesus is a semi-historical novel by Robert Graves, first published in 1946. The novel treats Jesus not as the son of God, but rather as a philosopher with a legitimate claim to the Judaean throne through Herod the Great, as well as the Davidic monarchy; and treats numerous Biblical stories in...
, The Golden Fleece, and Count Belisarius
Count Belisarius
Count Belisarius is a historical novel by Robert Graves, first published in 1938, recounting the life of the Byzantine general Belisarius ....
.
Unanswered Questions
Quotations
To be a poet is a condition rather than a profession.
Reply to questionnaire, “The Cost of Letters,” Horizon (London), September 1946.
I believe that every English poet should read the English classics, master the rules of grammar before he attempts to bend or break them, travel abroad, experience the horror of sordid passion and — if he is lucky enough — know the love of an honest woman.
Lecture at Oxford as quoted in Time (15 December 1961)
Anthropologists are a connecting link between poets and scientists; though their field-work among primitive peoples has often made them forget the language of science.
"Mammon" an address at the London School of Economics (6 December 1963); published in Mammon and the Black Goddess (1965)
The remarkable thing about Shakespeare is that he is really very good — in spite of all the people who say he is very good.
Quoted in The Observer [London] (6 December 1964)
A perfect poem is impossible. Once it had been written, the world would end.
The Paris Review, "Writers at Work: 4th series," interview with Peter Buckman and William Fifield (1969)
Trench stinks of shallow buried deadWhere Tom stands at the periscope,Tired out. After nine months he’s shedAll fear, all faith, all hate, all hope.
"Through the Periscope" (1915) [first published in 1988]
Christ of His gentlenessThirsting and hungering,Walked in the wilderness;Soft words of grace He spokeUnto lost desert-folkThat listened wondering.
"In the Wilderness," lines 1-6, from Over the Brazier (1916), Part I: Poems Written Mostly at Charterhouse 1910-1914
His eyes are quickened so with grief,He can watch a grass or leafEvery instant grow; he canClearly through a flint wall see,Or watch the startled spirit fleeFrom the throat of a dead man.
"Lost Love," lines 1-6, from Treasure Box (1919)
Encyclopedia
Robert von Ranke Graves (also known as Robert Ranke Graves and most commonly Robert Graves) 24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985 was an English poet, translator and novelist. During his long life he produced more than 140 works. Graves' poems—together with his translations and innovative interpretations of the Greek myths
, his memoir of his early life, including his role in the First World War
, Goodbye to All That
, and his historical study of poetic inspiration, The White Goddess
—have never been out of print.
He earned his living from writing, particularly popular historical novels such as I, Claudius
, King Jesus
, The Golden Fleece, and Count Belisarius
. He also was a prominent translator of Classical
Latin and Ancient Greek texts; his versions of The Twelve Caesars and The Golden Ass
remain popular today for their clarity and entertaining style. Graves was awarded the 1934 James Tait Black Memorial Prize
for both I, Claudius and Claudius the God.
(1846–1931), a school inspector, Gaelic
scholar, and the author of the popular song 'Father O'Flynn'; and his second wife, Amalie von Ranke (1857–1951). Graves's mother was from a recently-ennobled German family, the eldest daughter of Heinrich Ranke, professor of medicine at the University of Munich, and his wife, Luise. She was also a great-niece of the German historian Leopold von Ranke
. At the age of seven, double-pneumonia following measles
almost took Graves's life, the first of three occasions when he was given up by his doctors with afflictions of the lungs; the second being a war-wound (see below); the third when he contracted Spanish influenza in late 1918 immediately before demobilisation
. At school, Graves was enrolled as Robert von Ranke Graves and in Germany his books are published under that name, but before and during the war the name caused him difficulties. In August 1916 an officer who disliked him spread the rumour that he was a spy, brother to a captured German spy who had coincidentally taken the name Carl Graves. The problem resurfaced in a minor way in the Second World War, when a suspicious rural policeman blocked his appointment to the Special Constabulary
. Graves' eldest half-brother Philip Perceval Graves
achieved note as a journalist. and his younger brother Charles Patrick Graves
was a writer and journalist.
in Wimbledon
, Penrallt in Wales, and Copthorne
in West Sussex
, from which last in 1909 he won a scholarship
to Charterhouse
. There, in response to persecution—due to the German element in his name, his outspokenness, his scholarly and moral seriousness, and poverty relative to the other boys—he feigned madness, began to write poetry, and took up boxing, in due course becoming school champion at both welter-
and middleweight
. He also sang in the choir, meeting there an aristocratic boy three years younger, G. H. 'Peter' Johnstone, with whom he began an intense romantic friendship, the scandal of which led ultimately to an interview with the headmaster. Among the masters his chief influence was George Mallory
, who introduced him to contemporary literature and took him mountaineering in vacations. In his final year at Charterhouse he won a classical
exhibition
to St John's College, Oxford
, but would not take his place there until after the war.
. He published his first volume of poems, Over the Brazier, in 1916. He developed an early reputation as a war poet and was one of the first to write realistic poems about experience of front-line conflict. In later years, he omitted his war poems from his collections, on the grounds that they were too obviously "part of the war poetry boom". At the Battle of the Somme
, he was so badly wounded by a shell-fragment through the lung that he was expected to die and, indeed, was officially reported as having died of wounds. He gradually recovered, however; and, apart from a brief spell back in France, he spent the remainder of the war in England.
One of Graves's close friends at this time was the poet Siegfried Sassoon
, also an officer in the RWF. In 1917, Sassoon rebelled against the war by making a public anti-war statement. Graves feared Sassoon could face court martial and intervened with the military authorities, persuading them that Sassoon was suffering from shell shock
and that they should treat him accordingly. As a result Sassoon was sent to Craiglockhart
, a military hospital near Edinburgh, where he was treated by Dr. W. H. R. Rivers
and met fellow patient Wilfred Owen
. Graves also suffered from shell shock, or neurasthenia
as it was officially called, although he was never hospitalised for it:
The friendship between Graves and Sassoon is documented in Graves's letters and biographies, and the story is fictionalised in Pat Barker
's novel Regeneration
. The intensity of their early relationship is demonstrated in Graves's collection Fairies and Fusiliers (1917), which contains many poems celebrating their friendship. Sassoon himself remarked upon a "heavy sexual element" within it, an observation supported by the sentimental nature of much of the surviving correspondence between the two men. Through Sassoon, Graves became a friend of Wilfred Owen, "who often used to send me poems from France." Owen attended Graves's wedding to Nancy Nicholson
in January 1918, presenting him, as Graves recalled, with "a set of twelve Apostle spoon
s, the thirteenth, he joked, had been shot for cowardice". Graves's army career ended dramatically with an incident which could have led to a charge of desertion
. Having been posted to Limerick
in late 1918, he "woke up with a sudden chill, which I recognized as the first symptoms of Spanish influenza." "I decided to make a run for it," he wrote, "I should at least have my influenza in an English, and not an Irish, hospital." Arriving at Waterloo with a high fever but without the official papers that would secure his release from the army, he chanced to share a taxi with a demobilisation officer also returning from Ireland, who completed his papers for him with the necessary secret codes.
Language and Literature, though managing to retain his Classics exhibition. In consideration of his health he was permitted to live a little outside Oxford, on Boars Hill
, where the residents included Robert Bridges
, John Masefield
his landlord, Edmund Blunden
, Gilbert Murray
, and Robert Nichols. Later the family moved to Worlds End Cottage on Collice Street, Islip, Oxfordshire
. His most notable Oxford companion was T.E. Lawrence, then a Fellow
of All Souls
, with whom he discussed contemporary poetry and shared in the planning of elaborate pranks. He later attempted to make a living by running a small shop, but the business soon failed. In 1926 he took up a post at Cairo University
, accompanied by his wife, their children, and the poet Laura Riding
. He returned to London briefly, where he split up with his wife under highly emotional circumstances (at one point Riding attempted suicide) before leaving to live with Riding in Deià
, Majorca. There they continued to publish letterpress books under the rubric of the Seizin Press
, founded and edited the literary journal, Epilogue; they also wrote two successful academic books together: A Survey of Modernist Poetry (1927) and A Pamphlet Against Anthologies (1928); both had great influence on modern literary criticism, particularly new criticism
.
. Good-bye to All That (1929, revised by him and republished in 1957) proved a success but cost him many of his friends, notably Siegfried Sassoon
. In 1934 he published his most commercially successful work, I, Claudius
. Using classical sources he constructed a complex and compelling tale of the life of the Roman emperor Claudius
, a tale extended in the sequel Claudius the God (1935). Another historical novel by Graves, Count Belisarius
(1938), recounts the career of the Byzantine
general Belisarius
.
Graves and Riding left Majorca in 1936 at the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War
, and in 1939, they moved to the United States, taking lodging in New Hope, Pennsylvania
. Their volatile relationship was described by Robert's nephew Richard Perceval Graves
in Robert Graves: 1927–1940: the Years with Laura, and T.S. Matthews's Jacks or Better (1977). It was also the basis for Miranda Seymour
's novel The Summer of '39 (1998).
After returning to England, Graves began a relationship with Beryl Hodge, then the wife of Alan Hodge, his collaborator on The Long Week-End
(1941) and The Reader Over Your Shoulder (1943; republished in 1947 as The Use and Abuse of the English Language). In 1946 he and his new wife Beryl re-established a home in Deià
, Majorca. The house is now a museum. 1946 also saw the publication of the historical novel, King Jesus
. He published The White Goddess
in 1948. He turned to science fiction with Seven Days in New Crete
(1949), and in 1953 he published The Nazarene Gospel Restored with Joshua Podro.
In 1955, he published The Greek Myths
, containing translations and interpretations. His translations are well respected and continue to dominate the English-language market for mythography
. Many of his unconventional interpretations and etymologies are dismissed by classicists, but have provoked more research into the topics he raised. Graves in turn dismissed the reactions of classical scholars, arguing that they are too specialized and "prose-minded" to interpret "ancient poetic meaning", and that "the few independent thinkers...[are]...the poets, who try to keep civilization alive."
He published a volume of short stories, Catacrok! Mostly Stories, Mostly Funny, in 1956. In 1961 he became Professor of Poetry at Oxford, a post he held until 1966.
In 1967, Robert Graves published, together with Omar Ali-Shah
, a new translation of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
. The translation quickly became controversial; Graves was attacked for trying to break the spell of famed passages in Edward FitzGerald
's Victorian translation, and L. P. Elwell-Sutton, an orientalist at Edinburgh University, maintained that the manuscript used by Ali-Shah and Graves—which Ali-Shah and his brother Idries Shah
claimed had been in their family for 800 years—was a forgery. The translation was a critical disaster, and Graves' reputation suffered severely due to what the public perceived as his gullibility in falling for the Shah brothers' deception.
From the 1960s until his death, Robert Graves frequently exchanged letters with Spike Milligan
. Many of their letters to each other are collected in the book, Dear Robert, Dear Spike.
On 11 November 1985, Graves was among 16 Great War poets commemorated on a slate stone unveiled in Westminster Abbey's Poet's Corner. The inscription on the stone was written by friend and fellow Great War poet Wilfred Owen
. It reads: "My subject is War, and the pity of War. The Poetry is in the pity." Of the 16 poets, Graves was the only one still living at the time of the commemoration ceremony.
, on the site of a shrine which had once been sacred to The White Goddess
of Pelion. His second wife Beryl Graves was buried with him on her own death on 27 October 2003.
), David (who was killed in the Second World War), Catherine (who married nuclear scientist Clifford Dalton
), and Sam. With his second wife, Beryl Graves (1915–2003), he had William, Lucia
(also a translator), Juan and Tomás
(a writer and musician).
Greek mythology
Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...
, his memoir of his early life, including his role in the First World War
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, Goodbye to All That
Goodbye to All That
Good-Bye to All That, an autobiography by Robert Graves, first appeared in 1929, when the author was thirty-four. "It was my bitter leave-taking of England," he wrote in a prologue to the revised second edition of 1957, "where I had recently broken a good many conventions"...
, and his historical study of poetic inspiration, The White Goddess
The White Goddess
The White Goddess: a Historical Grammar of Poetic Myth is a book-length essay on the nature of poetic myth-making by author and poet Robert Graves. First published in 1948, based on earlier articles published in Wales magazine, corrected, revised and enlarged editions appeared in 1948, 1952 and 1961...
—have never been out of print.
He earned his living from writing, particularly popular historical novels such as I, Claudius
I, Claudius
I, Claudius is a novel by English writer Robert Graves, written in the form of an autobiography of the Roman Emperor Claudius. As such, it includes history of the Julio-Claudian Dynasty and Roman Empire, from Julius Caesar's assassination in 44 BC to Caligula's assassination in AD 41...
, King Jesus
King Jesus
King Jesus is a semi-historical novel by Robert Graves, first published in 1946. The novel treats Jesus not as the son of God, but rather as a philosopher with a legitimate claim to the Judaean throne through Herod the Great, as well as the Davidic monarchy; and treats numerous Biblical stories in...
, The Golden Fleece, and Count Belisarius
Count Belisarius
Count Belisarius is a historical novel by Robert Graves, first published in 1938, recounting the life of the Byzantine general Belisarius ....
. He also was a prominent translator of Classical
Classical antiquity
Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, collectively known as the Greco-Roman world...
Latin and Ancient Greek texts; his versions of The Twelve Caesars and The Golden Ass
The Golden Ass
The Metamorphoses of Apuleius, which St. Augustine referred to as The Golden Ass , is the only Latin novel to survive in its entirety....
remain popular today for their clarity and entertaining style. Graves was awarded the 1934 James Tait Black Memorial Prize
James Tait Black Memorial Prize
Founded in 1919, the James Tait Black Memorial Prizes are among the oldest and most prestigious book prizes awarded for literature written in the English language and are Britain's oldest literary awards...
for both I, Claudius and Claudius the God.
Early life
Graves was born into a middle-class family in Wimbledon in south London. He was the third of five children born to Alfred Perceval GravesAlfred Perceval Graves
Alfred Perceval Graves , was an Anglo-Irish poet, songwriter, and school inspector . His first marriage to Jane Cooper, eldest daughter of James Cooper of Cooper Hill, Co. Limerick, resulted in five children: the journalist Philip Graves, Mary, Richard, Alfred, and Susan...
(1846–1931), a school inspector, Gaelic
Gaels
The Gaels or Goidels are speakers of one of the Goidelic Celtic languages: Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Manx. Goidelic speech originated in Ireland and subsequently spread to western and northern Scotland and the Isle of Man....
scholar, and the author of the popular song 'Father O'Flynn'; and his second wife, Amalie von Ranke (1857–1951). Graves's mother was from a recently-ennobled German family, the eldest daughter of Heinrich Ranke, professor of medicine at the University of Munich, and his wife, Luise. She was also a great-niece of the German historian Leopold von Ranke
Leopold von Ranke
Leopold von Ranke was a German historian, considered one of the founders of modern source-based history. Ranke set the standards for much of later historical writing, introducing such ideas as reliance on primary sources , an emphasis on narrative history and especially international politics .-...
. At the age of seven, double-pneumonia following measles
Measles
Measles, also known as rubeola or morbilli, is an infection of the respiratory system caused by a virus, specifically a paramyxovirus of the genus Morbillivirus. Morbilliviruses, like other paramyxoviruses, are enveloped, single-stranded, negative-sense RNA viruses...
almost took Graves's life, the first of three occasions when he was given up by his doctors with afflictions of the lungs; the second being a war-wound (see below); the third when he contracted Spanish influenza in late 1918 immediately before demobilisation
Demobilization
Demobilization is the process of standing down a nation's armed forces from combat-ready status. This may be as a result of victory in war, or because a crisis has been peacefully resolved and military force will not be necessary...
. At school, Graves was enrolled as Robert von Ranke Graves and in Germany his books are published under that name, but before and during the war the name caused him difficulties. In August 1916 an officer who disliked him spread the rumour that he was a spy, brother to a captured German spy who had coincidentally taken the name Carl Graves. The problem resurfaced in a minor way in the Second World War, when a suspicious rural policeman blocked his appointment to the Special Constabulary
Special Constabulary
The Special Constabulary is the part-time volunteer section of a statutory police force in the United Kingdom or some Crown dependencies. Its officers are known as Special Constables or informally as Specials.Every United Kingdom territorial police force has a special constabulary except the...
. Graves' eldest half-brother Philip Perceval Graves
Philip Graves
Philip Perceval Graves was an Irish journalist and writer. While working as a foreign correspondent of The Times in Constantinople, he exposed The Protocols of the Elders of Zion as an antisemitic plagiarism, fraud, and hoax.-Life:Graves, eldest son of the writer Alfred Perceval Graves , was born...
achieved note as a journalist. and his younger brother Charles Patrick Graves
Charles Patrick Graves
Charles Ranke Patrick Graves was a journalist and writer.Born in Wimbledon, England, he worked on the Sunday Express, Daily Mail and many other newspapers. He published 46 books in all including the Thin Blue Line or Adventures in the RAF. His hobbies were golf and gin rummy...
was a writer and journalist.
Education
Graves received his early education at a series of six preparatory schools, including King's College SchoolKing's College School
King's College School, commonly referred to as KCS, King's, or KCS Wimbledon, is an independent school for day pupils in Wimbledon in south-west London. The school was founded as the junior department of King's College London and occupied part of its premises in Strand, before relocating to...
in Wimbledon
Wimbledon, London
Wimbledon is a district in the south west area of London, England, located south of Wandsworth, and east of Kingston upon Thames. It is situated within Greater London. It is home to the Wimbledon Tennis Championships and New Wimbledon Theatre, and contains Wimbledon Common, one of the largest areas...
, Penrallt in Wales, and Copthorne
Copthorne Prep School
Copthorne Preparatory School is situated near Crawley in West Sussex, for pupils aged between 2 and 13. It consists of a nursery for infants from 2½. A junior department is for children under the age of eight . Older pupils work in the two prep school buildings, the 'New Block' which is the main...
in West Sussex
West Sussex
West Sussex is a county in the south of England, bordering onto East Sussex , Hampshire and Surrey. The county of Sussex has been divided into East and West since the 12th century, and obtained separate county councils in 1888, but it remained a single ceremonial county until 1974 and the coming...
, from which last in 1909 he won a scholarship
Scholarship
A scholarship is an award of financial aid for a student to further education. Scholarships are awarded on various criteria usually reflecting the values and purposes of the donor or founder of the award.-Types:...
to Charterhouse
Charterhouse School
Charterhouse School, originally The Hospital of King James and Thomas Sutton in Charterhouse, or more simply Charterhouse or House, is an English collegiate independent boarding school situated at Godalming in Surrey.Founded by Thomas Sutton in London in 1611 on the site of the old Carthusian...
. There, in response to persecution—due to the German element in his name, his outspokenness, his scholarly and moral seriousness, and poverty relative to the other boys—he feigned madness, began to write poetry, and took up boxing, in due course becoming school champion at both welter-
Welterweight
Welterweight is a weight class division in combat sports. Originally the term "welterweight" was used only in boxing, but other combat sports like kickboxing, taekwondo and mixed martial arts also began to use it for their own weight division system...
and middleweight
Middleweight
Middleweight is a division, or weight class, in boxing. Early boxing history is less than exact, but the middleweight designation seems to have begun in the 1840s. In the bare-knuckle era, the first middleweight championship fight was between Tom Chandler and Dooney Harris in 1897...
. He also sang in the choir, meeting there an aristocratic boy three years younger, G. H. 'Peter' Johnstone, with whom he began an intense romantic friendship, the scandal of which led ultimately to an interview with the headmaster. Among the masters his chief influence was George Mallory
George Mallory
George Herbert Leigh Mallory was an English mountaineer who took part in the first three British expeditions to Mount Everest in the early 1920s....
, who introduced him to contemporary literature and took him mountaineering in vacations. In his final year at Charterhouse he won a classical
Classics
Classics is the branch of the Humanities comprising the languages, literature, philosophy, history, art, archaeology and other culture of the ancient Mediterranean world ; especially Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome during Classical Antiquity Classics (sometimes encompassing Classical Studies or...
exhibition
Exhibition (scholarship)
-United Kingdom and Ireland:At the universities of Dublin, Oxford and Cambridge, and at Westminster School, Eton College and Winchester College, and various other UK educational establishments, an exhibition is a financial award or grant to an individual student, normally on grounds of merit. The...
to St John's College, Oxford
St John's College, Oxford
__FORCETOC__St John's College is a constituent college of the University of Oxford, one of the larger Oxford colleges with approximately 390 undergraduates, 200 postgraduates and over 100 academic staff. It was founded by Sir Thomas White, a merchant, in 1555, whose heart is buried in the chapel of...
, but would not take his place there until after the war.
First World War
At the outbreak of World War I in August 1914, Graves enlisted almost immediately, taking a commission in the Royal Welch Fusiliers (RWF)Royal Welch Fusiliers
The Royal Welch Fusiliers was an infantry regiment of the British Army, part of the Prince of Wales' Division. It was founded in 1689 to oppose James II and the imminent war with France...
. He published his first volume of poems, Over the Brazier, in 1916. He developed an early reputation as a war poet and was one of the first to write realistic poems about experience of front-line conflict. In later years, he omitted his war poems from his collections, on the grounds that they were too obviously "part of the war poetry boom". At the Battle of the Somme
Battle of the Somme (1916)
The Battle of the Somme , also known as the Somme Offensive, took place during the First World War between 1 July and 14 November 1916 in the Somme department of France, on both banks of the river of the same name...
, he was so badly wounded by a shell-fragment through the lung that he was expected to die and, indeed, was officially reported as having died of wounds. He gradually recovered, however; and, apart from a brief spell back in France, he spent the remainder of the war in England.
One of Graves's close friends at this time was the poet Siegfried Sassoon
Siegfried Sassoon
Siegfried Loraine Sassoon CBE MC was an English poet, author and soldier. Decorated for bravery on the Western Front, he became one of the leading poets of the First World War. His poetry both described the horrors of the trenches, and satirised the patriotic pretensions of those who, in Sassoon's...
, also an officer in the RWF. In 1917, Sassoon rebelled against the war by making a public anti-war statement. Graves feared Sassoon could face court martial and intervened with the military authorities, persuading them that Sassoon was suffering from shell shock
Shell Shock
Shell Shock, also known as 82nd Marines Attack was a 1964 film by B-movie director John Hayes. The film takes place in Italy during World War II, and tells the story of a sergeant with his group of soldiers....
and that they should treat him accordingly. As a result Sassoon was sent to Craiglockhart
Craiglockhart Hydropathic
Craiglockhart Hydropathic, now a part of Edinburgh Napier University and known as Craiglockhart Campus, is a building with surrounding grounds in Craiglockhart, Edinburgh, Scotland.-Origins:...
, a military hospital near Edinburgh, where he was treated by Dr. W. H. R. Rivers
W. H. R. Rivers
William Halse Rivers Rivers, FRCP, FRS, was an English anthropologist, neurologist, ethnologist and psychiatrist, best known for his work with shell-shocked soldiers during World War I. Rivers' most famous patient was the poet Siegfried Sassoon...
and met fellow patient Wilfred Owen
Wilfred Owen
Wilfred Edward Salter Owen MC was an English poet and soldier, one of the leading poets of the First World War...
. Graves also suffered from shell shock, or neurasthenia
Neurasthenia
Neurasthenia is a psycho-pathological term first used by George Miller Beard in 1869 to denote a condition with symptoms of fatigue, anxiety, headache, neuralgia and depressed mood...
as it was officially called, although he was never hospitalised for it:
I thought of going back to France, but realised the absurdity of the notion. Since 1916, the fear of gas obsessed me: any unusual smell, even a sudden strong smell of flowers in a garden, was enough to send me trembling. And I couldn't face the sound of heavy shelling now; the noise of a car back-firing would send me flat on my face, or running for cover.
The friendship between Graves and Sassoon is documented in Graves's letters and biographies, and the story is fictionalised in Pat Barker
Pat Barker
Pat Barker CBE, FRSL is an English writer and novelist. She has won many awards for her fiction, which centres around themes of memory, trauma, survival and recovery. Her work is described as direct, blunt and plainspoken.-Personal life:...
's novel Regeneration
Regeneration (novel)
For the 1997 film adaptation of the novel see Regeneration .Regeneration is a prize-winning novel by Pat Barker, first published in 1991. The novel was a Booker Prize nominee and was described by the New York Times Book Review as one of the four best novels of the year in its year of publication...
. The intensity of their early relationship is demonstrated in Graves's collection Fairies and Fusiliers (1917), which contains many poems celebrating their friendship. Sassoon himself remarked upon a "heavy sexual element" within it, an observation supported by the sentimental nature of much of the surviving correspondence between the two men. Through Sassoon, Graves became a friend of Wilfred Owen, "who often used to send me poems from France." Owen attended Graves's wedding to Nancy Nicholson
Nancy Nicholson
Nancy Nicholson was a British painter and fabric designer.Born Annie Mary Pryde Nicholson, she was the only daughter of the artists Sir William Nicholson and Mabel Pryde. She had three brothers, sculptor Ben Nicholson, architect Christopher Nicholson and Anthony, who was killed in action in 1918...
in January 1918, presenting him, as Graves recalled, with "a set of twelve Apostle spoon
Apostle spoon
An apostle spoon is a spoon with an image of an apostle or other Christian religious figure as the termination of the handle, each bearing his distinctive emblem. Apostle spoons were particularly popular in Pre-Reformation times when belief in the services of a patron saint was still strong...
s, the thirteenth, he joked, had been shot for cowardice". Graves's army career ended dramatically with an incident which could have led to a charge of desertion
Desertion
In military terminology, desertion is the abandonment of a "duty" or post without permission and is done with the intention of not returning...
. Having been posted to Limerick
Limerick
Limerick is the third largest city in the Republic of Ireland, and the principal city of County Limerick and Ireland's Mid-West Region. It is the fifth most populous city in all of Ireland. When taking the extra-municipal suburbs into account, Limerick is the third largest conurbation in the...
in late 1918, he "woke up with a sudden chill, which I recognized as the first symptoms of Spanish influenza." "I decided to make a run for it," he wrote, "I should at least have my influenza in an English, and not an Irish, hospital." Arriving at Waterloo with a high fever but without the official papers that would secure his release from the army, he chanced to share a taxi with a demobilisation officer also returning from Ireland, who completed his papers for him with the necessary secret codes.
Post-war period
Immediately post-war, Graves had a wife and growing family, but was financially insecure, and weakened physically and mentally:Very thin, very nervous, and with about four years' loss of sleep to make up, I was waiting until I got well enough to go to Oxford on the Government educational grant. I knew that it would be years before I could face anything but a quiet country life. My disabilities were many: I could not use a telephone, I felt sick every time I travelled by train, and to see more than two new people in a single day prevented me from sleeping. I felt ashamed of myself as a drag on Nancy, but had sworn on the very day of my demobilization never to be under anyone's orders for the rest of my life. Somehow I must live by writing.In October 1919 he took up his place at Oxford, soon changing course to English
English literature
English literature is the literature written in the English language, including literature composed in English by writers not necessarily from England; for example, Robert Burns was Scottish, James Joyce was Irish, Joseph Conrad was Polish, Dylan Thomas was Welsh, Edgar Allan Poe was American, J....
Language and Literature, though managing to retain his Classics exhibition. In consideration of his health he was permitted to live a little outside Oxford, on Boars Hill
Boars Hill
Boars Hill is a hill hamlet southwest of Oxford, straddling the boundariy between the civil parishes of Sunningwell and Wootton. It was part of Berkshire until the 1974 boundary changes transferred it to Oxfordshire.-History:...
, where the residents included Robert Bridges
Robert Bridges
Robert Seymour Bridges, OM, was a British poet, and poet laureate from 1913 to 1930.-Personal and professional life:...
, John Masefield
John Masefield
John Edward Masefield, OM, was an English poet and writer, and Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom from 1930 until his death in 1967...
his landlord, Edmund Blunden
Edmund Blunden
Edmund Charles Blunden, MC was an English poet, author and critic. Like his friend Siegfried Sassoon, he wrote of his experiences in World War I in both verse and prose. For most of his career, Blunden was also a reviewer for English publications and an academic in Tokyo and later Hong Kong...
, Gilbert Murray
Gilbert Murray
George Gilbert Aimé Murray, OM was an Australian born British classical scholar and public intellectual, with connections in many spheres. He was an outstanding scholar of the language and culture of Ancient Greece, perhaps the leading authority in the first half of the twentieth century...
, and Robert Nichols. Later the family moved to Worlds End Cottage on Collice Street, Islip, Oxfordshire
Islip, Oxfordshire
Islip is a village and civil parish on the River Ray, just above its confluence with the River Cherwell in Oxfordshire, England. It is about east of Kidlington and about north of Oxford. This village in Oxfordshire is not related to Islip, New York...
. His most notable Oxford companion was T.E. Lawrence, then a Fellow
Fellow
A fellow in the broadest sense is someone who is an equal or a comrade. The term fellow is also used to describe a person, particularly by those in the upper social classes. It is most often used in an academic context: a fellow is often part of an elite group of learned people who are awarded...
of All Souls
All Souls College, Oxford
The Warden and the College of the Souls of all Faithful People deceased in the University of Oxford or All Souls College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England....
, with whom he discussed contemporary poetry and shared in the planning of elaborate pranks. He later attempted to make a living by running a small shop, but the business soon failed. In 1926 he took up a post at Cairo University
Cairo University
Cairo University is a public university located in Giza, Egypt.The university was founded on December 21, 1908, as the result of an effort to establish a national center for educational thought...
, accompanied by his wife, their children, and the poet Laura Riding
Laura Riding
Laura Jackson was an American poet, critic, novelist, essayist and short story writer.- Early life :...
. He returned to London briefly, where he split up with his wife under highly emotional circumstances (at one point Riding attempted suicide) before leaving to live with Riding in Deià
Deià
Deià is a small coastal village on the northern ridge of the Spanish island of Majorca. It is located about ten miles north of Valldemossa, and it is known for its literary and musical residents...
, Majorca. There they continued to publish letterpress books under the rubric of the Seizin Press
Seizin Press
The Seizin Press was a small press, founded in 1927 by Laura Riding and Robert Graves in London. From 1930 to 1937 it operated out of Majorca....
, founded and edited the literary journal, Epilogue; they also wrote two successful academic books together: A Survey of Modernist Poetry (1927) and A Pamphlet Against Anthologies (1928); both had great influence on modern literary criticism, particularly new criticism
New Criticism
New Criticism was a movement in literary theory that dominated American literary criticism in the middle decades of the 20th century. It emphasized close reading, particularly of poetry, to discover how a work of literature functioned as a self-contained, self-referential aesthetic...
.
Literary career
In 1927 also, he published Lawrence and the Arabs, a commercially successful biography of T. E. LawrenceT. E. Lawrence
Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Edward Lawrence, CB, DSO , known professionally as T. E. Lawrence, was a British Army officer renowned especially for his liaison role during the Arab Revolt against Ottoman Turkish rule of 1916–18...
. Good-bye to All That (1929, revised by him and republished in 1957) proved a success but cost him many of his friends, notably Siegfried Sassoon
Siegfried Sassoon
Siegfried Loraine Sassoon CBE MC was an English poet, author and soldier. Decorated for bravery on the Western Front, he became one of the leading poets of the First World War. His poetry both described the horrors of the trenches, and satirised the patriotic pretensions of those who, in Sassoon's...
. In 1934 he published his most commercially successful work, I, Claudius
I, Claudius
I, Claudius is a novel by English writer Robert Graves, written in the form of an autobiography of the Roman Emperor Claudius. As such, it includes history of the Julio-Claudian Dynasty and Roman Empire, from Julius Caesar's assassination in 44 BC to Caligula's assassination in AD 41...
. Using classical sources he constructed a complex and compelling tale of the life of the Roman emperor Claudius
Claudius
Claudius , was Roman Emperor from 41 to 54. A member of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, he was the son of Drusus and Antonia Minor. He was born at Lugdunum in Gaul and was the first Roman Emperor to be born outside Italy...
, a tale extended in the sequel Claudius the God (1935). Another historical novel by Graves, Count Belisarius
Count Belisarius
Count Belisarius is a historical novel by Robert Graves, first published in 1938, recounting the life of the Byzantine general Belisarius ....
(1938), recounts the career of the Byzantine
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...
general Belisarius
Belisarius
Flavius Belisarius was a general of the Byzantine Empire. He was instrumental to Emperor Justinian's ambitious project of reconquering much of the Mediterranean territory of the former Western Roman Empire, which had been lost less than a century previously....
.
Graves and Riding left Majorca in 1936 at the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil WarAlso known as The Crusade among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War among Carlists, and The Rebellion or Uprising among Republicans. was a major conflict fought in Spain from 17 July 1936 to 1 April 1939...
, and in 1939, they moved to the United States, taking lodging in New Hope, Pennsylvania
New Hope, Pennsylvania
New Hope, formerly known as Coryell's Ferry, is a borough in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, USA. The population was 2,528 at the 2010 census. The borough lies on the west bank of the Delaware River at its confluence with Aquetong Creek. A two-lane bridge carries automobile and foot traffic across the...
. Their volatile relationship was described by Robert's nephew Richard Perceval Graves
Richard Perceval Graves
Richard Perceval Graves is an English biographer, poet and lecturer.-Early career:Richard Graves was born in Brighton, England and educated at Tollard Royal, Dorset, The White House, Wokingham and at Holme Grange School, Wokingham. He went on to Copthorne School , Charterhouse and St. John's...
in Robert Graves: 1927–1940: the Years with Laura, and T.S. Matthews's Jacks or Better (1977). It was also the basis for Miranda Seymour
Miranda Seymour
Miranda Jane Seymour is an English literary critic, novelist, and biographer.Miranda Seymour was two years old when her parents moved into Thrumpton Hall, the family's ancestral home in Nottinghamshire. This celebrated Jacobean mansion is on the south bank of the River Trent at the secluded...
's novel The Summer of '39 (1998).
After returning to England, Graves began a relationship with Beryl Hodge, then the wife of Alan Hodge, his collaborator on The Long Week-End
The Long Week-End
The Long Week-End is a social history of interwar Britain, written by Robert Graves and Alan Hodge.Their story covers a wide range of popular and social themes, including politics, business, science, religion, art, literature, fashion, education, popular amusements, domestic life, sexual relations,...
(1941) and The Reader Over Your Shoulder (1943; republished in 1947 as The Use and Abuse of the English Language). In 1946 he and his new wife Beryl re-established a home in Deià
Deià
Deià is a small coastal village on the northern ridge of the Spanish island of Majorca. It is located about ten miles north of Valldemossa, and it is known for its literary and musical residents...
, Majorca. The house is now a museum. 1946 also saw the publication of the historical novel, King Jesus
King Jesus
King Jesus is a semi-historical novel by Robert Graves, first published in 1946. The novel treats Jesus not as the son of God, but rather as a philosopher with a legitimate claim to the Judaean throne through Herod the Great, as well as the Davidic monarchy; and treats numerous Biblical stories in...
. He published The White Goddess
The White Goddess
The White Goddess: a Historical Grammar of Poetic Myth is a book-length essay on the nature of poetic myth-making by author and poet Robert Graves. First published in 1948, based on earlier articles published in Wales magazine, corrected, revised and enlarged editions appeared in 1948, 1952 and 1961...
in 1948. He turned to science fiction with Seven Days in New Crete
Seven Days in New Crete
Seven Days in New Crete, also known as Watch the North Wind Rise, is a seminal future-utopian speculative fiction novel by Robert Graves, first published in 1949.-Summary:...
(1949), and in 1953 he published The Nazarene Gospel Restored with Joshua Podro.
In 1955, he published The Greek Myths
The Greek Myths
The Greek Myths is a mythography, a compendium of Greek mythology, by the poet and writer Robert Graves, normally published in two volumes....
, containing translations and interpretations. His translations are well respected and continue to dominate the English-language market for mythography
Mythography
A mythographer, or a mythologist is a compiler of myths. The word derives from the Greek "μυθογραφία" , "writing of fables", from "μῦθος" , "speech, word, fact, story, narrative" + "γράφω" , "to write, to inscribe". Mythography is then the rendering of myths in the arts...
. Many of his unconventional interpretations and etymologies are dismissed by classicists, but have provoked more research into the topics he raised. Graves in turn dismissed the reactions of classical scholars, arguing that they are too specialized and "prose-minded" to interpret "ancient poetic meaning", and that "the few independent thinkers...[are]...the poets, who try to keep civilization alive."
He published a volume of short stories, Catacrok! Mostly Stories, Mostly Funny, in 1956. In 1961 he became Professor of Poetry at Oxford, a post he held until 1966.
In 1967, Robert Graves published, together with Omar Ali-Shah
Omar Ali-Shah
Omar Ali-Shah was a prominent exponent of modern Naqshbandi Sufism who lived from 1922 to 2005. He wrote a number of books on the subject, and was head of a large number of sufi groups, particularly in Latin America, Europe and Canada.- Life and work :...
, a new translation of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám is the title that Edward FitzGerald gave to his translation of a selection of poems, originally written in Persian and of which there are about a thousand, attributed to Omar Khayyám , a Persian poet, mathematician and astronomer...
. The translation quickly became controversial; Graves was attacked for trying to break the spell of famed passages in Edward FitzGerald
Edward FitzGerald (poet)
Edward FitzGerald was an English writer, best known as the poet of the first and most famous English translation of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. The spelling of his name as both FitzGerald and Fitzgerald is seen...
's Victorian translation, and L. P. Elwell-Sutton, an orientalist at Edinburgh University, maintained that the manuscript used by Ali-Shah and Graves—which Ali-Shah and his brother Idries Shah
Idries Shah
Idries Shah , also known as Idris Shah, né Sayed Idries el-Hashimi , was an author and teacher in the Sufi tradition who wrote over three dozen critically acclaimed books on topics ranging from psychology and spirituality to travelogues and culture studies.Born in India, the descendant of a...
claimed had been in their family for 800 years—was a forgery. The translation was a critical disaster, and Graves' reputation suffered severely due to what the public perceived as his gullibility in falling for the Shah brothers' deception.
From the 1960s until his death, Robert Graves frequently exchanged letters with Spike Milligan
Spike Milligan
Terence Alan Patrick Seán "Spike" Milligan Hon. KBE was a comedian, writer, musician, poet, playwright, soldier and actor. His early life was spent in India, where he was born, but the majority of his working life was spent in the United Kingdom. He became an Irish citizen in 1962 after the...
. Many of their letters to each other are collected in the book, Dear Robert, Dear Spike.
On 11 November 1985, Graves was among 16 Great War poets commemorated on a slate stone unveiled in Westminster Abbey's Poet's Corner. The inscription on the stone was written by friend and fellow Great War poet Wilfred Owen
Wilfred Owen
Wilfred Edward Salter Owen MC was an English poet and soldier, one of the leading poets of the First World War...
. It reads: "My subject is War, and the pity of War. The Poetry is in the pity." Of the 16 poets, Graves was the only one still living at the time of the commemoration ceremony.
Death
During the early 1970s Graves began to suffer from increasingly severe memory loss, and by his eightieth birthday in 1975 he had come to the end of his working life. By this time he had published more than 140 works. He survived for ten more years in an increasingly dependent condition until he died from heart failure on 7 December 1985 aged 90. He was buried the next morning in the small churchyard on a hill at DeiàDeià
Deià is a small coastal village on the northern ridge of the Spanish island of Majorca. It is located about ten miles north of Valldemossa, and it is known for its literary and musical residents...
, on the site of a shrine which had once been sacred to The White Goddess
The White Goddess
The White Goddess: a Historical Grammar of Poetic Myth is a book-length essay on the nature of poetic myth-making by author and poet Robert Graves. First published in 1948, based on earlier articles published in Wales magazine, corrected, revised and enlarged editions appeared in 1948, 1952 and 1961...
of Pelion. His second wife Beryl Graves was buried with him on her own death on 27 October 2003.
Children
Robert Graves had eight children. With his first wife Nancy Nicholson he had Jennie (who married journalist Alexander CliffordAlexander Clifford
Alexander G. Clifford was a British journalist and author, best known as a war correspondent during World War II.-Life:Clifford married the actress and journalist Jennie Prydie Nicholson on 22 February 1945 in the Savoy Chapel, London; she was the eldest child of poet and author Robert Graves...
), David (who was killed in the Second World War), Catherine (who married nuclear scientist Clifford Dalton
Clifford Dalton
Dr. Clifford Dalton was a New Zealand nuclear scientist and inventor of the fast breeder reactor. During the Second World War he married scientist and author Catherine Graves . They subsequently emigrated to Australia, where he worked as Engineer-In-Chief of the Australian Atomic Energy...
), and Sam. With his second wife, Beryl Graves (1915–2003), he had William, Lucia
Lucia Graves
Lucia Graves is a writer and translator.Born in Devon, England she is the daughter of Robert Graves, and is herself a translator working in English and Spanish/Catalan. Her translations include the worldwide bestsellers The Shadow of the Wind and The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafón, and The...
(also a translator), Juan and Tomás
Tomás Graves
Tomás Graves , is a graphic designer, printer, musician and writer. He is the son of poet Robert Graves and Beryl Graves ....
(a writer and musician).
Poetry collections
- Country Sentiment, New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1920
- Over the Brazier. London: William Heinemann, 1923; New York: Alfred. A. Knopf, 1923.
- The Feather Bed. Richmond, Surrey: Hogarth Press, 1923.
- Mock Beggar Hall. London: Hogarth Press, 1924.
- Welchmans Hose. London: The Fleuron, 1925.
- Poems. London: Ernest Benn, 1925.
- The Marmosites Miscellany (as John Doyle). London: Hogarth Press, 1925.
- Poems (1914–1926). London: William Heinemann, 1927; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1929.
- Poems (1914–1927). London: William Heinemann
- To Whom Else? Deyá, Majorca: Seizin Press, 1931.
- Poems 1930–1933. London: Arthur Barker, 1933.
- Collected Poems. London: Cassell, 1938; New York: Random House, 1938.
- No More Ghosts: Selected Poems. London: Faber & Faber, 1940.
- Work in Hand, with Norman Cameron and Alan Hodge. London: Hogarth Press, 1942.
- Poems. London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1943.
- Poems 1938–1945. London: Cassell, 1945; New York: Creative Age Press, 1946.
- Collected Poems (1914–1947). London: Cassell, 1948.
- Poems and Satires. London: Cassell, 1951.
- Poems 1953. London: Cassell, 1953.
- Collected Poems 1955. New York: Doubleday, 1955.
- Poems Selected by Himself. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1957; rev. 1961, 1966, 1972, 1978.
- The Poems of Robert Graves. New York: Doubleday, 1958.
- Collected Poems 1959. London: Cassell, 1959.
- The Penny Fiddle: Poems for Children. London: Cassell, 1960; New York: Doubleday, 1961.
- More Poems 1961. London: Cassell, 1961.
- Collected Poems. New York: Doubleday, 1961.
- New Poems 1962. London: Cassell, 1962; as New Poems. New York: Doubleday, 1963.
- The More Deserving Cases: Eighteen Old Poems for Reconsideration. Marlborough College Press, 1962.
- Man Does, Woman Is. London: Cassell, 1964/New York:Doubleday, 1964.
- Ann at Highwood Hall: Poems for Children. London: Cassell, 1964.
- Love Respelt. London: Cassell, 1965/New York: Doubleday, 1966.
- One Hard Look, 1965
- Collected Poems, 1965. London: Cassell, 1965.
- Seventeen Poems Missing from "Love Respelt". privately printed, 1966.
- Colophon to "Love Respelt". Privately printed, 1967.
- Poems 1965–1968. London: Cassell, 1968; New York: Doubleday, 1969.
- Poems About Love. London: Cassell, 1969; New York: Doubleday, 1969.
- Love Respelt Again. New York: Doubleday, 1969.
- Beyond Giving. privately printed, 1969.
- Poems 1968–1970. London: Cassell, 1970; New York: Doubleday, 1971.
- The Green-Sailed Vessel. privately printed, 1971.
- Poems: Abridged for Dolls and Princes. London: Cassell, 1971.
- Poems 1970–1972. London: Cassell, 1972; New York: Doubleday, 1973.
- Deyá, A Portfolio. London: Motif Editions, 1972.
- Timeless Meeting: Poems. privately printed, 1973.
- At the Gate. privately printed, London, 1974.
- Collected Poems 1975. London: Cassell, 1975.
- New Collected Poems. New York: Doubleday, 1977.
- Selected Poems, ed. Paul O'PreyPaul O'PreyProfessor Paul O'Prey is Vice-Chancellor of Roehampton University in London, where he is also Professor of Modern Literature. He was appointed in 2004.O'Prey was born in Southampton in 1956, the youngest of five children...
. London: Penguin, 1986 - The Centenary Selected Poems, ed. Patrick Quinn. Manchester: Carcanet Press, 1995.
- Complete Poems Volume 1, ed. Beryl Graves and Dunstan Ward. Manchester: Carcanet PressCarcanet PressCarcanet Press is a publisher, primarily of poetry, based in the United Kingdom and founded in 1969 by Michael Schmidt.Carcanet Press is now in its fourth decade. In 2000 it was named the Sunday Times millennium Small Publisher of the Year...
, 1995. - Complete Poems Volume 2, ed. Beryl Graves and Dunstan Ward. Manchester: Carcanet PressCarcanet PressCarcanet Press is a publisher, primarily of poetry, based in the United Kingdom and founded in 1969 by Michael Schmidt.Carcanet Press is now in its fourth decade. In 2000 it was named the Sunday Times millennium Small Publisher of the Year...
, 1996. - Complete Poems Volume 3, ed. Beryl Graves and Dunstan Ward. Manchester: Carcanet PressCarcanet PressCarcanet Press is a publisher, primarily of poetry, based in the United Kingdom and founded in 1969 by Michael Schmidt.Carcanet Press is now in its fourth decade. In 2000 it was named the Sunday Times millennium Small Publisher of the Year...
, 1999. - The Complete Poems in One Volume, ed. Beryl Graves and Dunstan Ward. Manchester: Carcanet PressCarcanet PressCarcanet Press is a publisher, primarily of poetry, based in the United Kingdom and founded in 1969 by Michael Schmidt.Carcanet Press is now in its fourth decade. In 2000 it was named the Sunday Times millennium Small Publisher of the Year...
, 2000.
Fiction
- My Head! My Head!. London: Secker, 1925; Alfred. A. Knopf, New York, 1925.
- The Shout. London: Mathews & Marrot, 1929.
- No Decency Left. (with Laura Riding) (as Barbara Rich). London: Jonathan Cape, 1932.
- The Real David Copperfield. London: Arthur Barker, 1933; as David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens, Condensed by Robert Graves, ed. M. P. Paine. New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1934.
- I, ClaudiusI, ClaudiusI, Claudius is a novel by English writer Robert Graves, written in the form of an autobiography of the Roman Emperor Claudius. As such, it includes history of the Julio-Claudian Dynasty and Roman Empire, from Julius Caesar's assassination in 44 BC to Caligula's assassination in AD 41...
. London: Arthur Barker, 1934; New York: Smith & Haas, 1934.- Sequel: Claudius the God and his Wife Messalina. London: Arthur Barker, 1934; New York: Smith & Haas, 1935.
- Antigua, Penny, Puce. Deyá, Majorca/London: Seizin Press/Constable, 1936; New York: Random House, 1937.
- Count BelisariusCount BelisariusCount Belisarius is a historical novel by Robert Graves, first published in 1938, recounting the life of the Byzantine general Belisarius ....
. London: Cassell, 1938: Random House, New York, 1938. - Sergeant Lamb of the Ninth. London: Methuen, 1940; as Sergeant Lamb's America. New York: Random House, 1940.
- Sequel: Proceed, Sergeant Lamb. London: Methuen, 1941; New York: Random House, 1941.
- The Story of Marie Powell: Wife to Mr. MiltonThe Story of Marie Powell: Wife to Mr. MiltonThe Story of Marie Powell: Wife to Mr. Milton, by Robert Graves, 1943. ISBN 0-14-001024-6. This is based on a true story, the young wife of poet John Milton. He tells it from her viewpoint and paints an unflattering portrait of the man...
. London: Cassell, 1943; as Wife to Mr Milton: The Story of Marie Powell. New York: Creative Age Press, 1944. - The Golden Fleece. London: Cassell, 1944; as Hercules, My Shipmate, New York: Creative Age Press, 1945.
- King JesusKing JesusKing Jesus is a semi-historical novel by Robert Graves, first published in 1946. The novel treats Jesus not as the son of God, but rather as a philosopher with a legitimate claim to the Judaean throne through Herod the Great, as well as the Davidic monarchy; and treats numerous Biblical stories in...
. New York: Creative Age Press, 1946; London: Cassell, 1946. - Watch the North Wind Rise. New York: Creative Age Press, 1949; as Seven Days in New CreteSeven Days in New CreteSeven Days in New Crete, also known as Watch the North Wind Rise, is a seminal future-utopian speculative fiction novel by Robert Graves, first published in 1949.-Summary:...
. London: Cassell, 1949. - The Islands of UnwisdomThe Islands of UnwisdomThe Islands of Unwisdom, by Robert Graves, 1949. Also published in the UK as The Isles of Unwisdom. It is a reconstruction of an historic event, the voyage of voyage of Álvaro de Mendaña de Neirato find the Solomon Islands. Graves tells a rather surprising story, in which some people turn out to...
. New York: Doubleday, 1949; as The Isles of Unwisdom. London: Cassell, 1950. - Homer's Daughter. London: Cassell, 1955; New York: Doubleday, 1955.
- Catacrok! Mostly Stories, Mostly Funny. London: Cassell, 1956.
- They Hanged My Saintly Billy. London: Cassell, 1957; New York: Doubleday, 1957.
- Collected Short Stories. Doubleday: New York, 1964; Cassell, London, 1965.
- An Ancient Castle. London: Peter Owen, 1980.
Other works
- On English Poetry. New York: Alfred. A. Knopf, 1922; London: Heinemann, 1922.
- The Meaning of Dreams. London: Cecil Palmer, 1924; New York: Greenberg, 1925.
- Poetic Unreason and Other Studies. London: Cecil Palmer, 1925.
- Contemporary Techniques of Poetry: A Political Analogy. London: Hogarth Press, 1925.
- Another Future of Poetry. London: Hogarth Press, 1926.
- Impenetrability or The Proper Habit of English. London: Hogarth Press, 1927.
- The English Ballad: A Short Critical Survey. London: Ernest Benn, 1927; revised as English and Scottish Ballads. London: William HeinemannWilliam HeinemannWilliam Heinemann was the founder of the Heinemann publishing house in London.He was born in 1863, in Surbiton, Surrey. In his early life he wanted to be a musician, either as a performer or a composer, but, realising that he lacked the ability to be successful in that field, he took a job with...
, 1957; New York: Macmillan, 1957. - Lars Porsena or The Future of Swearing and Improper Language. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner, 1927; E.P. Dutton, New York, 1927; revised as The Future of Swearing and Improper Language. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner, 1936.
- A Survey of Modernist Poetry (with Laura Riding). London: William Heinemann, 1927; New York: Doubleday, 1928.
- Lawrence and the Arabs. London: Jonathan Cape, 1927; as Lawrence and the Arabian Adventure. New York: Doubleday, 1928.
- A Pamphlet Against Anthologies (with Laura Riding). London: Jonathan Cape, 1928; as Against Anthologies. New York: Doubleday, 1928.
- Mrs. Fisher or The Future of Humour. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner, 1928.
- Good-bye to All That: An Autobiography. London: Jonathan Cape, 1929; New York: Jonathan Cape and Smith, 1930; rev., New York: Doubleday, 1957; London: Cassell, 1957; Penguin: Harmondsworth, 1960.
- But It Still Goes On: An Accumulation. London: Jonathan Cape, 1930; New York: Jonathan Cape and Smith, 1931.
- T. E. Lawrence to His Biographer Robert Graves. New York: Doubleday, 1938; London: Faber & Faber, 1939.
- The Long Weekend (with Alan Hodge). London: Faber & Faber, 1940; New York: Macmillan, 1941.
- The Reader Over Your Shoulder (with Alan Hodge). London: Jonathan Cape, 1943; New York: Macmillan, 1943.
- The White GoddessThe White GoddessThe White Goddess: a Historical Grammar of Poetic Myth is a book-length essay on the nature of poetic myth-making by author and poet Robert Graves. First published in 1948, based on earlier articles published in Wales magazine, corrected, revised and enlarged editions appeared in 1948, 1952 and 1961...
. London: Faber & Faber, 1948; New York: Creative Age Press, 1948; rev., London: Faber & Faber, 1952, 1961; New York: Alfred. A. Knopf, 1958. - The Common Asphodel: Collected Essays on Poetry 1922–1949. London: Hamish Hamilton, 1949.
- Occupation: Writer. New York: Creative Age Press, 1950; London: Cassell, 1951.
- The Golden AssThe Golden AssThe Metamorphoses of Apuleius, which St. Augustine referred to as The Golden Ass , is the only Latin novel to survive in its entirety....
of ApuleiusApuleiusApuleius was a Latin prose writer. He was a Berber, from Madaurus . He studied Platonist philosophy in Athens; travelled to Italy, Asia Minor and Egypt; and was an initiate in several cults or mysteries. The most famous incident in his life was when he was accused of using magic to gain the...
, New York: Farrar, Straus, 1951. - The Nazarene Gospel Restored (with Joshua Podro). London: Cassell, 1953; New York: Doubleday, 1954.
- The Greek MythsThe Greek MythsThe Greek Myths is a mythography, a compendium of Greek mythology, by the poet and writer Robert Graves, normally published in two volumes....
. London: Penguin, 1955; Baltimore: Penguin, 1955. - The Crowning Privilege: The Clark Lectures, 1954–1955. London: Cassell, 1955; New York: Doubleday, 1956.
- Adam's Rib. London: Trianon Press, 1955; New York: Yoseloff, 1958.
- Jesus in Rome (with Joshua Podro). London: Cassell, 1957.
- Steps. London: Cassell, 1958.
- 5 Pens in Hand. New York: Doubleday, 1958.
- Food for Centaurs. New York: Doubleday, 1960.
- Greek Gods and Heroes. New York: Doubleday, 1960; as Myths of Ancient Greece. London: Cassell, 1961.
- Selected Poetry and Prose (ed. James Reeves). London: Hutchinson, 1961.
- Oxford Addresses on Poetry. London: Cassell, 1962; New York: Doubleday, 1962.
- The Siege and Fall of Troy. London: Cassell, 1962; New York: Doubleday, 1963.
- The Big Green Book. New York: Crowell Collier, 1962; Penguin: Harmondsworth, 1978. Illustrated by Maurice SendakMaurice SendakMaurice Bernard Sendak is an American writer and illustrator of children's literature. He is best known for his book Where the Wild Things Are, published in 1963.-Early life:...
- Hebrew Myths. The Book of Genesis (with Raphael PataiRaphael PataiRaphael Patai , born Ervin György Patai, was a Hungarian-Jewish ethnographer, historian, Orientalist and anthropologist.-Family background:...
). New York: Doubleday, 1964; London: Cassell, 1964. - Majorca Observed. London: Cassell, 1965; New York: Doubleday, 1965.
- Mammon and the Black Goddess. London: Cassell, 1965; New York: Doubleday, 1965.
- Two Wise Children. New York: Harlin Quist, 1966; London: Harlin Quist, 1967.
- The Rubaiyyat of Omar Khayyam (with Omar Ali-ShahOmar Ali-ShahOmar Ali-Shah was a prominent exponent of modern Naqshbandi Sufism who lived from 1922 to 2005. He wrote a number of books on the subject, and was head of a large number of sufi groups, particularly in Latin America, Europe and Canada.- Life and work :...
). London: Cassell, 1967. - Poetic Craft and Principle. London: Cassell, 1967.
- The Poor Boy Who Followed His Star. London: Cassell, 1968; New York: Doubleday, 1969.
- Greek Myths and Legends. London: Cassell, 1968.
- The Crane Bag. London: Cassell, 1969.
- On Poetry: Collected Talks and Essays. New York: Doubleday, 1969.
- Difficult Questions, Easy Answers. London: Cassell, 1972; New York: Doubleday, 1973.
- In Broken Images: Selected Letters 1914–1946, ed. Paul O'PreyPaul O'PreyProfessor Paul O'Prey is Vice-Chancellor of Roehampton University in London, where he is also Professor of Modern Literature. He was appointed in 2004.O'Prey was born in Southampton in 1956, the youngest of five children...
. London: Hutchinson, 1982 - Between Moon and Moon: Selected Letters 1946–1972, ed. Paul O'PreyPaul O'PreyProfessor Paul O'Prey is Vice-Chancellor of Roehampton University in London, where he is also Professor of Modern Literature. He was appointed in 2004.O'Prey was born in Southampton in 1956, the youngest of five children...
. London: Hutchinson, 1984 - Collected Writings on Poetry, ed. Paul O'PreyPaul O'PreyProfessor Paul O'Prey is Vice-Chancellor of Roehampton University in London, where he is also Professor of Modern Literature. He was appointed in 2004.O'Prey was born in Southampton in 1956, the youngest of five children...
, Manchester: Carcanet Press, 1995. - Complete Short Stories, ed. Lucia GravesLucia GravesLucia Graves is a writer and translator.Born in Devon, England she is the daughter of Robert Graves, and is herself a translator working in English and Spanish/Catalan. Her translations include the worldwide bestsellers The Shadow of the Wind and The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafón, and The...
, Manchester: Carcanet Press, 1995. - Some Speculations on Literature, History, and Religion, ed. Patrick Quinn, Manchester: Carcanet Press, 2000.
- November 5 address, X magazineX (magazine)X, A Quarterly Review was a British arts review published in London which ran for seven issues between 1959-1962. It was founded and co-edited by Patrick Swift and David Wright...
, Volume One, Number Three, June 1960; An Anthology from XX (magazine)X, A Quarterly Review was a British arts review published in London which ran for seven issues between 1959-1962. It was founded and co-edited by Patrick Swift and David Wright...
(Oxford University Press 1988).
See also
- English translations of Homer: Robert Graves
External links
- Robert Graves Trust and Society Information Portal
- Profile at Poetry Foundation
- Profile, poems written and audio at poets.org
- Profile, poems written and audio at Poetry Archive
- Gallery of Graves' portraits, National Portrait Gallery, London
Works and archives
- The Robert Graves Digital Archive by Oxford University
- Robert Graves archives at University of Victoria, Special Collections
- Robert Graves Papers at Southern Illinois University Carbondale Special Collections Research Center