Beers, Henry A(ugustin) 1847-1926

views updated

BEERS, Henry A(ugustin) 1847-1926

PERSONAL: Born July 2, 1847, in Buffalo, NY; died September 7, 1926, in New Haven, CT; son of George Webster and Elizabeth Victoria (Clerc) Beers; married Mary Heaton, July 7, 1873; children: Thomas, Elizabeth, Katherine, Frederick, Dorothy, Mary, Henry, Donald. Education: Yale University, B.A., 1869; studied law in New York, NY, 1869; attended University of Heidelberg, 1876; attended Bronson Alcott's School of Philosophy, 1877.

CAREER: Author and educator. Yale University, New Haven, CT, tutor of English literature, 1871-74; assistant professor, 1875-80; professor of English, 1880-1916; professor emeritus, 1916-26. Admitted to the Bar of New York state, 1870.

MEMBER: Phi Beta Kappa, Kappa Sigma Epsilon, Alpha Delta Phi, Skull and Bones, Elizabethan Club of New Haven, CT, Author's Club of New York City.

AWARDS, HONORS: Honorary M.A., Yale University, 1887.

WRITINGS:

Odds and Ends: Verses Humorous, Occasional, and Miscellaneous, Houghton, Osgood (Boston, MA), 1878.

(Editor) A Century of American Literature 1776-1876, Holt (New York, NY), 1878.

Nathaniel Parker Willis, Houghton, Mifflin (Boston, MA and New York, NY), 1885.

The Thankless Muse, Houghton, Mifflin (Boston, MA and New York, NY), 1885.

An Outline Sketch of English Literature, Chautauqua Press (New York, NY), 1886, published as From Chaucer to Tennyson: English Literature in Eight Chapters, with Selections from Thirty Authors, Chautauqua Press (New York, NY), 1890.

An Outline Sketch of American Literature, Chautauqua Press (New York, NY), 1887, published as Initial Studies in American Letters, Chautauqua Press (New York, NY), 1891, published as Studies in American Letters, Jacobs (Philadelphia, PA), 1895, published as A Short History of American Literature, Unwin (London, England), 1906.

(Editor and author of introduction) Selections from the Prose Writings of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Holt (New York, NY), 1893.

A Suburban Pastoral, and Other Tales, Holt (New York, NY), 1894.

The Ways of Yale in the Consulship of Plancus, Holt (New York, NY), 1895.

Brief History of English and American Literature, Eaton & Mains (New York, NY), 1897.

A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century, Holt (New York, NY), 1899.

A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century, Holt (New York, NY), 1901.

Points at Issue and Some Other Points, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1904.

Milton's Tercentenary: An Address Delivered before the Modern Language Club at Yale University on Milton's Three Hundredth Birthday, Yale University Press (New Haven, CT), 1910.

The Two Twilights, Badger (Boston, MA), 1917.

(Editor and author of foreword) Afterglow, Yale University Press (New Haven, CT), 1918.

Four Americans: Roosevelt, Hawthorne, Emerson, Whitman, Yale University Press (New Haven, CT), 1919.

The Connecticut Wits, and Other Essays, Yale University Press (New Haven, CT), 1920.

Poems, Yale University Press (New Haven, CT), 1921.

Bumblebee, Bernhardt Wall (New Preston, CT), 1925.

Wrote introduction to Readings from Ruskin: Italy, Chautauqua Press (Boston, MA), 1885. Contributor to several anthologies and periodicals, including Stories by American Authors, The Memorial History of Hartford County, Connecticut 1633-1884, Yale Literary Magazine, Chautauquan, and Century.

SIDELIGHTS: Henry A. Beers was well known for his contributions to literary scholarship at the end of the nineteenth century and at the beginning of the twentieth. For more than forty years, Beers taught the subject of English literature at Yale University. He was a devoted teacher whose "intimate knowledge of all kinds of literature," according to Dictionary of Literary Biography contributor Philip B. Eppard, "was legendary." Prior to Beers' career in the English literature department, the Yale curriculum focused exclusively upon grammar. Beers, however, quickly redirected the program toward "a more historically based study of literature itself."

Although Beers lived nearly his entire life in Connecticut, he was actually born on July 2, 1847, in Buffalo, New York, while his parents were traveling. His childhood years were spent in Hartford, Connecticut, where he attended school, and after his high school graduation Beers began his studies at Yale University. In 1869, he received his bachelor's degree, then moved to New York City in order to study law; he successfully passed the bar exam and practiced as a lawyer for one year. This career did not suit him, however, and he returned to Yale as an English tutor in 1871 and remained there until 1916, when he retired as professor emeritus.

In 1885, Beers published a scholarly biography titled Nathaniel Parker Willis, which Eppard considered "one of Beers's most substantial works." Beers carefully investigates the life of this nineteenth-century essayist and poet, and Eppard noted that Beers's book is important, "particularly for its use of original source material, some of which has been lost." In the book, Beers also praises much of Willis's work, lamenting the fact that literary critics had ceased to favor him.

Beers followed his biography with two introductory histories of literature: An Outline Sketch of English Literature (1886) and An Outline Sketch of American Literature (1887). These works were tremendously popular and were re-published in several editions. Eppard reported that a student of Beers, Francis Parsons, felt that the book contained a "vividness of statement and portrayal of character coupled with a wise conciseness which . . . generate a kind of electric sparkle."

In 1899 and 1901, Beers wrote the books which would confirm and assure his reputation as a literary scholar. A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century and A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century were based upon lectures Beers had prepared for his literature classes at Yale. In these works Beers demonstrates his comprehensive knowledge of both English and European literature. He also attempts to illustrate how the Romantic Movement manifested itself in various cultures. Although these books were considered somewhat controversial due to Beers's definition of romanticism, Henry Barrett Hinckley, a reviewer for Bookman, stated that the author "is admirably free from that dullness of the specialist which prevents so much excellent scholarship from appealing to the people."

Although most of Beers's books were scholarly literary studies, he also had a penchant and a talent for writing verse. At the beginning of his writing career, Beers published Odds and Ends: Verses Humorous, Occasional, and Miscellaneous. His final works were also collections of poetry. Eppard noted that William Lyon Phelps once described Beers by saying: "Had he had any ambition he would have been one of the best known of contemporary creative writers."