Thomas Sturge Moore (4 March 1870 – 18 July 1944) was a British poet, author and artist.

Biography

Sturge Moore was born at 3 Wellington Square, Hastings, East Sussex, on 4 March 1870 and educated at

Dulwich College Dulwich College is a 2–19 independent, day and boarding school for boys in Dulwich, London, England. As a public school, it began as the College of God's Gift, founded in 1619 by Elizabethan actor Edward Alleyn, with the original purpose of ...

, the

Croydon School of Art Croydon College is a large further and higher education college located in Croydon, within the London Borough of Croydon. Its origins can be traced to a School of Art that was established in 1868, which subsequently merged with Croydon Polytechnic ...

and

Lambeth School of Art Founded in 1854 as the Lambeth School of Art, the City and Guilds of London Art School is a small specialist art college located in central London, England. Originally founded as a government art school, it is now an independent, not-for-profit ...

. In Lambeth he studied under the wood-engraver Charles Roberts. He was a long-term friend and correspondent of

W. B. Yeats William Butler Yeats (13 June 186528 January 1939) was an Irish poet, dramatist, writer and one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. He was a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival and became a pillar of the Irish liter ...

, who was to describe him as "one of the most exquisite poets writing in England". He was also a playwright, writing a ''

Medea In Greek mythology, Medea (; grc, Μήδεια, ''Mēdeia'', perhaps implying "planner / schemer") is the daughter of King Aeëtes of Colchis, a niece of Circe and the granddaughter of the sun god Helios. Medea figures in the myth of Jason an ...

'' influenced by Yeats' drama and the Japanese

Noh is a major form of classical Japanese dance-drama that has been performed since the 14th century. Developed by Kan'ami and his son Zeami, it is the oldest major theatre art that is still regularly performed today. Although the terms Noh and ' ...

style. As a wood-engraver and artist he designed the covers for poetry editions of Yeats and others, as well as illustrating books for the Vale Press of Charles Ricketts.Untermeyer, Louis, ''Modern British Poetry'', Doubleday and Page & Co, 1920 He was a prolific poet and his subjects included morality, art and the spirit writing in a 'severely classical tone', according to poet/critic

Yvor Winters Arthur Yvor Winters (October 17, 1900 – January 25, 1968) was an American poet and literary critic. Life Winters was born in Chicago, Illinois and lived there until 1919 except for brief stays in Seattle and in Pasadena, where his grandparen ...

. His first pamphlet, ''Two Poems'', was printed privately in 1893 and his first book of verse, ''The Vinedresser'', was published in 1899. His love for poetry led him to become an active member of the Poetry Recital Society. In 1901, Moore, with Yeats,

Laurence Binyon Robert Laurence Binyon, CH (10 August 1869 – 10 March 1943) was an English poet, dramatist and art scholar. Born in Lancaster, England, his parents were Frederick Binyon, a clergyman, and Mary Dockray. He studied at St Paul's School, London ...

Charles Ricketts Charles de Sousy Ricketts (2 October 1866 – 7 October 1931) was a British artist, illustrator, author and printer, known for his work as a book designer and typographer and for his costume and scenery designs for plays and operas. Ricketts ...

, and Ethel and

Sybil Pye Sybil Pye (18 November 1879 – 1958) was a self-trained British bookbinder famous for her distinctive inlay Art Deco leather bindings. She was, along with Katharine Adams and Sarah Prideaux, one of the most famous women bookbinders of their per ...

, formed the Literary Theatre Club. Moore's first (of 31) play to be produced, a copyright reading of ''Aphrodite against Artemis'', was the first production staged by the club, at the Dalston Theatre on 30 July 1901. Yeats described the play as "powerful with a beautiful constrained passion." In 1913 Moore nominated Rabindranath Tagore the Indian poet for the Nobel Prize in literature. Moore received a

civil list pension Pensions in the United Kingdom, whereby United Kingdom tax payers have some of their wages deducted to save for retirement, can be categorised into three major divisions - state, occupational and personal pensions. The state pension is based on ...

of £75 per annum in 1920 in recognition of his contribution to literature. In 1930 he was nominated as one of seven candidates for the position of

Poet Laureate A poet laureate (plural: poets laureate) is a poet officially appointed by a government or conferring institution, typically expected to compose poems for special events and occasions. Albertino Mussato of Padua and Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch) ...

. He suffered from chronic ill health, suffering a series of heart attacks in 1942 and 1943, and died on 18 July 1944 at a convalescent home, St Andrews Cottage in

Clewer Clewer (also known as Clewer Village) is an ecclesiastical parish and an area of Windsor, Berkshire, Windsor in the county of Berkshire, England. Clewer makes up three Ward (electoral subdivision), wards of the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maid ...

Windsor, Berkshire Windsor is a historic market town and unparished area in the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead in Berkshire, England. It is the site of Windsor Castle, one of the official residences of the British monarch. The town is situated west of ...

, from a kidney infection following a prostate operation. He was cremated at

Woking Woking ( ) is a town and borough status in the United Kingdom, borough in northwest Surrey, England, around from central London. It appears in Domesday Book as ''Wochinges'' and its name probably derives from that of a Anglo-Saxon settlement o ...

. His ashes were scattered near

Petersfield Petersfield is a market town and civil parish in the East Hampshire district of Hampshire, England. It is north of Portsmouth. The town has its own railway station on the Portsmouth Direct line, the mainline rail link connecting Portsmouth a ...

in August 1953.

Family

Sturge Moore adopted the use of his middle name 'Sturge' (his mother's family name) as a way of avoiding confusion with the poet

Thomas Moore Thomas Moore (28 May 1779 – 25 February 1852) was an Irish writer, poet, and lyricist celebrated for his ''Irish Melodies''. Their setting of English-language verse to old Irish tunes marked the transition in popular Irish culture from Irish ...

. On 26 November 1903 Moore married Marie Appia, niece of

Louis Appia Louis Paul Amédée Appia (13 October 1818 – 1 May 1898) was a Swiss surgeon with special merit in the area of military medicine. In 1863 he became a member of the Geneva "Committee of Five", which was the precursor to the International Committe ...

, a founder of the

International Committee of the Red Cross The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC; french: Comité international de la Croix-Rouge) is a humanitarian organization which is based in Geneva, Switzerland, and it is also a three-time Nobel Prize Laureate. State parties (signato ...

, and cousin of the Swiss stage designer

Adolphe Appia Adolphe Appia (1 September 1862 – 29 February 1928), son of Red Cross co-founder Louis Appia, was a Swiss architect and theorist of stage lighting and décor. Early life Adolphe Appia was raised in Geneva, Switzerland, in a "strictly Calvinis ...

. They had two children: Daniel Sturge-Moore, journalist and broadcaster; and Henriette Sturge-Moore, prominent theatre designer, teacher and interior decorator. Moore was the brother of the Bloombury philosopher

George Edward Moore George Edward Moore (4 November 1873 – 24 October 1958) was an English philosopher, who with Bertrand Russell, Ludwig Wittgenstein and earlier Gottlob Frege was among the founders of analytic philosophy. He and Russell led the turn from ideal ...

, one of the founders of the Analytic tradition in philosophy, and uncle of

Nicholas Moore Nicholas Moore (16 November 1918 – 26 January 1986) was an English poet, associated with the New Apocalyptics in the 1940s, whose reputation stood as high as Dylan Thomas’s. He later dropped out of the literary world. Biography Moore wa ...

New Apocalyptics The New Apocalyptics were a poetry grouping in the United Kingdom in the 1940s, taking their name from the anthology ''The New Apocalypse'' (1939), which was edited by J. F. Hendry (1912–1986) and Henry Treece. There followed the further antholog ...

poet of the 1940s, and of the composer Timothy Moore.Hodges, S, (1981), ''God's Gift: A Living History of Dulwich College'', pp. 87-88 (Heinemann: London)

Works

*''Two Poems'', 1893 *''The Vinedresser and Other Poems'', 1899 *''The Centaur and the Bacchant. From the French by Maurice de Guerin'', 1899 *''Altdorfer'', 1900 *''Aphrodite Against Artemis'', 1901 (play) *''Absalom'', 1903 (poems) *''Danäe'', 1903 (poems) *''Durer'', 1904 *''The Little School'', 1905 (poems) *''Poems'', 1906 *''Correggio'', 1906 *''Art and Life (Flaubert and Blake)'', 1910 *''Mariamne'', 1911 (poems) *''A Sicilian Idyll and Judith: A Conflict'', 1911 (play) *''The Sea is Kind'', 1914 (collection of 69 poems) *''The Wilderness,'' 1915 (poetic drama) *''Medea'', 1920 (play) *''Tragic Mothers: Medea, Niobe, Tyrfing'', 1920 (play) *''Mystery and Tragedy: Two Dramatic Poems'', 1930 (play) *''Nine Poems'', 1930 *''Wind's Work'',(poem)

References

External links

"Sturge Moore and the Life of Art"
by Frederick L. Gwynn (University of Kansas Press, Lawrence, 1951). 159 pages, includes "A Bibliography of Sturge Moore." Open access full-text PDF file available from the

University of Kansas The University of Kansas (KU) is a public research university with its main campus in Lawrence, Kansas, United States, and several satellite campuses, research and educational centers, medical centers, and classes across the state of Kansas. Tw ...

.
Papers of Thomas Sturge Moore in Senate House Library, University of London
* *
''The Wilderness'' (1915) at Great War TheatreStuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library
Emory University
T. Sturge Moore collection, 1928-1934
{{DEFAULTSORT:Moore, Thomas Sturge People educated at Dulwich College Alumni of the Lambeth School of Art Alumni of Croydon College 1870 births 1944 deaths English dramatists and playwrights English wood engravers English male dramatists and playwrights English male poets People from Hastings

Biography

Family

Works

See also

References

External links