Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
James Joyce
-
Standard Name: Joyce, James
Irish exile JJ
, hailed by Yeats
as a new kind of novelist even before his first novel was published, became one of the leading practitioners of modernism. As well as poems, a play, and a volume of short stories, he produced three important novels, from the last of which he put out several separate sections long before the whole appeared. Joyce encountered obstacles to publishing almost all his books, raised by censors both official and self-appointed. Without the tireless patronage of Harriet Shaw Weaver
and Sylvia Beach
, his last two books might never have been published at all.
In January 1916, after the serialization of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man had ended, HSW
privately back-paid Joyce
£50, insisting that the money was from the journal, which it was not...
Residence
Harriet Shaw Weaver
In May 1934, faulty wiring in the flat below hers caused an electrical fire in the building. HSW
's first editions were protected by her glass-fronted bookcase, but other precious books and mementoes such as...
Occupation
Harriet Shaw Weaver
In November 1915, after Joyce
's novel had been rejected by various publishers, HSW
offered to publish it. But it was difficult for her to find a printer who was not frightened by the prospect...
Occupation
Harriet Shaw Weaver
Writer and suffragist Iris Barry
, summarizing a general admiration for HSW
on the part of Soho writers (Pound, Eliot, Wyndham Lewis, Violet Hunt
, and others), coined the phrase, the lion-hearted Miss Weaver who...
Occupation
Harriet Shaw Weaver
In August 1921, while she waited for Ulysses' appearance, HSW
obtained the rights to all of Joyce
's publications: Chamber Music from Elkin Mathews
, and Dubliners and Exiles from Grant Richards
. Joyce...
Occupation
Harriet Shaw Weaver
Ulysses grossed £2,608 and netted £1,637. Joyce
received royalties of £1,636.
Lidderdale, Jane, and Mary Nicholson. Dear Miss Weaver. Viking.
234, 462
Occupation
Harriet Shaw Weaver
The relevant clause in his will states: I leave all my manuscripts to Harriet Shaw Weaver and direct that she have sole decision in all literary matters relating to my writings published and unpublished.
Lidderdale, Jane, and Mary Nicholson. Dear Miss Weaver. Viking.
305
Friends, Associates
Harriet Shaw Weaver
Her friendship with Dora Marsden
remained constant until Marsden's mental health deteriorated. Marsden was one of the few people who knew and addressed HSW
by her pseudonym, Josephine Wright. After Weaver closed down the...
Friends, Associates
Harriet Shaw Weaver
Before meeting James Joyce
but after becoming his patron, HSW
envisaged him as noble and ascetic. She was upset when in 1921 Wyndham Lewis
depicted Joyce to her as a drunken spendthrift. Joyce countered these...
Occupation
Harriet Shaw Weaver
Largely through the efforts of HSW
, Ben Huebsch
printed James Joyce
's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man for the Egoist Press
, as the firm's inaugural publication.
Lidderdale, Jane, and Mary Nicholson. Dear Miss Weaver. Viking.
128
death
Harriet Shaw Weaver
Samuel Beckett
, hearing of the news in Paris, remarked to Sylvia Beach
: I . . . shall think of her when I think of goodness.
Lidderdale, Jane, and Mary Nicholson. Dear Miss Weaver. Viking.
455
Having dedicated her life to English...
Occupation
Harriet Shaw Weaver
HSW
contracted with the Complete Press
to print the second and third instalments of James Joyce
's Ulysses (Nestor and Proteus) for The Egoist; but fear of prosecution soon made them pull out.
Lidderdale, Jane, and Mary Nicholson. Dear Miss Weaver. Viking.
155
Textual Production
Harriet Shaw Weaver
From her experiences with the problems of publishing James Joyce
, HSW
concludes, we have in working practice in England a printer's censorship much more drastic than that of the official censorship itself.
Lidderdale, Jane, and Mary Nicholson. Dear Miss Weaver. Viking.
164
The...
Occupation
Harriet Shaw Weaver
James Joyce
asked HSW
to be his literary executrix, although he was five years the younger.
Lidderdale, Jane, and Mary Nicholson. Dear Miss Weaver. Viking.
305
Reception
Harriet Shaw Weaver
In 1932Eliot
dedicated his Selected Essays to HSW
: in gratitude and in recognition of her services to English letters.
Lidderdale, Jane, and Mary Nicholson. Dear Miss Weaver. Viking.