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Ernest Rhys
Ernest Percival Rhys (/riːs/ REESS; 17 July 1859 – 25 May 1946) was a Welsh-English writer, best known for his role as founding editor of the Everyman's Library series of affordable classics. He wrote essays, stories, poetry, novels and plays.
Rhys was born in Islington in north London, the son of John Rees (his spelling) and his English wife Emma Percival of Hockerill. Shortly afterwards his father set up in the wine and spirits trade, working for Walter Gilbey in premises in Nott Square, Carmarthen, where before marriage he had been in training for the ministry. The family was in Carmarthen for a number of years, and had a Welsh-speaking maid. In 1865 John Rees was transferred to another Gilbey shop, in Newcastle upon Tyne.
After home education with a governess, Rhys spent two years at Bishop's Stortford Grammar School as a boarder, leaving in poor health. He then attended a Newcastle school run by a German master, acquiring some German and French. He then spent a desultory period working in his father's office. In 1876 he took up an apprenticeship as a mining engineer, or "coal viewer". Against the wishes of his father, Rhys did not apply to the University of Oxford.
Rhys worked through his apprenticeship in the Durham coalfield. He passed his mining engineer examination. At this period he lived in a pit village in Lower Weardale, and wrote extensively, poetry and prose, without being published. He set up a library, a book group and a programme of lectures. He described the miners' life in his story collection Black Horse Pit (1925).
On his own account, Rhys owed his first literary commission, and his interest in poetry, to Joseph Skipsey, whom he knew in Newcastle in the early 1880s. He was employed by the Walter Scott Publishing Co. of Newcastle. Initially he edited the works of George Herbert for its Canterbury Poets series. After that he was employed doing editorial work on its Camelot Series, of reprints and translations. Rhys later wrote that the approach was based on the mistaken idea that he was the academic John Rhys.
Rhys had connections to the Fabian Society, and the Socialist League led by William Morris, though he did not join the League. He was a friend of Percival Chubb (1860–1960), eventually President of the American Ethical Union. In his early life, Chubb was a disciple of Thomas Davidson, founder of the Fellowship of the New Life, and indirectly of the Fabian Society. Chubb with Rhys at the start of the 1880s mixed in these circles, and also with the Social Democratic Federation. Rhys kept up during the decade with socialists such as Edward Carpenter.
Rhys was one of a number of British socialists who visited Walt Whitman; it followed a postal introduction in 1885 by William Michael Rossetti.
Turning to writing in London as a profession from 1886, Rhys built up a steady reputation as a reviewer for periodicals. The American journey on which the meeting with Walt Whitman occurred is described in Everyman Remembers, Rhys's autobiography. It was also the occasion of his encounter with Edmund Clarence Stedman in New York, and dates to 1887/8. He and Stedman became correspondents. In 1890, he was sharing rooms in Hampstead with Arthur Symons.
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Ernest Rhys
Ernest Percival Rhys (/riːs/ REESS; 17 July 1859 – 25 May 1946) was a Welsh-English writer, best known for his role as founding editor of the Everyman's Library series of affordable classics. He wrote essays, stories, poetry, novels and plays.
Rhys was born in Islington in north London, the son of John Rees (his spelling) and his English wife Emma Percival of Hockerill. Shortly afterwards his father set up in the wine and spirits trade, working for Walter Gilbey in premises in Nott Square, Carmarthen, where before marriage he had been in training for the ministry. The family was in Carmarthen for a number of years, and had a Welsh-speaking maid. In 1865 John Rees was transferred to another Gilbey shop, in Newcastle upon Tyne.
After home education with a governess, Rhys spent two years at Bishop's Stortford Grammar School as a boarder, leaving in poor health. He then attended a Newcastle school run by a German master, acquiring some German and French. He then spent a desultory period working in his father's office. In 1876 he took up an apprenticeship as a mining engineer, or "coal viewer". Against the wishes of his father, Rhys did not apply to the University of Oxford.
Rhys worked through his apprenticeship in the Durham coalfield. He passed his mining engineer examination. At this period he lived in a pit village in Lower Weardale, and wrote extensively, poetry and prose, without being published. He set up a library, a book group and a programme of lectures. He described the miners' life in his story collection Black Horse Pit (1925).
On his own account, Rhys owed his first literary commission, and his interest in poetry, to Joseph Skipsey, whom he knew in Newcastle in the early 1880s. He was employed by the Walter Scott Publishing Co. of Newcastle. Initially he edited the works of George Herbert for its Canterbury Poets series. After that he was employed doing editorial work on its Camelot Series, of reprints and translations. Rhys later wrote that the approach was based on the mistaken idea that he was the academic John Rhys.
Rhys had connections to the Fabian Society, and the Socialist League led by William Morris, though he did not join the League. He was a friend of Percival Chubb (1860–1960), eventually President of the American Ethical Union. In his early life, Chubb was a disciple of Thomas Davidson, founder of the Fellowship of the New Life, and indirectly of the Fabian Society. Chubb with Rhys at the start of the 1880s mixed in these circles, and also with the Social Democratic Federation. Rhys kept up during the decade with socialists such as Edward Carpenter.
Rhys was one of a number of British socialists who visited Walt Whitman; it followed a postal introduction in 1885 by William Michael Rossetti.
Turning to writing in London as a profession from 1886, Rhys built up a steady reputation as a reviewer for periodicals. The American journey on which the meeting with Walt Whitman occurred is described in Everyman Remembers, Rhys's autobiography. It was also the occasion of his encounter with Edmund Clarence Stedman in New York, and dates to 1887/8. He and Stedman became correspondents. In 1890, he was sharing rooms in Hampstead with Arthur Symons.