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JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN (1803-1849)

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Originally appearing in Volume V17, Page 569 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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JAMES See also:CLARENCE See also:MANGAN (1803-1849)  , Irish poet, was See also:born in See also:Dublin on the 1st of May 1803 . His baptismal name was See also:James, the " See also:Clarence" being his own addition . His See also:father, a See also:grocer, who boasted of the terror with which he inspired his See also:children, had ruined himself by imprudent See also:speculation and extravagant hospitality . The See also:burden of supporting the See also:family See also:fell on James, who entered a scrivener's See also:office, at the See also:age of fifteen, and drudged as a copying clerk for ten years . He was employed for some See also:time in the library of Trinity See also:College, and in 1833 he found a See also:place in the Irish See also:Ordnance Survey . He suffered a disappointment in love, and continued See also:ill See also:health drove him to the use of See also:opium . He was habitually the victim of hallucinations which at times threatened his See also:reason . For See also:Charles See also:Maturin, the See also:eccentric author of Melmoth, he cherished a deep admiration, the results of which are evident in his See also:prose stories . He belonged to the See also:Comet See also:Club, a See also:group of youthful enthusiasts who carried on See also:war in their See also:paper, the Comet, against the levying of See also:tithes on behalf of the See also:Protestant See also:clergy . Contributions to the Dublin See also:Penny See also:Journal followed; and to the Dublin University See also:Magazine he sent See also:translations from the See also:German poets . The mystical tendency of German See also:poetry had a See also:special See also:appeal for him . He See also:chose poems that were attuned to his own See also:melancholy temperament, and did much that was excellent in this See also:field .

He also wrote versions of old Irish poems, though his knowledge of the See also:

language, at any See also:rate at the beginning of his career, was but slight . Some of his best-known Irish poems, however, O'Hussey's See also:Ode to the Maguire, for instance, follow the originals very closely . Besides these were " translations " from Arabic, See also:Turkish and See also:Persian . How much of these See also:languages he knew is uncertain, but he had read widely in See also:Oriental subjects, and some of the poems are exquisite though the See also:original authors whom he cites are frequently mythical . He took a mischievous See also:pleasure in mystifying his readers, and in practising extraordinary metres . For the Nation he wrote from the beginning (1842) of its career, and much of his best See also:work appeared in it . He afterwards contributed to the See also:United Irishman . On the loth of See also:June 1849 he died at See also:Meath See also:Hospital, Dublin, of See also:cholera . It was alleged at the time that See also:starvation was the real cause . This statement was untrue, but there is no doubt that his wretched poverty made him ill able to withstand disease . See also:Mangan holds a high place among Irish poets, but his fame was deferred by the inequality and See also:mass of his work, much of which See also:lay buried in inaccessible newspaper files under his many pseudonyms, " Vacuus," " Terrae Filius," " Clarence," &c . Of his See also:genius, morbid though it sometimes is, as in his tragic autobiographical ballad of The Nameless One, there can be no question .

He expressed with rare sincerity the tragedy of Irish hopes and aspirations, and he furnished abundant See also:

proof of his versatility in his excellent nonsense verses, which are in See also:strange contrast with the See also:general trend of his work . An autobiography which appeared in the Irish Monthly (1882) does not reproduce the real facts of his career with any fidelity . For some time after his See also:death there was no adequate edition of his See also:works, but German See also:Anthology (1845), and The Poets and Poetry of See also:Munster (1849) had appeared during his lifetime . In 185o See also:Hercules See also:Ellis included See also:thirty of his See also:ballads in his Romances and Ballads of See also:Ireland . Other selections appeared subsequently, notably one (1897), by See also:Miss L . I . Guiney . The Poems of James Clarence Magan (1903),, and the Prose Writings (1904), were both edited by D . J . O'Donoghue, who wrote in 1897 a See also:complete See also:account of the See also:Life and Writings of the poet .

End of Article: JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN (1803-1849)
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