J. M. Barrie
Sir James Matthew Barrie, 1st Baronet, OM (9 May 1860 – 19 June 1937), more commonly known as J. M. Barrie, was a Scottish novelist and playwright. He is best remembered for his play Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Would Not Grow Up about Peter, Wendy and the Lost Boys of Never Never Land. It has been speculated that the story found its origins in an unconvential relationship that Barrie had with the Llewylyn Davies boys who he regaled with stories of pirates and their misadventures in Kensington Park. Critics have speculated that Peter Pan is autobiographical and reflects Barries' own troubled childhood. Regardless, the story has captivated millions whether in play or movie form and has provided a platform for the emergence of some of the greatest actors of the 20th century including: Mary Martin, Jean Arthur, Margaret Lockwood, Glynis Johns, Mia Farrow and gymnast, Cathy Rigby as Peter Pan. The nefarious pirate Captain Hook has been played by Charles Laughton, Boris Karloff, Alistair Sim, Cyril Ritchard and Dustin Hoffman. The timeless classic delights both children and adults with its theme of never leaving the innocent realm of childhood.
Biography
Born in Kirriemuir, Angus, the second youngest of ten children, Barrie was educated at Dumfries Academy, and the University of Edinburgh. He became a journalist in Nottingham, then London, and turned to writing novels and subsequently plays. J.M. Barrie's family were Scottish weavers; he was the ninth child of ten. When he was six, his brother David, his mother's favourite, died in a skating accident on the eve of his 14th birthday. His mother never recovered from the loss [citation needed]
Barrie was married to the actress Mary Ansell but it has been speculated that their marriage was platonic; it produced no children. The marriage ended in divorce which was highly stimagized in those times.
Made a baronet in 1913, Barrie lies buried at Kirriemuir next to his parents and one sister and a brother.
Literary career
Barrie set his first novels in his birthplace of Kirriemuir, which he referred to as "Thrums." Barrie often wrote dialogue in Scots. His Thrums novels were hugely successful: Auld Licht Idylls (1888), A Window in Thrums (1889), and The Little Minister (1891). His two "Tommy" novels, Sentimental Tommy (1896) and Tommy and Grizel (1902.
Barrie also wrote a number of works for the theatre, beginning with Ibsen's Ghost (1891), a parody of Henrik Ibsen's drama Ghosts
Barrie also authored the flop, Jane Annie (1893), which he begged his friend Arthur Conan Doyle to revise and finish. Notable successes included Quality Street (1901) and The Admirable Crichton (1902).
Barrie's most famous and enduring work, Peter Pan, had its first stage performance on December 27 1904.
Later plays included What Every Woman Knows (1908). His final play was The Boy David (1936), which dramatized the Biblical story of King Saul and the young David. Like the role of Peter Pan, that of David was played by a woman — Elisabeth Bergner.
Barrie, along with a number of other playwrights, was involved in the 1909 and 1911 attempts to challenge the censorship of the theatre by the Lord Chamberlain.
Influences
Barrie travelled in high literary circles, and had many famous friends. With Arthur Conan Doyle he wrote a failed musical. With Robert Louis Stevenson he conducted a long correspondence, but the two never met in person. George Bernard Shaw was for several years his neighbor, and once participated in a Western that Barrie scripted and filmed. Jerome K. Jerome introduced Barrie to his wife; H.G. Wells was a friend of many years. J.M. Barrie met Thomas Hardy through Hugh Clifford while he was staying in London. Conan Doyle, Jerome, Wells and other luminaries such as G. K. Chesterton and A.A. Milne also occasionally played cricket with a team founded by Barrie.
Barrie also befriended Antarctic explorer Robert Falcon Scott and was one of the seven recipients of letters that Scott wrote in the final hours of his life. [1] Another close friend of Barrie's, theater producer Charles Frohman, died famously, declining a lifeboat seat when the RMS Lusitania was sunk by a German U-boat in the North Atlantic, reportedly paraphrasing Peter Pan's final line from the stage play, "To die will be an awfully big adventure."
On several occasions he met and told stories to the little girl who would become Queen Elizabeth and her younger sister Princess Margaret.
Peter Pan
The Llewelyn Davies family consisted of parents Arthur (1863–1907) and Sylvia, née du Maurier (1866–1910) (daughter of George du Maurier), and their five sons George (1893–1915), John (1894-1959), Peter (1897–1960), Michael (1900–1921), and Nicholas (1903–1980).
Barrie became acquainted with the family in 1897 or 1898 after meeting George and Jack with their nurse (i.e nanny) Mary Hodgson in London's Kensington Gardens. He lived nearby and often walked his dog Porthos in the park. He met Sylvia, the mother, througha chance encounter at a dinner party.
He became a surrogate father to the boys, and when they were orphaned, he became their guardian. Sylvia Llewelyn Davies' specified in her will that Barrie be trustee and guardian to the boys, alongside her mother, her brother Guy Du-Maurier and Arthur Llewelyn Davies' brother Compton. Mary Hodgson, the boys' nurse continued caring for the boys until they were all in school and Jack was married. (Chaney, p. 285)
statue of Peter Pan.? Barrie is credited with popularizing the name "Wendy." The first appearance of Pan came in The Little White Bird (1901). In 1924 he specified that the copyright of the play should go to the nation's leading children's hospital, Great Ormond Street Hospital in London. The current status of the copyright is complex.
Criticism
Filmology
The BBC made an award-winning miniseries by Andrew Birkin, The Lost Boys at the Internet Movie Database (also titled J.M. Barrie and the Lost Boys), in 1978, starring Ian Holm as Barrie and Ann Bell as Sylvia. It is considered factual, includes Arthur Llewelyn Davies (Tim Piggot-Smith), and confronts the issue of Barrie's affection for the Davies boys. The DVD is available in both the UK and USA.
A semi-fictional movie about his relationship with the family, Finding Neverland, was released in November 2004, starring Johnny Depp as Barrie and Kate Winslet as Sylvia Llewelyn Davies. It omits Arthur and Nico
| Academic offices | ||
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| Preceded by: Field Marshall Sir Douglas Haig |
Rector of the University of St Andrews 1919 - 1922 |
Succeeded by: Rudyard Kipling |
ReferencesISBN links support NWE through referral fees
- Chaney, Lisa. Hide-and-Seek with Angels - A Life of J.M.Barrie (2005). London: Arrow Books ISBN 0312357796
- Silvey, Anita, ed. Children's Books and Their Creators. (1995) Houghton Mifflin Co.: New York ISBN 978-0-927663-37-3
- "James Matthew Barrie, (Sir)." St. James Guide to Fantasy Writers. St. James Press 1996. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale. 2007.
- "James Matthew Barrie, Sir." Encyclopedia of World Biography, 2nd ed. 17 Vols. Gale Research, 1998. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale. 2007.
- The Story of J.M.B. by Sewell Stokes, Theatre Arts, Vol.XXV No.11, New York: Theatre Arts Inc, Nov 1941, pp 845-848.
External links
- Works by J. M. Barrie. Project Gutenberg, Retrieved May 26, 2007.
- "Works by J. M. Barrie", eLook.org, Retrieved May 26, 2007.
- "Barrie's official website", J.M. Barrie.co.uk, Retrieved May 26, 2007.
- "French website", sirjmbarrie.com, Retrieved May 26, 2007.
- "Info on It Might Have Been Raining", Fiery Chariot, Retrieved May 26, 2007.
- "A biography", Books and Writers, Retrieved May 26, 2007.
- Cecil Adams, Chicago Reader, 2004:"Was the author of Peter Pan a pedophile?", The Straight Dope, Retrieved May 26, 2007.
- Anthony Lane, The New Yorker, 2004:"Why J.M. Barrie Created Peter Pan", The New Yorker, Retrieved May 26, 2007.
- "J. M. Barrie and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle", The Chronicles of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Retrieved May 26, 2007.
- "Further information about the Copyright for Peter Pan and Great Ormond Street Hospital", Great Ormond Street Hospital Children's Charity, Retrieved May 26, 2007.
- "J.M. Barrie", IMDb, Retrieved May 26, 2007.
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- ↑ Chaney, Lisa. Hide-and-Seek with Angels - A Life of J.M.Barrie, London: Arrow Books, 2005
