James Brander Matthews (February 21, 1852 – March 31, 1929) was an American academic, writer and literary critic. He was the first full-time professor of dramatic literature at Columbia University in New York and played a significant role in establishing theater as a subject worthy of formal study by academics. His interests ranged from
Shakespeare
William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...
,
Molière
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin (, ; 15 January 1622 (baptised) – 17 February 1673), known by his stage name Molière (, , ), was a French playwright, actor, and poet, widely regarded as one of the greatest writers in the French language and world ...
, and
Ibsen
Henrik Johan Ibsen (; ; 20 March 1828 – 23 May 1906) was a Norwegian playwright and theatre director. As one of the founders of modernism in theatre, Ibsen is often referred to as "the father of realism" and one of the most influential playw ...
to French boulevard comedies, folk theater, and the new realism of his own time.
Early life
Matthews born to a wealthy family in New Orleans, grew up in New York City.
He attended
Columbia College, graduating in 1871.
There, he was a member of the
Philolexian Society
The Philolexian Society of Columbia University is one of the oldest college literary and debate societies in the United States, and the oldest student group at Columbia. Founded in 1802, the Society aims to "improve its members in Oratory, Compo ...
and the fraternity of Delta Psi (St. Anthony Hall).
He graduated from
Columbia Law School
Columbia Law School (Columbia Law or CLS) is the law school of Columbia University, a private Ivy League university in New York City. Columbia Law is widely regarded as one of the most prestigious law schools in the world and has always ranked i ...
in 1873.
[Negus, W. H. (1900).]
Delta Ps
i". In Maxwell, W. J. (ed.). ''Greek Lettermen of Washington''. New York, New York: The Umbdenstock Publishing Co. pp. 231–234. However, he demonstrated no real interest in law and never really needed to work for a living.
Later, Matthews' father went bankrupt and the family fortune was lost.
However, his mother's money provided him with a comfortable living.
[Biographical information from this entry is taken from Matthews' autobiography.]
Career
Writing
Matthews began a literary career, writing novels, plays, short stories, books about drama, and biographies of actors during the 1880s and 1890. He wrote three books of sketches of city life. One of these, ''Vignettes of Manhattan'' (1894), was dedicated to his friend
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt Jr. ( ; October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), often referred to as Teddy or by his initials, T. R., was an American politician, statesman, soldier, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer who served as the 26t ...
.
Brander Matthews was a prolific and varied writer, author of more than thirty books. His own novels and plays are undistinguished and long-forgotten (the claim to fame of one of his plays is its footnote status in
Theodore Dreiser
Theodore Herman Albert Dreiser (; August 27, 1871 – December 28, 1945) was an American novelist and journalist of the naturalist school. His novels often featured main characters who succeeded at their objectives despite a lack of a firm mora ...
's novel ''
Sister Carrie
''Sister Carrie'' (1900) is a novel by Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945) about a young woman who moves to the big city where she starts realizing her own American Dream. She first becomes a mistress to men that she perceives as superior, but later ...
'': it is the melodrama, ''A Gold Mine'', which the character Carrie attends and which causes her to consider a drama career). Some of his surveys of American literature and drama sold very well as high-school and college texts. One of his earliest books, ''French Dramatists of the Nineteenth Century'' (1881), is a scholarly study of the subject and was revised and reprinted twice during two decades, while his 1919 autobiography, ''These Many Years'', is a story of an education in the arts by a man who lived a rich and productive life. It also offers an evocation of life in Manhattan c. 1860–1900. Matthews published a biography of Molière in 1910 and a biography of Shakespeare in 1913.
Teaching
From 1892 to 1900, he was a professor of literature at
Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
, becoming professor of Dramatic Literature until his retirement in 1924. He was known as an engaging lecturer and a charismatic, if demanding, teacher. His influence was such that a popular pun claimed that an entire generation had been "brandered by the same Matthews."
Matthews' students knew him as a man well-versed in the history of drama and as knowledgeable about continental dramatists as he was about American and British playwrights. Long before they were fashionable, he championed playwrights who were regarded as too bold for Americans, such as
Hermann Sudermann
Hermann Sudermann (30 September 1857 – 21 November 1928) was a German dramatist and novelist.
Life
Early career
Sudermann was born at Matzicken, a village to the east of Heydekrug in the Province of Prussia (now Macikai and Šilutė, i ...
,
Arthur Pinero, and preeminently
Henrik Ibsen
Henrik Johan Ibsen (; ; 20 March 1828 – 23 May 1906) was a Norwegian playwright and theatre director. As one of the founders of modernism in theatre, Ibsen is often referred to as "the father of realism" and one of the most influential playw ...
, about whom he wrote frequently and eloquently. His students also knew him as an opinionated man with somewhat conservative politics.
Playwright
S.N. Behrman
Samuel Nathaniel Behrman (; June 9, 1893 – September 9, 1973) was an American playwright, screenwriter, biographer, and longtime writer for ''The New Yorker''. His son is the composer David Behrman.
Biography
Early years
Behrman's parents, Z ...
, who studied with him during 1917, recalled in his memoirs, "One day I made the mistake of bringing into class a copy of
he liberal magazine''
The New Republic
''The New Republic'' is an American magazine of commentary on politics, contemporary culture, and the arts. Founded in 1914 by several leaders of the progressive movement, it attempted to find a balance between "a liberalism centered in hum ...
.'' I had, actually, a contribution in it. Matthews looked at ''The New Republic'' and said, 'I am sorry to see you wasting your time on that stuff.' As a staunch Republican and intimate of Theodore Roosevelt's, he had his duty to do." He could also be "easy and anecdotal", Behrman acknowledged, and he was respected on campus as a man-of-the-world. He taught that performance was the main art of drama, not the literary texts of plays.
Other students recalled him as a teacher who elicited "mingled affection and impatience" and who behaved in a manner that never attempted to hide his privileged life and connoisseurship. His relations with Columbia colleagues were sometimes adversarial. His conservatism became more pronounced during his later years: he was adamant about not admitting women to his graduate courses and publicly expressed the opinion that women did not have the natural ability to be great playwrights. According to
Mark Van Doren
Mark Van Doren (June 13, 1894 – December 10, 1972) was an American poet, writer and critic. He was a scholar and a professor of English at Columbia University for nearly 40 years, where he inspired a generation of influential writers and thin ...
, he taught an "ancient" American literature elective that he refused to revise over the decades. Not surprisingly, he was a natural target for the World War I-era generation of writers and activists. Reviewing Matthews' autobiography in 1917, the radical critic and fellow Columbia graduate
Randolph Bourne
Randolph Silliman Bourne (; May 30, 1886 – December 22, 1918) was a progressive writer and intellectual born in Bloomfield, New Jersey, and a graduate of Columbia University. He is considered to be a spokesman for the young radicals living du ...
complained that for Matthews, "literature was a gesture of gentility and not a comprehension of life". In his publication ''On Native Grounds'',
Alfred Kazin
Alfred Kazin (June 5, 1915 – June 5, 1998) was an American writer and literary critic. He wrote often about the immigrant experience in early twentieth century America.
Early life
Like many other New York Intellectuals, Alfred Kazin was t ...
characterized him as a "literary gentleman".
Matthews taught a number of students who later had major dramatic careers, including playwright Behrman and drama critics
Stark Young
Stark Young (October 11, 1881 – January 6, 1963) was an American teacher, playwright, novelist, painter, literary critic, translator, and essayist.
Early life
Stark Young was born on October 11, 1881 in Como, Mississippi. His father, Alfre ...
,
Ludwig Lewisohn
Ludwig Lewisohn (May 30, 1882 – December 31, 1955) was a novelist, literary critic, the drama critic for ''The Nation'' and then its associate editor. He was the editor of the New Palestine, an American Zionist journal. He taught at the Uni ...
, and
John Gassner
John Waldhorn Gassner (January 30, 1903 – April 2, 1967) was a Hungarian-born American theatre historian, critic, educator, and anthologist.
Early life and education
At birth in the town of Sighetu Marmației, Máramarossziget, Hungary (today ...
.
During his long tenure at Columbia University, Matthews created and curated a "dramatic museum" of costumes, scripts, props, and other stage memorabilia. Housed in a four-room complex in
Philosophy Hall
Philosophy Hall is a building on the campus of Columbia University in New York City. It houses the English, Philosophy, and French departments, along with the university's writing center, part of its registrar's office, and the student lounge of it ...
, the collection was divided and sold after his death. However, its books were incorporated into the university library and its dioramas of the
Globe Theatre
The Globe Theatre was a theatre in London associated with William Shakespeare. It was built in 1599 by Shakespeare's playing company, the Lord Chamberlain's Men, on land owned by Thomas Brend and inherited by his son, Nicholas Brend, and gra ...
and other historic dramatic venues have been dispersed for public display around campus, mainly in
Dodge Hall
Northeastern University (NU) is a private research university with its main campus in Boston. Established in 1898, the university offers undergraduate and graduate programs on its main campus as well as satellite campuses in Charlotte, North Ca ...
.
Despite his complacent persona during later years, wearing mutton-chop whiskers long after that style has passed, Matthews was always an intensely social man. He regularly invited students to his West End apartment for evenings of conversation. He retired from Columbia University in 1924 at the age of seventy-two.
Professional affiliations
Matthews had an active professional life off-campus. He was one of the founders of the
Authors' Club
The Authors' Club is a British membership organisation established as a place where writers could meet and talk. It was founded by the novelist and critic Walter Besant in 1891. It is headquartered at the National Liberal Club.
The Authors' Clu ...
and the
Players' Club
The Players (often inaccurately called The Players Club) is a private social club founded in New York City by the noted 19th-century Shakespearean actor Edwin Booth.
In 1888, Booth purchased an 1847 mansion at 16 Gramercy Park, reserved an ...
and was one of the organizers of the
American Copyright League. He was a member of the
American Academy of Arts and Letters
The American Academy of Arts and Letters is a 300-member honor society whose goal is to "foster, assist, and sustain excellence" in American literature, music, and art. Its fixed number membership is elected for lifetime appointments. Its headqu ...
and president of the
National Institute of Arts and Letters
The American Academy of Arts and Letters is a 300-member honor society whose goal is to "foster, assist, and sustain excellence" in American literature, music, and art. Its fixed number membership is elected for lifetime appointments. Its headqua ...
during 1913. In 1906, he was named the first chairman of the
Simplified Spelling Board
The Simplified Spelling Board was an American organization created in 1906 to reform the spelling of the English language, making it simpler and easier to learn, and eliminating many of what were considered to be its inconsistencies. The board oper ...
and served as president of the
Modern Language Association of America
The Modern Language Association of America, often referred to as the Modern Language Association (MLA), is widely considered the principal professional association in the United States for scholars of language and literature. The MLA aims to "st ...
during 1910.
Honors
* Matthews was the inspiration for the now-destroyed
Brander Matthews Theater on 117th Street, between
Amsterdam Avenue and
Morningside Drive.
* An English professorship with his name still exists at Columbia University.
* In 1907, the French government decorated him with the
Legion of Honor
The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon ...
for his services in promoting the cause of French drama.
Works
* ''The Theatres of Paris'' (1880)
* ''French Dramatists of the Nineteenth Century'' (1881, revised in 1891 and 1901)
* ''Margery's Lovers'' (1884)
* ''Love at First Sight'' (1885)
* ''Actors and Actresses of the United States and Great Britain'' (five volumes, 1886), with
Laurence Hutton
Laurence Hutton (August 8, 1843 – June 10, 1904) was an American essayist and critic.
Biography
Hutton was born in New York City on August 8, 1843, and educated privately there. He was an inveterate traveler and for about 20 years spent hi ...
* ''A Secret of the Sea'' (1886)
* ''The Last Meeting, A Story'' (1887)
* ''A Family Tree, and Other Stories'' (1889)
* ''In the Vestibule Limited'' (1892)
* ''A tale of twenty-five hours'' (1892) with George H. Jessop
* ''Tom Paulding : the story of a search for buried treasure in the streets of New York'' (1892)
* ''Americanisms and Briticisms'' (1892)
* ''The Decision of the Court'' (1893)
* ''The Story of a Story, and other Stories'' (1893)
* ''This picture and that : a comedy'' (1894)
* ''Vignettes of Manhattan'' (1894)
* ''Studies of the Stage'' (1894)
* ''Pen and ink : papers on subjects of more or less importance'' (1894)
* ''The Royal Marine: An Idyl of Narragansett Pier'' (1894) (Harper's New Monthly Magazine June 1894)
* ''The Gift of Story-Telling'' (1895) (Harper's New Monthly Magazine Oct 1895)
* ''His Father's Son'' (1895), a novel
* ''Bookbindings Old and New: Notes of a book-lover, with an account of the Grolier Club of New York'' (1895)
* ''Aspects of Fiction'' (1896; revised in 1902)
* ''An Introduction to the Study of American Literature'' (1896)
* ''Tales of Fantasy and Fact'' (1896)
* ''Studies in Local Color'' (1898)
* ''A Confident To-Morrow'' (1900)
* ''The Action and the Word'' (1900)
* ''The Historical Novel and Other Essays'' (1901)
* ''Parts of Speech, Essays on English'' (1901)
*
The Philosophy of the Short-Story' (1901)
*
''The Development of the Drama''(1903)
* ''American Character'' (1906)
* ''The Short Story'' (1907)
* ''Americans of the Future and Other Essays'' (1909)
* ''
Molière
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin (, ; 15 January 1622 (baptised) – 17 February 1673), known by his stage name Molière (, , ), was a French playwright, actor, and poet, widely regarded as one of the greatest writers in the French language and world ...
: His Life and Works'' (1910)
* ''Introduction to the Study of American literature'' (1911)
* ''Fugitives from Justice'' (1912) Poetry.
* ''Vistas of New York'' (1912)
* ''
Shakespeare
William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...
as a Playwright'' (1913)
* ''On Acting'' (1914)
* ''The Oxford Book of American Essays'' (1914)
* ''A Book About the Theater'' (1916)
* ''These Many Years'' (1917): autobiography
* ''Principles of Playmaking'' (1919)
* ''Playwrights on Playmaking'' (1923)
Personal life
Matthews married Ada Harland, an actress who had given up her career when they married. They had a daughter.
During the 1890s he was a charter member of an informal group known as "the Friendly Sons of Saint Bacchus", which met in a bohemian cafe in
Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village ( , , ) is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street to the north, Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the south, and the Hudson River to the west. Greenwich Village ...
for entertainment and readings. Other members of the group included the erudite and cosmopolitan critic
James Gibbons Huneker
James Gibbons Huneker (January 31, 1857 – February 9, 1921) was an American art, book, music, and theater critic. A colorful individual and an ambitious writer, he was "an American with a great mission," in the words of his friend, the critic Be ...
and the rowdy
Ashcan school
The Ashcan School, also called the Ash Can School, was an artistic movement in the United States during the late 19th-early 20th century that produced works portraying scenes of daily life in New York, often in the city's poorer neighborhoods.
...
painter
George Luks
George Benjamin Luks (August 13, 1867 – October 29, 1933) was an American artist, identified with the aggressively realistic Ashcan School of American painting.
After travelling and studying in Europe, Luks worked as a newspaper illustrator a ...
, two New Yorkers notorious for their alcohol drinking, whose presence would suggest that the "sons" were not devoted to purely intellectual pastimes.
Matthews was a member of the long-running
Gin Mill Club
Gin () is a distilled alcoholic drink that derives its flavour from juniper berries (''Juniperus communis'').
Gin originated as a medicinal liquor made by monks and alchemists across Europe, particularly in southern Italy, Flanders and the Ne ...
, a more exclusive informal organization whose members included Columbia University's president,
Nicholas Murray Butler
Nicholas Murray Butler () was an American philosopher, diplomat, and educator. Butler was president of Columbia University, president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, and the deceased Ja ...
, and numerous public officials equally devoted to fraternal evenings of conversation, good wine, and good food.
He was friends with many notable men, including.
Robert Louis Stevenson
Robert Louis Stevenson (born Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson; 13 November 1850 – 3 December 1894) was a Scottish novelist, essayist, poet and travel writer. He is best known for works such as ''Treasure Island'', ''Strange Case of Dr Jekyll a ...
,
Rudyard Kipling
Joseph Rudyard Kipling ( ; 30 December 1865 – 18 January 1936)''The Times'', (London) 18 January 1936, p. 12. was an English novelist, short-story writer, poet, and journalist. He was born in British India, which inspired much of his work.
...
,
Bret Harte
Bret Harte (; born Francis Brett Hart; August 25, 1836 – May 5, 1902) was an American short story writer and poet best remembered for short fiction featuring miners, gamblers, and other romantic figures of the California Gold Rush.
In a caree ...
,
Mark Twain
Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, entrepreneur, publisher, and lecturer. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has p ...
,
William Dean Howells
William Dean Howells (; March 1, 1837 – May 11, 1920) was an American realist novelist, literary critic, and playwright, nicknamed "The Dean of American Letters". He was particularly known for his tenure as editor of ''The Atlantic Monthly'', ...
, and
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt Jr. ( ; October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), often referred to as Teddy or by his initials, T. R., was an American politician, statesman, soldier, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer who served as the 26t ...
. His relationship with Twain had a bantering quality; in his famous essay "
Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses
"Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses" is an 1895 essay by Mark Twain, written as a satire and criticism of the writings of James Fenimore Cooper. It draws on examples from ''The Deerslayer'' and '' The Pathfinder'' from Cooper's Leatherstocking T ...
," Twain lambasted Matthews' statements concerning Cooper's literary merits). Matthews' correspondence with Roosevelt, which extended from the 1880s through the White House years, was published posthumously. They shared a temperamental affinity as well as an interest in the cause of simplified spelling.
[Nathan Miller, ''Theodore Roosevelt: A Life'' (New York: William Morrow, 1992), PP. 422-423.]
In 1929, he died in New York City five years after his retirement.
References
Sources
*
Green, Ashbel (ed.). ''My Columbia: Reminiscences of University Life.'' New York: Columbia University Press, 2005.
*Matthews, Brander. ''These Many Years: Recollections of a New Yorker.'' New York: Scribner, 1919.
*Oliver, Lawrence J. ''Brander Matthews, Theodore Roosevelt, and the Politics of American Literature, 1880-1920.'' Knoxville: University of Tennessee, 1995.
*Stein, Howard
"Brander Matthews and Theater Studies at Columbia."''Living Legacies: Columbia University of the City of New York.'' in ''Columbia Magazine'', Spring 2002
Further reading
*
External links
*
*
*
*
Finding aid to Brander Matthews papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.Finding aid to the Brander Matthews Dramatic Museum records at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.Finding aid to the Dramatic Museum realia collection at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.Finding aid to the Milton Smith script collection, 1927-1946, at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Matthews, Brander
American autobiographers
American essayists
1852 births
1929 deaths
Members of the American Academy of Arts and Letters
Columbia University faculty
Columbia College (New York) alumni
St. Anthony Hall
Presidents of the Modern Language Association