Life
1920- [Alexander Norman; fam. “Derry”]; b. Dublin, of Wexford Anglo-Irish family; son of automobile importer; ed. High School where he elicited
“What Then?” from W. B. Yeats as a contrib. to The Erasmian;
grad. TCD, and Oxford; taught Classics at TCD; PhD in Yeats studies, resulting in one of the first biographies; afterwards taught English at Groningen University
in Holland, Edinburgh, Adelaide, Leeds, and Stirling Universities; issued W.
B. Yeats: Man and Poet (1949; rep. 1996); founded IASAIL, 1968 [now
IASIL], with others; issued Commentary on the Poems of W B Yeats (Poems, 1968,
rev. 1984); issued Commentaries on the Plays ...&c., with A. S. Knowland
(1975); Anglo-Irish Literature (1982), or the many editions of
seventeenth and eighteenth-century poets and dramatists - helped to reveal
the full range of Irish literature in the English language; also edited
texts and collections of Shakespeare, Farquhar, and R. B. Sheridan, together
with two anthologies of Irish writing; poetry collections, Brought
Up in Dublin (1987) and Brought Up to Leave (1987); ed., Ariel
[Journal of International Literature in English] (1970); ed.
Review of English Literature (c.1967- ); Jeffares is a senior editor
of the York Notes Series (Librarie de Liban); edited and issued numerous anthologies; also edited works of Oliver St. John Gogarty; m. Jeanne, a Belgian homeopathist, and sometime manager in wartime factory; his dg., Bo is an artist. OCIL
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Works
‘Tribute to a Dublin Poet and Writer ...’, in Envoy IV,
no. 14 Jan 1951, pp.23-32; Foreword to K. G. W. Cross & R. T. Dunlop,
A Bibliography of Yeats Criticism 1887-1965 (London: Macmillan
1971), 341pp.; Teaching Anglo-Irish Literature,’ Hermathena, CXXIX
(Winter 1980), [q.p.]; ed. Yeats, Sligo and Ireland: Essays to Mark
the 21st Yeats International Summer School (Gerrard Cross: Smythe
1980), x, 267pp.; A. N. Jeffares and Anthony Kamm, eds., An Irish Childhood:
An Anthology (Collins 1987), 384pp. [infra]; ‘Aspects of
Swift as a Letter Writer’ in Hermethena (1992), pp.5-52; W.
B. Yeats, The Gonne-Yeats Letters 1893-1938: Always your Friend,
ed. Anna MacBride White and A. N. Jeffares (London: Hutchinson 1992),
xvi, 544pp., [incl. 372 letters by Maud Gonne and 30 by Yeats], rep. (NY:
Norton 1993); Maud Gonne MacBride, A Servant of the Queen: Reminiscences,
ed. A. N. Jeffares and Anna MacBride White (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe
1994), xvii, 378pp., [autobiog., incl. new material and rearranges chapters
in correct MS order], rep. as The Autobiography of Maud Gonne: A Servant
of the Queen (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1995); Images
of Invention: Essays on Irish Writing (Gerards Cross: Colin Smythe
1995), 359pp. [22 essays]; ed., Irish Love Poems (Dublin: O’Brien
1997), 185pp.; ed. The Secret Rose: Love Poems of W.B. Yeats (Boulder:
Roberts Rinehart 1998), 120pp.; Ireland’s Love Poems: Wonder and a
Wild Desire (London: Kyle Cathie 2000), 240pp.; ed., Poems and
Plays Oliver St. John Gogarty (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe 2001); ‘The Realist Novel: 1900-1945’, in Augustine Martin, ed., The Genius of Irish Prose (Mercier 1985), 42-52; rep. as ‘The Realist Novel in Ireland: 1900-1945’, in Images of Invention (Colin Smythe 1996), 314-322pp.
An Irish Childhood: An Anthology, ed., with Anthony Kamm (London: Collins 1987), 384pp. Contains passages from Boy Deeds of Cuchulain, Lady Gregory; The Childhood of Finn, S.J. O’Grady; The Escape of Hugh Roe O’Donnell, from Life of Hugh Roe O’Donnell, by Lughaidh O’Clery, trans. D Murphy; Jonathan Swift, Childhood Disappointments; George Berkeley, Memorandum; John Banim, Kilkenny College, from The Fetches; On Recollections of Childhood, Sir Richard Steele; Charles Macklin - Schooling of an Actor, from Kirkman; A Forward Miss, Laetitia Pilkington; the Mill-Race, Lawrence Sterne; Oliver Goldsmith, The schoolmaster; Mrs George Ann Bellamy, the Faithful Nurse; William Hickey, Water and Other, Sports; RBS Sheridan, Letter to his Uncle; Sir Jonah Barrington, The Great House; Mary Leadbeater, the Child-Minders; Theo. Wolfe Tone, Call of the Cockade; The Birth of the Duke of Wellington; Thomas Moore, the Minstrel Boy; Maria Edgeworth, Master Harrington’s Obsession; Adelaide O’Keeffe, the Kite; Sir Aubrey de Vere, Christmas Holidays; William Carleton, The Hedge School; Anna Maria Hall, the Spelling Lesson; Edward Walsh, The Fairy Nurse; Daniel Griffin, Playing with Fire Arms; Charles Lever at the Front; George Henry Moore, Letter to his Mother; W R Le Fanu, Practical Joke; Charles Gavan Duffy [calls Moore’s Captain Rock a ‘quasi history’], Schooling for a Patriot, from Two Hemispheres; William Allingham, Church Diversions; Cecil Frances Alexander; J B Yeats; Viscount Wolseley; Thomas Barnardo; John Howard Parnell, Lady Gregory; Frank Harris; G B Shaw; George Tyrrell; Katharine Tynan; W. B. Yeats; Martin Ross; Somerville and Ross; JM Synge; Edward Stephens; AE; Peig Sayers; Forrest Reid; Gogarty; Lord Dunsany; Sir William Orpen, Life class; James Joyce; James Stephens; Glimpses of Patrick Pearse; Eamon de Valera–boyhood of a president; C P Curran; MacLiammoir; Austin Clarke; Sean O’Casey; Liam O’Flaherty, ‘The New Suit’; Joyce Cary; Patricia Lynch; Kate O’Brien; C S Lewis; T R Henn; L A G Strong; Elizabeth Bowen; Sean O’Faolain; Michael Farrell; Frank O’Connor; Maurice O’Sullivan; Cyril Connolly; Molly Keane; C Day Lewis; Val Iremonger; Sam. Beckett; MacNeice; Patrick Kavanagh; Patrick O’Sheas Flann O’Brien; Patrick Campbell; Brigid Boland; M Jesse Hoare; Anne Gregory; Brian Boydell; E D Doyle; Fergus Allen; Derry Jeffares; Iris Kellett; J P Donleavy [Beastly Beatitudes]; Brendan Behan; Adele Crowder; Richard Murphy; Thomas Kinsella; Peter Connolly; John Montague; William Trevor; Sean Lucy; Christy Brown; Edna O’Brien; Brendan Kennelly; Liam Weldon; Seamus Heaney; Kate Cruise O’Brien; Bob Geldof; Caragh Devlin.
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Criticism
Brendan Glacken, ‘Irish Feathers Fly Abroad’, in The Irish Times (19 Dec 1996).
Conleth Ellis, review of Brought Up in Dublin (1987), in Books Ireland, May 1987, p.100.
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Notes
Maud Gonne is cited as having told A. N. Jeffares that her leaving
the IRB was due to the attempted assassination of Frank Hugh O’Donnell
(see Frank Tuohy, Yeats, 1976, p.106.)
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Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)