Early Memories: Some Chapters of Autobiography

by John Butler Yeats

1923. This little book contains an intriguing and notably well-written autobiographical account of John Butler Yeats, the father of William Butler Yeats the Irish poet and dramatist. John Yeats was a notable artist in his own right and this historical account of his life will grab the reader's attention.

98 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1923

About the author

John Butler Yeats (16 March 1839 – 3 February 1922) was an Irish artist and the father of William Butler Yeats and Jack B. Yeats (born John). He is probably best known for his portrait of the young William Butler Yeats which is one of a number of his portraits of Irishmen and women in the Yeats museum in the National Gallery of Ireland. His portrait of John O'Leary (1904) is considered his masterpiece (Raymond Keaveney 2002).

Yeats was born in Lawrencetown, townland of Tullylish, County Down. His parents were William Butler Yeats (1806–1862) and Jane Grace Corbert, John Butler Yeats was the eldest of nine children. Educated in Trinity College Dublin and a member of the University Philosophical Society, John Butler Yeats began his career as a lawyer and devilled briefly with Isaac Butt before he took up painting in 1867 and studied at the Heatherley School of Fine Art. There are few records of his sales, so there is no catalogue of his work in private collections. It is possible that some of his early work may have been destroyed by fire in World War II. It is clear that he had no trouble getting commissions as his sketches and oils are found in private homes in Ireland, England and America. His later portraits show great sensitivity to the sitter. However, he was a poor businessman and was never financially secure. He moved house frequently and shifted several times between England and Ireland. At the age of 69 he moved to New York, where he was friendly with members of the Ashcan School of painters. He is buried in Chestertown Rural Cemetery in Chestertown, New York, next to his friend, Jeanne Robert Foster.

Reviews

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Free download available at Project Gutenberg

I made the proofing of this book for Free Literature and Project Gutenberg will publish it.

Opening lines:
My father died in New York on February 2nd, 1922, at the end of his eighty second year. He died after a few hours illness brought on, as it seemed, by a long walk in the cold of a New York winter. He awoke in the middle of the night to find his friends Mrs Foster and Mr John Quinn sitting beside his bed and after a few words of pleasure at the sight said to Mrs Foster 'Remember you have promised me a sitting in the morning.' ...

Preface by W. B. Yeats

[Frazt Des · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sensitive young Man in 1850s Ireland