T. W. Rolleston

Life
1857-1920 [Thomas William Hazen Rolleston; T. W. H. Rolleston], b. Shinrone, Co. Offaly [King’s Co.], son of Charles Rolleston-Spunner, QC and later County Court Judge for Tipperary, North Riding, with Elizabeth, dg. of Baron Richards; family home at ffranckfort [Frankfort] Castle, Co. Offaly; ed. Columba’s College, Rathfarnham, TCD, winning Vice-Chancellor’s Prize with "Feast of Belshazzar"; BA 1878; lived in Dresden and travelled on the continent before settling in London; settled in Delgany, Co. Wicklow, 1885; fnd. & ed. Dublin University Review, May 1885-Dec. 1886; contrib. to Academy, Spectator, Kottabos, Boston Pilot, Irish Fireside, &c.; ed. anthology of TCD poets; contrib. two poems in Book of the Rhymers’ Club (1892); contrib. five to Poems and Ballads of Young Ireland, ed. W. B. Yeats (1888), incl. anonymous ded. lines; ed., Prose and Writings of Thomas Davis (1889), emphasising his character as reformed with Theobald Mathew and later Horace Plunkett; also Selections from Plato, and poems of Ellen O’Leary (Lays of Country, Home and Friends, 1891); issued Life of Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1889); trans. Teachings of Epictetus (1886); trans. Whitman’s Leaves of Grass (1886) into German with Dr. Knortz; trans. Wagner loosely into English; prefaced rep. of Shelley’s Dublin pamphlet (An Address to the Irish People, 1812), 1890; gave Taylorian Lecture, Oxford, on ‘Lessing and the Origins of Modern German Literature’ (1892); first Secretary of Irish Literary Society in London; travelled to Dublin to establish a branch there, but was pre-empted by Yeats (who came to regard him as ‘intimate enemy’ and ‘hollow image’); joined C. G. Duffy against Yeats in dispute over the Irish National Library, and earned the lasting animosity of the poet; issued pamphlet on Ireland, the Empire, and the [Boer] War (1900); ed. with Stopford Augustus Brooke, A Treasury of Irish Poetry in the English Tongue (1900), introductory notes being provided by W. B. Yeats, Lionel Johnson, Douglas Hyde and George Sigerson; living at Killiney, Dublin, in 1894. PI NCBE IF TAY DIW DIL JMC FDA OCIL

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Works
The Encheiridion of Epictetus, trans. from the Greek with preface and notes (London: Kegan Paul & Co. 1881; new. edns. 1888, 1891, 1892, 1900), xxix, 59pp. 8o.; Ueber Wordsworth und Walt Whitman (1883); Boycotting: A Reply to Mr S. Laing (Dublin: Ponsonby 1888); A Life of Lessing (London: W. Scott 1889), 218pp., xv, [1]; with Karl Knorts, Grashalme [Whitman’s Leaves of Grass] (1899); Imagination and Art in Gaelic Literature, being notes on some recent translations from the Gaelic (Kilkenny: Library of the Nore 1900; Kilkenny Moderator 1900); Ireland, the Empire, and the War (Dublin: Sealy, Bryers & Walker 1900) [v]; Modern Ireland and her Agrarian Problem, trans from German of Moritz Bonn (Dublin: Figgis 1906), 156pp.; Sea Sprays, Verses and Translations (Dublin: Maunsel 1909) [from Irish]; The High Deeds of Finn and other Bardic Romances of Ancient Ireland (London: Harrap 1910; NY: T. Y. Crowell 1911) [infra], and Do., [rep. edn. as] The Adventures of Finn Mac Cumhal and Other other Stories of Ancient Ireland (Dublin & Cork: Mercier Press 1979) [q.pp.]; T. W. Rolleston, intro., From the Land of Dreams: Irish poems (Dublin: Talbot Press; London: T. Fisher Unwin: 1918), xxii, 115pp., iv., 8o.; Ireland’s Vanishing Opportunity (Dublin: Talbot Press 1919), 19pp.; trans., The Teaching of Epictetus [Camelot Classics] (London: Walter Scott 1886; Chicago: Donohoe 1892); Life of Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (London: Walter Scott 1889, rep. Kennikat 1972), xv, 21pp. with bibl. [13pp.]; ed., with Stopford A. Brooke, A Treasury of Irish Poetry in the English Tongue (London: Smith, Elder; NY: Macmillan 1900; rev. edns. 1915; 1932) [infra]; Myths and Legends of the Celtic Race (London: Harrap; NY: Crowell 1911); Do. [another edn.] (1922), 450pp., 46 ills.; Do., rep. as Celtic Myths and Legends (London: Bracken Books [q.d.]). [For full listing of Treasury, 1900, see under Stopford A. Brooke.] See also Horst Frenz, ed., Whitman and Rolleston: A Correspondence [Humanities Series No. 26] (Indiana UP 1951), 137pp.; Do. (Dublin : Browne and Nolan, 1952); and Do. (NY: Kraus Reprint, 1969).

High Deeds of Finn and Other Romances of Ancient Ireland, introduced by Stopford A. Brooke (London: Harrap MCMX [1910]), 16 ills. by Stephen Reid; lv, 214pp; author’s preface expresses debt to translations of the ‘Finn Cycle’ by Standish Hayes O’Grady (Silva Gadelica), A. H. Leahy (Heroic Romances), Whitley [sic] Stokes, Kuno Meyer, M. de Arbois de Jubainville (Cycle Mythologique Irlandais, trans. R. I. Best), and makes complimentary reference to Eleanor Hull’s Cuchullain, the Hound of Ulster. The collection omits the ‘Pursuit of Dermot and Grania’ on the grounds that ‘it represents the character of Finn in a light inconsistent with what is said of him elsewhere and partly because it has in it a certain sinister and depressing element which renders it unsuitable for a collection intended largely for the young’ [p.ix, ftn.]. Brooke regards Rolleston’s version of the Finn Cycle as a fulfillment of his own plan for the recasting of Irish epic in modern literary English (for Brooke’s Introduction, see Brooke, Rx.)

A Treasury of Irish Poetry in the English Tongue, ed. Stopford A. Brooke & T W Rolleston; London; Smith, Elder, & Co. 1900) [15 Waterloo Place]; ded. to Sir Charles Gavan Duffy/among whose many services to Ireland/was the publication of the/first worthy collection of Irish national poetry/the editors, with deep respect /dedicate this volume.’ Stopford A. Brooke, Introduction, [vii]-xxiv, incl. para., ‘As yet, in modern Ireland, the larger religion is untouched, the religion of the greater poets - not their persoal religion which is often limited - but that which poetry of its own will creates; which answers for the unformulated aspiration of the soul towards the eternal love; which is neither Catholic nor Protestant, but includes both; which has no fixed creed, no necessary ritual, no formulas; and no church but that invisble Church with which the innumerable spirits of the universe are in communion, and whose devies bears the words, ‘The Letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life.’ It is my hope that the spiritual tendency of Irish poetry will embody that conception.’ [xxxii.] Poems incl. Bk. 1, Introduction [anon. selection, The Boyne Water, Willie Reilly, The Night that Larry was Stretched, et al.]; 576pp. and index. Bk II, William Drennan; Curran; RB Sheridan; GN Reyonlds; Moore; Wolfe; Luke Aylmer Connolly; Marg. Power; Darley; Lover [intro. notice by DJ O’Donoghue]; Lever; Mahony (Fr. Prout); Waller; Carleton; Griffin [intro. notice by Sigerson]; Callanan [notice by Sigerson]; Edward Walsh [notice by Hyde as CrAo]; Fox; J. Banim [notice by DJOD]. Bk. III, Poets of the Nation, intro. Rolleston; Davis; Fazer; John O’Hagan; Wm. B McBurney [Croppy]; Ingram; MacDermott; RD Williams; Ellen Mary Patrick Downing; AG Geoghegan; Denny Lane; Mary Kelly; John Keegan; MJ Barry; M Torney; T D’Arcy McGee; DF McCarthy; Michael Doheny; Lady Wilde; James McCarroll; John Savage; John Walsh; D. MacAleese; JS le Fanu; Charles Kickham [intro notice by John O’Leary]; RD Joyce; JK Casey; Ellen O’Leary; TC Irwin; Lady Dufferin; Boucicault; TD Sullivan; Fanny Parnell. Bk. IV, Mangan [intro. notice L Johnson]; Ferguson [intro. AP Graves]. Bk. V, Aubrey de Vere [intro. Prof. W. Macneile]; Whitley Stokes; Todhunter [intro. GF Savage-Armstrong]; Allingham [intro. Lionel Johnson]; SA Brooke; AP Graves [intro. GA Greene]; Francis A Fahy; Malachy Ryan; P J Coleman; P J McCall; Lady Gilbert; K. Tynan-Hinkson [intro. G. A. Greene]; Rose Kavanagh; Alice Furlong; Jane Barlow [intro. Greene]; Dora Sigerson [intro. Hyde]; SL Gwynn; Frances Wynne; ‘Moira O’Neill; Douglas Hyde; T. W. Rolleston; Thomas Boyd; L. Johnson [intro. Yeats]; Nora Hopper [intro. notice Yeats]; Althea Gyles [intro. Yeats]; William Larminie [intro. AE]; Standish J O’Grady; AE [intro. Yeats]; Yeats [intro Rolleston]. Bk VI, Aubrey de Vere [intro Macneile]; Ingram; Wm. Alexander; Cecil Francis Alexander; Edward Dowden [intro. Macneile]; Edmund j Armstrogn; G F Savage-Armstrong [intro. Rolleston]; William Wilkins [intro. GF Savage-Armstrong]; Geroge Arthur Greene; Wm Knox Johnson; W. E. H. Lecky; Kottabistai [intro. Savage-Armstrong]; CP Mulvany; John Martley; Arthur Palmer; Percy Somers Payne.

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Criticism
Charles Henry Rolleston, Portrait of an Irishman, intro. Stephen Gwynn (London: Methuen 1939).

Curtis Bradford, Yeats at Work, 1965, p.355.

William Rooney, Poems and Ballads; in Daily Express, 11 Dec. 1902; rep. in Critical Writings, ed. Mason & Ellmann, [1959] 1965, p.85.)

Frank Tuohy, Yeats (London: Macmillan 1976), p.87.

James Calahan, The Irish Novel: A Critical History (Boston: Twayne Publishers 1988), p.112.

Charles H. Rolleston, RN Commander retired, Portrait of An Irishman (1939), with a foreword by Stephen Gwynn; xv+189pp.

W. P. Ryan, The Irish Literary Revival (1894), pp. 36, 50, 53, 54, 56, 85-86,146.

Nicola Gordon Bowe, ‘Wilhelmina Geddes, Harry Clarke and their part in the Arts and Crafts Movement of Ireland’, in The Studio, vol. 26, 1902, p.295, and the Arts & Craft Society’s third Journal. [2-3]; The Journal of Decorative and Propaganda Arts [DAPA], No. 8, (Miami 1988).

Michael McAteer , ‘“Kindness in Your Unkindness”: Lady Gregory and History’, in Irish University Review, Spring/Summer 2004, p.97.)

Edna Longley, The Living Stream, 1994, p.17.

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Notes
Justin McCarthy, ed., Irish Literature (Washington: Catholic Univ. of America 1904), selects "On the Colloquy of the Ancients" from Lecture on Imagination and Art in Gaelic Literature"; also "The Dead at Clonmacnoise", "The Last Desire", "To My Bicycle", and other poems.

D. J. O’Donoghue, Poets of Ireland: A Biographical and Bibliographical Dictionary of Irish Writers of English Verse (Dublin: Hodges Figgis & Co. 1912), tentatively attributes the occasional pseudonym ‘Kendal’ to him.

Stephen Brown, Ireland in Fiction [Pt. I] (Dublin: Maunsel 1919) lists Myths and Legends of the Celtic Race (1911) and The High Deeds of Finn (1910).

Arthur Quiller Couch, ed., Oxford Book of English Verse, 1250-1918 (new ed. 1929), gives "Clonmacnoise" (p.866).

Geoffrey Taylor, ed., Dublin Book of Verse [1909], gives bio-data: 1857-1920, b Shinrone, son of a judge; ed. St. Columba’s and TCD; lived on the Continent; only good verse is ‘The Dead at Clonmacnoise’, which Taylor calls the best poem of the 19th c. O’Connor quotes ‘The Dead at Clonmacnoise’ (Book of Ireland, 1979).

Frank O’Connor, A Book of Ireland (London: Collins 1959), selected "The Dead at Clonmacnoise" (p.50) and "The Grave of Rury" (pp.51-52). O’Connor remarks that Rory O’Connor, the subject of the latter, was actually buried at Clonmacnoise, not Cong.

Seamus Deane, gen. ed., Field Day Anthology of Irish Writing (Derry: Field Day 1991), Vol. 2 selects from Sea Spray, Verses and Translations, ‘The Dead at Clonmacnoise’; also Rolleston’s defence of the Treasury of Irish Poetry, and especially its preface by Stopford Brooke [also printed], in an exchange with D. P. Moran of The Leader, beginning with an editorial of 5 Jan. 1901, followed by Rolleston’s reply, 5 Jan. 1901. [969-975]. [BIOG, 779]

British Library lists [1] Modern Ireland and her Agrarian Problem [...] translated [...] by T. W. Rolleston.. 168pp. Hodges, Figgis & Co.: Dublin, 1906. 8o.[2] A Treasury of Irish Poetry in the English tongue. Edited by S. A. Brooke and T. W. Rolleston.. xliiipp. 578. Smith, Elder & Co.: London, 1900. 8o. [3] Prose Writings of Thomas Davis. Edited, with an introduction, by T. W. Rolleston.. xiv, 285pp. Walter Scott: London, [1890.] 8o. [4] Thomas Davis. Selections from his prose and poetry. Introduction by T. W. Rolleston. With a portrait and other illustrations.. xiv, 367pp. Gresham Publishing Co.: London, [1910?] 8o. [5] The Encheiridion of Epictetus. Translated from the Greek, with preface and notes, by T. W. H. Rolleston. xxix, 59pp. Kegan Paul & Co.: London, 1881. 8o. [6] The Teaching of Epictetus: being the ‘Encheiridion of Epictetus,’ with selections from the ‘Dissertations’ and ‘Fragments.’ Translated from the Greek, with introduction and notes, by T. W. Rolleston.. xxxix, 222pp. 1888. [7] The Teaching of Epictetus. Being the ‘Encheiridion of Epictetus’ with selections from the ‘Dissertations’ and ‘Fragments.’ Translated [...] with introduction and notes, by T. W. Rolleston.. xxxix, 222pp. 1891. [8] Because I am a German [...] Edited with an introduction by T. W. Rolleston.. 153pp. Constable & Co.: London, 1916. 8o. [9] Irland och Polen. [By T. W. H. Rolleston.] Översättning fran Engelskan.. 24pp. Stockholm, 1917. 8o. [10] An Address to the Irish People, by P. B. Shelley. Reprinted from the original edition of 1812. Edited by T. J. Wise, with an introduction by T. W. Rolleston.. 29. 22pp. London, 1890. 8o. [11] Lays of Country, Home and Friends. (Poems of Arthur O’Leary.) [With an introduction by T. W. H. Rolleston.]. xxxi, 100pp. Sealy, Bryers & Walker: Dublin, 1891. 8o. [12] Selections from Plato, from the translation of Sydenham and Taylor. Revised and edited by T. W. Rolleston. Including portions of the "Phaedrus," the "Republic," "Greater Hippias" and the "Banquet," together with the "Apology of Socrates," the "Crito," the "Phaedo" and the Seventh Epistle of Plato.. xxxii, 281pp. [1892.] [13] Portrait of an Irishman. A biographical sketch of T. W. Rolleston [...] 14 plates [including portraits].. xv, 189pp. Methuen & Co.: London, 1939. 8o. [14] Deirdre: the Feis Ceoil prize cantata, Dublin, 1897, etc.. 17pp. P. Geddes & Co.: Edinburgh, [1897.] 8o. [15] Imagination and Art in Gaelic Literature, being notes on some recent translations from the Gaelic. A lecture delivered [...] on February 16th, 1900.. 32pp. [1900.] [16] Ireland and Poland. A comparison. London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1917. 21p; 22cm [17] Ireland and Poland. A comparison.. 14pp. G. H. Doran Co.: New York, 1917. 8o. [18] Ireland’s Vanishing Opportunity.. 19pp. Talbot Press: Dublin; T. Fisher Unwin: London, 1919. 8o. [19] Lessing and Modern German Literature. [20] Thomas William Hazen Rolleston, Letters to Walt Whitman. With a portrait. Indiana University Publications. Humanities Series. no. 26. [21] Life of G. E. Lessing (Bibliography by J. P. Anderson.). 218, xvpp. 1889. [22] Life of Gotthold Ephraim Lessing.. Port Washington, London: Kennikat Press, 1972. ISBN 0 8046 1609 4 218, xv p. 21 cm. bibl. i-xiv [...]. [23]pp. Myths & Legends of the Celtic Race [...] With sixty-four full-page illustrations.. 456pp. George G. Harrap & Co.: London, 1911. 8o. [24] Parallel Paths: a study in biology, ethics, and art.. xv, 299pp. Duckworth & Co.: London, 1908. 8o. [25] Parsifal; or, the Legend of the Holy Grail. Retold from ancient sources with acknowledgement to the "Parsifal" of Richard Wagner by T. W. Rolleston. Presented by Willy Pogány. F.P.. Harrap & Co.: London, 1912. fol. [26] Sea Spray. Verses and translations.. 64pp. Maunsel & Co.: Dublin, 1909. 8o. [27] The High Deeds of Finn, and other Bardic romances of ancient Ireland [...] With an introduction by Stopford A. Brooke [...] and with sixteen illustrations by Stephen Reid.. lv, 214pp. George G. Harrap & Co.: London, 1910. 8o. [28] Three Love Tales after Richard Wagner. Tannhäuser, Lohengrin, Parsifal. [In verse.]. xv, 127pp. G. G. Harrap & Co.: London, 1920. 8o. [29] Walt Whitman. [By T. W. Rolleston.] [30] A Philosophical View of Reform [...] Now printed for the first time. Together with an introduction and appendix by T. W. Rolleston.. xi, 94pp. Humphrey Milford: London, 1920. 4o. [31] From the Land of Dreams (Irish poems.) [...] With an introduction by T. W. Rolleston.. xxii, 115pp., iv. Talbot Press: Dublin; T. Fisher Unwin: London, 1918. 8o [...]. [32] Tannhäuser [...] Freely translated in poetic narrative form by T. W. Rolleston. Presented by Willy Pogány.. G. G. Harrap & Co.: London, [1911.] 8o. [33] Tannhäuser [...] Translated [...] by T. W. Rolleston. Presented by Willy Pogány.. G. G. Harrap & Co.: London, [1927.] 4o. [34] The Tale of Lohengrin, Knight of the Swan, after the drama of Richard Wagner. By T. W. Rolleston. Presented by Willy Pogany. (Etched plate [...] by W. Pogany.). G. G. Harrap & Co.: London, [1913.] 8o. [35] Grashalme [...] In Auswahl übersetzt von K. Knortz und T. W. Rolleston.. xii, 180pp. Zürich, 1889. 8o.

Belfast Linenhall Library lists Myths and Legends of the Celtic Race; see also Lyra Celtica. Belfast Central Public Library holds High Deeds of Finn (1910, 1934); Myths and Legions of the Celtic Race (1918); Sea Spray (1909).

W. B. Yeats alluded to “Clonmacnoise” in the course of a Senate debate on the Electricity Bill, 1925, dealing with historic monuments, ‘There are many monuments which we should respect and which will become of great improtance to this country, not only to the education of the people, but to the tourists who come here. Therefore, they will be of financial value. There is a famous poem called "Clonmacnoise", which will be sung by the people of other countries. A poem of the late Mr Rolleston is so beautful that it will in all probability bring many tourists into that district if you can protect the ruins [quotes "In a quiet, watered land [...] Slumber there.’] I think I am the first person to quote a poem in the Seanad. I only do so because I am sure the poem will be, to use the appropriate words, "a definite asset". (The Senate Speeches of WB Yeats, ed. Donald Pearce, Indiana 1960; Faber 1961), p.89. Cf. punct. in Frank Tuohy, Yeats, 1976, p.42, ‘water’d’; ‘fair:’; ‘Slumber there ...’; continuing, ‘Many and many a son of Conn, the Hundred Fighter,/In the red earth lies at rest;/Many a blue eye of Clan Colman the turf covers,/Many a swan-white breast.’

John Eglinton, writing of Thomas Davis in his essay ‘Island of Saints’ (see Saints and Bards, 1906), mentions that ‘Mr T. W. Rolleston has called him "an ideal Irishman"‘, but that ‘an ideal editor’ is his truer designation. [See Eglinton, RX]

Charles Hubert Oldham, TCD don in whose rooms the policy of the new Dublin University Review, ed. by T. W. Rolleston, was discussed [SEE A N Jeffares, Yeats, A New Life (1988), p.21; p.70, &c.] for this, and an account of the fracas over the Irish Library.

Charles Henry Rolleston, Portrait of an Irishman (London: Methuen 1939), the author appears with his sister Thea and W. B. Yeats in a photo taken in Rolleston’s garden in Killiney in 1894; also printed in Tuohy (Yeats, 1976, p.74).

Christina Hunt [Mahony] completed a doctorate on Rolleston (UCD). There are allusions to Rolleston in the Irish Book Lover, Vols. 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 11, 13 & 20. For W. B. Yeats’s comments on Rolleston, see Douglas Archibald, John Butler Yeats [Irish Writers Series] (Lewisburg: Bucknell UP 1974), p.91. See also Michael McAteer , ‘“Kindness in Your Unkindness”: Lady Gregory and History’, in Irish University Review, Spring/Summer 2004), pp.94-108; espec. 97ff.

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Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)