Edward Irenaeus Prime-Stevenson (January 29, 1858 – July 23, 1942) was an American writer. He used the pseudonym Xavier Mayne.
[Bullough, Vern L]
''Before Stonewall: Activists for Gay and Lesbian Rights in Historical Context''
Haworth Press
Haworth Press was a publisher of scholarly, academic and trade books, and approximately 200 peer-reviewed academic journals. It was founded in 1978 by the publishing industry executives Bill Cohen and Patrick Mcloughlin. The name was taken from ...
Inc, 2003, pp. 35–36.
Biography
Prime-Stevenson (also known as Edward Stevenson, Edward Prime Stevenson, and E. Irenaeus Prime Stevenson) was born in 1858 in
Madison, New Jersey
Madison is a Borough (New Jersey), borough in Morris County, New Jersey, Morris County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 United States census, the borough's population was 16,937, an increase of 1,092 (+6.9%) from the 2010 United ...
,
the youngest of five children born to Paul E. Stevenson and Cornelia Prime. His father was a
Presbyterian
Presbyterianism is a historically Reformed Protestant tradition named for its form of church government by representative assemblies of elders, known as "presbyters". Though other Reformed churches are structurally similar, the word ''Pr ...
minister and a school principal; his mother came from a distinguished literary and academic figures.
After studying
law
Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior, with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been variously described as a science and as the ar ...
, Stevenson decided to become a writer and a journalist.
During the 1880s, he began a career as a critic in New York City for ''
Harper's Weekly
''Harper's Weekly, A Journal of Civilization'' was an American political magazine based in New York City. Published by Harper (publisher), Harper & Brothers from 1857 until 1916, it featured foreign and domestic news, fiction, essays on many su ...
'', a political magazine, and as book reviewer and music critic for the weekly ''Independent''. In 1896, Stevenson published ''The Square of Sevens, and the Parallelogram: An Authoritative Method of Cartomancy with a Prefatory Note'' by Robert Antrobus that was supposedly written in 1735. However, it is believed that Prime-Stevenson was the author. In 1906, under the pseudonym Xavier Mayne, Stevenson published the homosexually themed novel ''
Imre: A Memorandum'', and in 1908 a sexology study, ''
The Intersexes'',
a defense of homosexuality from a scientific, legal, historical, and personal perspective.
Death
In 1901, he moved to Europe, living in Florence and Lausanne. He died in Lausanne of a heart attack in 1942, aged 84.
Quotes
Bibliography
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References
External links
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''Left to Themselves: Being the Ordeal of Philip and Gerald'' (scanned copy of the novel)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Prime-Stevenson, Edward
1858 births
1942 deaths
20th-century American novelists
American male novelists
American gay writers
LGBTQ people from New Jersey
People from Madison, New Jersey
Novelists from New Jersey
American LGBTQ novelists
20th-century American male writers
19th-century American LGBTQ people
20th-century American LGBTQ people
Writers from Morris County, New Jersey