George Moore

George Moore 1852-1933, English author, b. Ireland. As a young man he lived in Paris, studying at various art schools. Inspired by Zola, Flaubert, Turgenev, and the 19th-century French realists, Moore turned to writing, publishing his first novel, A Modern Lover, in 1883. A Mummer's Wife (1885), in portraying the degradation of a woman through alcohol, introduced naturalism into the Victorian novel. Moore's most famous novel, Esther Waters (1894), poignantly relates the poverty and hardships valiantly endured by a religious girl. Included among his other works are the novels Confessions of a Young Man (1888), Evelyn Innes (1898), Sister Teresa (1901), The Brook Kerith (1916), and Héloise and Abelard (1921); and the volumes of short stories Celibates (1895) and The Untilled Field (1903), the latter reminiscent of Dostoevsky. About 1900, Moore returned to Ireland and became associated with William Butler Yeats, George Russell (A. E.), and others in the Irish literary renaissance . His famous three-volume semi-autobiographical work, Hail and Farewell (1911-14), is a highly entertaining account of his experiences in Ireland.

Bibliography: See his letters, ed. by H. E. Gerber (1968); biographies by S. L. Mitchell (1916), J. Hone (1936, repr. 1973), and A. Frazier (2000); studies by J. Egleson (1973), R. A. Cave (1978), J. E. Dunleavy, ed. (1983), and J. Egleson, ed. (1983).

Moore, George (1852–1933). Anglo-Irish writer and painter, born in County Mayo. In 1873 he went to Paris intending to become a painter (he studied at the Académie Julian), but he realized that his talent lay in writing and eventually won fame as a novelist, notably with Esther Waters (1894). He remained in Paris for most of the 1870s and often returned afterwards. From 1880 to 1901 he divided his time mainly between London and Ireland, from 1901 to 1911 he lived in Dublin (where he was a leading figure of the Irish cultural renaissance), and then settled in London for the rest of his life. In Paris he was friendly with many of the leading French painters of the day (in 1911 he wrote ‘I am the only one in Dublin who knew Manet, Monet, Sisley, Renoir and Pissarro), and he was one of the first writers to introduce Impressionism to the English-speaking world (for example, his essay ‘Degas—The Painter of Modern Life', published in the Magazine of Art in September 1890, was the first article in English on this artist). He was art critic to the Speaker from 1891 to 1895 and also wrote for other journals; many of his articles were collected in his books Impressions and Opinions (1891) and Modern Painting (1893). His other books include Reminiscences of the Impressionist Painters (1906) and several volumes of autobiography. Such works are a lively commentary on a great age of French painting, but they are often inaccurate, and Julian Campbell writes that ‘Much of Moore's writing about art is superficial and repetitive’ (The Irish Impressionists, 1984). In his later years he turned increasingly against modern art. Moore owned a good collection of pictures and his portrait was painted by many of his artist friends, including Blanche, Manet, Orpen, Sickert, Tonks, and Jack Yeats.

Moore, George Augustus (1852–1933), Anglo-Irish novelist. He studied painting in Paris and the knowledge of French writing he gained there stood him in good stead when, returning to England c.1880, he set about revitalizing the Victorian novel with naturalistic and, later, realistic techniques borrowed from Balzac, Zola, and the Goncourts. His first novel, A Modern Lover (1883), set in artistic Bohemian society, was banned by the circulating libraries, a circumstance which confirmed Moore in his outspoken battle against prudery and censorship. It was followed by A Mummer's Wife (1885, set in the Potteries, which influenced Arnold Bennett); Esther Waters (1894), his most successful novel; Evelyn Innes (1898) and its sequel Sister Teresa (1901). The Untilled Field (1903) is a collection of short stories strongly influenced by Turgenev and Dostoevsky. In his later novels, e.g. The Brook Kerith (1916) and Heloïse and Abelard (1921), he aimed at epic effect. Confessions of a Young Man (1888), Memoirs of my Dead Life (1906), and Hail and Farewell (3 vols, 1911–14) are all autobiographical; the last is an important though unreliable source for the history of the Irish revival. Moore collaborated in the planning of the Irish National Theatre (see Abbey Theatre). His collection of short stories Celibate Lives (1927) shows the influence of Flaubert. The Ebury edition of Moore's works (20 vols, 1936–8) owes its name to 121 Ebury Street where he lived from 1911 until his death.