John Middleton Murry (6 August 1889 – 12 March 1957) was an English writer. He was a prolific author, producing more than 60 books and thousands of

essays An essay ( ) is, generally, a piece of writing that gives the author's own argument, but the definition is vague, overlapping with those of a Letter (message), letter, a term paper, paper, an article (publishing), article, a pamphlet, and a s ...

and reviews on literature, social issues, politics, and religion during his lifetime. A prominent

critic A critic is a person who communicates an assessment and an opinion of various forms of creative works such as Art criticism, art, Literary criticism, literature, Music journalism, music, Film criticism, cinema, Theater criticism, theater, Fas ...

, Murry is best remembered for his association with

Katherine Mansfield Kathleen Mansfield Murry (née Beauchamp; 14 October 1888 – 9 January 1923) was a New Zealand writer and critic who was an important figure in the Literary modernism, modernist movement. Her works are celebrated across the world and have been ...

, whom he married in 1918 as her second husband, for his friendship with D. H. Lawrence and T. S. Eliot, and for his friendship (and brief affair) with Frieda Lawrence. Following Mansfield's death, Murry edited her work.

Early life

John Middleton Murry was born in Peckham, London, on 6 August 1889 to John Murry (1860/1–1947), a clerk in the Inland Revenue, and Emily Wheeler (1869/70–1951). John Murry, a self-made man from an "impoverished and illiterate" background, prioritized his son's education. At the age of two, Murry was sent to the Roles Road Board School, and afterward attended the Bellendon Road Higher Grade Board School. His aunt, at the age of 11, called him a "little old man". By 1893, his parents moved from Peckham to East Dulwich, along with his mother's sister and mother, into a shared house. Beginning in 1901, Murry was educated at Christ's Hospital, where he received a scholarship. There, he and friends purchased a jellygraph machine for a newspaper he was the editor-in-chief of, and at 18 he became the editor of the school's magazine. When he was 16 and at Christ's Hospital, he was awarded the Charles Lamb medal for an essay entitled "Literature and Journalism". He also attended

Brasenose College, Oxford Brasenose College (BNC) is one of the Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. It began as Brasenose Hall in the 13th century, before being founded as a college in 1509. The l ...

. There he met the writer Joyce Cary, a lifelong friend. He met

at the end of 1911, through

W. L. George Walter Lionel George (20 March 1882, Paris, France – 30 January 1926) was an English writer, chiefly known for his popular fiction, which included feminism, feminist, pacifism, pacifist, and Labour movement, pro-labour themes. Life Although b ...

. His intense relationship with her, her early death, and his subsequent allusions to it shaped both his later life and the attitudes (often hostile) of others to him. Leonard Woolf in his memoirs called Murry " Pecksniffian". By 1933 his reputation "had touched bottom", and Rayner Heppenstall's short book of 1934, ''John Middleton Murry: A Study in Excellent Normality'', could note that he was "the best-hated man of letters in the country".

Editor

Murry was editor of the literary magazine ''

Rhythm Rhythm (from Greek , ''rhythmos'', "any regular recurring motion, symmetry") generally means a " movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions". This general meaning of regular r ...

'' from 1911 to 1913, and then '' The Blue Review''. In 1913 an associate, the publisher Charles Granville of Stephen Swift Ltd, was found guilty of

embezzlement Embezzlement (from Anglo-Norman, from Old French ''besillier'' ("to torment, etc."), of unknown origin) is a type of financial crime, usually involving theft of money from a business or employer. It often involves a trusted individual taking ...

and

bigamy In a culture where only monogamous relationships are legally recognized, bigamy is the act of entering into a marriage with one person while still legally married to another. A legal or de facto separation of the couple does not alter their mar ...

, and imprisoned. Some debts had been put in Murry's name, and their finances were seriously affected for the next six years. In 1914 he met D. H. Lawrence, and became an important supporter. The next year they started a short-lived magazine together, ''The Signature''. In 1931, after a complex evolution of the relationship, Murry wrote in ''Son of Woman'' one of the first and most influential posthumous assessments of Lawrence as a man. Medically certified as unfit for military service, with

pleurisy Pleurisy, also known as pleuritis, is inflammation of the membranes that surround the lungs and line the chest cavity (Pulmonary pleurae, pleurae). This can result in a sharp chest pain while breathing. Occasionally the pain may be a constant d ...

and possible

tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB), also known colloquially as the "white death", or historically as consumption, is a contagious disease usually caused by ''Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can al ...

, during the war years he was part of the Garsington circle of Ottoline Morrell. In 1919, Murry became the editor of '' The Athenaeum'', recently purchased by Arthur Rowntree. Under his editorship it was a literary review featuring work by T. S. Eliot,

Virginia Woolf Adeline Virginia Woolf (; ; 25 January 1882 28 March 1941) was an English writer and one of the most influential 20th-century modernist authors. She helped to pioneer the use of stream of consciousness narration as a literary device. Vir ...

Lytton Strachey Giles Lytton Strachey (; 1 March 1880 – 21 January 1932) was an English writer and critic. A founding member of the Bloomsbury Group and author of ''Eminent Victorians'', he established a new form of biography in which psychology, psychologic ...

, Clive Bell, and other members of the Bloomsbury Group. It lasted until 1921. It had enthusiastic support from E. M. Forster, who later wrote that "Here at last was a paper that was a pleasure to read and an honour to write for, and which linked up literature and life". Its fate was to be merged into ''

The Nation ''The Nation'' is a progressive American monthly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's '' The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper ...

'', which became ''The Nation and Athenaeum'', in the period 1923 to 1930 edited by H. D. Henderson. In 1923 he became the founding editor of '' The Adelphi'' (''The New Adelphi'', 1927–30), in association with Jack Common and Max Plowman. The magazine continued in various forms until 1948. It reflected his successive interests in Lawrence, an unorthodox Marxism, pacifism, and a return to the land. According to David Goldie, Murry and the ''Adelphi'', and Eliot and '' The Criterion'', were in an important rivalry by the mid-1920s, with competing definitions of literature, based respectively on

romanticism Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century. The purpose of the movement was to advocate for the importance of subjec ...

allied to liberalism and a subjective approach, and a form of

classicism Classicism, in the arts, refers generally to a high regard for a classical period, classical antiquity in the Western tradition, as setting standards for taste which the classicists seek to emulate. In its purest form, classicism is an aesthe ...

allied to traditionalism and a religious attitude. In this contest, Goldie says, Eliot emerged a clear victor in the sense that, in London during the 1930s, Eliot had taken the centre of the critical stage.

Critic

Murry reviewed for '' The Westminster Gazette'' and then '' The Times Literary Supplement'', from 1912. Initially he was much influenced by the philosophy of

Henri Bergson Henri-Louis Bergson (; ; 18 October 1859 – 4 January 1941) was a French philosopher who was influential in the traditions of analytic philosophy and continental philosophy, especially during the first half of the 20th century until the S ...

, which he disavowed in 1913. He was one of an identified group of post-

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

critics that included Richard Aldington, Robert Graves,

Aldous Huxley Aldous Leonard Huxley ( ; 26 July 1894 – 22 November 1963) was an English writer and philosopher. His bibliography spans nearly 50 books, including non-fiction novel, non-fiction works, as well as essays, narratives, and poems. Born into the ...

Herbert Read Sir Herbert Edward Read, (; 4 December 1893 – 12 June 1968) was an English art historian, poet, literary critic and philosopher, best known for numerous books on art, which included influential volumes on the role of art in education. Read wa ...

, and Edgell Rickword. Murry gave Huxley an editorial job at ''The Athenaeum''. Murry also helped encourage British interest in the work of

Fyodor Dostoyevsky Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky. () was a Russian novelist, short story writer, essayist and journalist. He is regarded as one of the greatest novelists in both Russian literature, Russian and world literature, and many of his works are consider ...

: his 1916 work ''Fyodor Dostoevsky: A Critical Study'' argued Dostoyevsky was an important novelist and philosophical thinker. Murry led the charge against Georgian poetry. A leader in the 16 May 1919 edition of ''The Athenaeum'' was an early example of a reasoned attack against the Georgian style of verse; and Murry coupled this with an adversarial attitude to '' The London Mercury'' edited by J. C. Squire. He reviewed quite harshly

Siegfried Sassoon Siegfried Loraine Sassoon (8 September 1886 – 1 September 1967) was an English war poet, writer, and soldier. Decorated for bravery on the Western Front (World War I), Western Front, he became one of the leading poets of the First World ...

's ''Counter-Attack'' in 1918, despite having helped him in 1917 to draft an anti-war piece for H. W. Massingham's ''The Nation''. In-house, however, he was not master enough to award an essay competition prize to the then-unknown

, over the wishes of George Saintsbury and Robert Bridges, who preferred the poet William Orton. F. R. Leavis admired and was influenced by Murry's early criticism; later he criticised Murry in the pages of ''Scrutiny'', but continued to acknowledge a debt to him late in life.

On Romanticism

Murry gave his philosophy its fullest expression in his writings on Keats and

Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 23 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's natio ...

and in an ambitiously titled volume, ''God: An Introduction to the Science of Metabiology''. There, picking up certain concepts from his acquaintance George Santayana, Murry describes the project of

Romanticism Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century. The purpose of the movement was to advocate for the importance of subjec ...

as one of inner exploration: :"To discover that within myself which I *must obey, to gain some awareness of the law which operates in the organic world of the internal world, to feel this internal world as an organic whole working out its own destiny according to some secret vital principle, to know which acts and utterances are a liberation from obstacles and an accession of strength, to acknowledge secret loyalties which one cannot deny without impoverishment and starvation – this is to possess one's soul indeed, and it is not easy either to do or to explain." The upshot of this discovery results in the highest degree of ethical awareness, "an immediate knowledge of what I am and may not do." The awareness of one being "really alone" in the universe, as he put it, marks the final point of discovery which is followed by the upward ascent to spiritual life. Murry vividly narrates this exploration as a spiritual conversion (in his 1929 book ''GOD'') —what he describes as a "desolation" followed by "illumination"—after the death of Katherine Mansfield (who had moved to G. I. Gurdjieff's '' Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man'', where she died).

''The Adelphi''

In 1930 Max Plowman joined Murry and Sir Richard Rees in developing '' The Adelphi'' as a socialist, and later pacifist, monthly; Murry had founded it in 1923 as a literary journal (''The New Adelphi'', 1927–30). Rees edited it from 1930; Plowman took on the role in 1938. ''The Adelphi'' was closely aligned with the

Independent Labour Party The Independent Labour Party (ILP) was a British political party of the left, established in 1893 at a conference in Bradford, after local and national dissatisfaction with the Liberal Party (UK), Liberals' apparent reluctance to endorse work ...

; Jack Common worked for it as circulation promoter and assistant editor in the 1930s. Throughout this period, Murry's then close friend and protégé, Guernsey-born G. B. Edwards, was a regular contributor to the magazine. Thanks to Murry's support, Jonathan Cape commissioned Edwards to write a book on D.H. Lawrence but following Lawrence's death it was never completed. He moved to

Norfolk Norfolk ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in England, located in East Anglia and officially part of the East of England region. It borders Lincolnshire and The Wash to the north-west, the North Sea to the north and eas ...

; to South Acre; and then, with his third marriage in 1931, to the Old Rectory, Larling. Murry told Antony Alpers the biographer of Katherine Mansfield that K.M.'s manuscripts had all been "dispersed to collectors" in the 1930s. He had the manuscripts of nine or ten completed stories, and when an admirer wrote to ask if he would sell a manuscript, he would reply that some land adjoining his farm in Norfolk was on the market or that he needed a tractor, so would sell one for the amount he required. Plowman co-founded (in 1934) and ran the Adelphi Centre. It was an early commune, based on a farm in Langham, Essex bought by Murry. Short-lived in its original conception, it ran a Summer School in August 1936 that was stellar:

George Orwell Eric Arthur Blair (25 June 1903 – 21 January 1950) was an English novelist, poet, essayist, journalist, and critic who wrote under the pen name of George Orwell. His work is characterised by lucid prose, social criticism, opposition to a ...

spoke on "An Outsider Sees the Distressed Areas" on 4 August, with Rayner Heppenstall in the chair. Other speakers were Steve Shaw,

, Grace Rogers, J. Hampden Jackson, N. A. Holdaway (a Marxist theorist and schoolmaster, and a director of the centre), Geoffrey Sainsbury, Reinhold Niebuhr, Karl Polanyi, John Strachey, Plowman and Common. By 1937 the commune had collapsed, and the house, 'The Oaks', was turned over to some 60

Basque Basque may refer to: * Basques, an ethnic group of Spain and France * Basque language, their language Places * Basque Country (greater region), the homeland of the Basque people with parts in both Spain and France * Basque Country (autonomous co ...

refugee children under the auspices of the Peace Pledge Union; they remained until 1939.

Lodge Farm, Thelnetham

In October 1942 Murry set up a new commune at Lodge Farm in the Suffolk village of Thelnetham. Murry purchased the farm and recruited fellow conscientious objectors to run the enterprise. The commune had mixed fortunes and it gradually reverted to a more conventional arrangement with Murry running the farm as a commercial enterprise. He wrote an account of his time at Lodge Farm in the book "Community Farm" which was published in 1953 and was illustrated by his brother, the artist Richard Murry.

Political views

Marxist

Murry had a

Marxist Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflic ...

phase in the early 1930s. With his third marriage in 1931, he moved within

, from South Acre to the Old Rectory, Larling, and wrote in two weeks his ''The Necessity of Communism''. It was this identification as "mystical Marxist" that led Bert Trick (1889–1968) to introduce Dylan Thomas to Murry, in 1933. The occasion went well enough for Richard Rees to publish Thomas in the ''Adelphi''. He supported the small Independent Socialist Party, a regional breakaway from the

Pacifist

Murry was an outspoken radical Christian and pacifist, writing ''The Necessity of Pacifism'' (1937). He was a Sponsor of the Peace Pledge Union, and editor of its weekly newspaper, '' Peace News'', from 1940 to 1946. Murry's opinions during this period often provoked controversy. He angered many left-wingers (including

and Vera Brittain) by arguing that

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...

should be allowed to retain control of mainland Europe. Murry believed even though Nazi rule was tyrannical, it was preferable to the horrors of

total war Total war is a type of warfare that includes any and all (including civilian-associated) resources and infrastructure as legitimate military targets, mobilises all of the resources of society to fight the war, and gives priority to warfare ov ...

.Richard A. Rempel, "The Dilemmas of British Pacifists During World War II", '' The Journal of Modern History'', Vol. 50, No. 4, On Demand Supplement (Dec., 1978), pp. D1213-D1229. Murry later "renounced his pacifism in 1948 and...urged a preventative war against the Soviet Union, ending his life as a

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy and ideology that seeks to promote and preserve traditional institutions, customs, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civiliza ...

voter". Finally Murry's opposition to the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

was attacked by pro-Soviet elements in the peace movement. Murry's anti-feminism also drew criticism from feminist pacifists such as Brittain and Sybil Morrison.

Christianity

During this period Murry was widely known as a Christian intellectual. He had in fact considered

ordination Ordination is the process by which individuals are Consecration in Christianity, consecrated, that is, set apart and elevated from the laity class to the clergy, who are thus then authorized (usually by the religious denomination, denominationa ...

as an

Anglican Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...

priest, but gave up on it after a diagnosis in 1938 of Buerger's disease, coupled with doubts about his marriages (his third was then breaking up messily).

Elitism

His views converged with those of Eliot: he supported a type of elitism foreshadowed by

Samuel Taylor Coleridge Samuel Taylor Coleridge ( ; 21 October 177225 July 1834) was an English poet, literary critic, philosopher, and theologian who was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets with his friend William Wordsworth ...

clerisy The intelligentsia is a status class composed of the university-educated people of a society who engage in the complex mental labours by which they critique, shape, and lead in the politics, policies, and culture of their society; as such, the in ...

, and argued for by Matthew Arnold. In ''Christianity and Culture'', Eliot partially supported Murry's reasoning from ''The Price of Leadership'' (1939), though stopping short of the endorsement of Arnold. When Murry died, Eliot wrote to Mary that 'a very warm affection existed between us'.

Family

Murry was married four times: first to

in 1918; after her death in 1923 he arranged the publishing or republishing of her works. In 1924 he married Violet Le Maistre, in 1932 Ada Elizabeth Cockbaine, and in 1954 Mary Gamble. With his second wife, Violet Le Maistre, he had two children: a daughter, Katherine Violet Middleton Murry who became a writer and published ''Beloved Quixote: The Unknown Life of John Middleton Murry'' in 1986, and a son, John Middleton Murry Jr., who became a writer under the names of Colin Murry and Richard Cowper. There were also two children from the third marriage.

Depictions

In fiction

Aldous Huxley portrayed him as "Denis Burlap" in '' Point Counter Point'' (1928). He was the model for Philip Surrogate in Graham Greene's 1934 novel ''It's a Battlefield''; Greene did not know him personally. David Holbrook wrote that Gudrun and Gerald in Lawrence's '' Women in Love'' were based on Mansfield and Murry. D. H. Lawrence satirised him in a number of short stories. In Lawrence's novel '' Aaron's Rod'' (1922), the title character is based on Murry. The relationship between Lilly and Aaron in the novel mirrors that of Lawrence and Murry.

Dramatic portrayals

Murry appears as a character in Amy Rosenthal's D.H. Lawrence biodrama ''On the Rocks''. In the 2008 Hampstead Theatre production Murry was played by Nick Caldecott with Ed Stoppard as Lawrence and Charlotte Emmerson as Mansfield. In '' Priest of Love'' (1981), he is portrayed by Mike Gwilym. In '' Leave All Fair'' (1985), he is portrayed by John Gielgud as a sanctimonious exploiter of Mansfield's memory who treated her poorly during their association.

Works

Non-Fiction *''Fyodor Dostoevsky: A Critical Study'' (1916). *''The Evolution of an Intellectual'' (1920). *''Aspects of Literature'' (1920), revised edition 1945 *''Countries of the Mind: Essays in Literary Criticism'' (1922). *''Pencillings'' (1922). *''The Problem of Style'' (1922). *''Wrap Me Up in My Aubusson Carpet'' (1924). *''Discoveries'' (1924). *''To the Unknown God'' (1925). *''Keats and Shakespeare'' (1925). *''The Life of Jesus'' (1926). *''Things to Come'' (1928). *''God: An Introduction to the Science of Metabiology'' (1929). *''D .H. Lawrence'' (1930). *''Son of Woman: The Story of D. H. Lawrence'' (1931). *''Studies in Keats'' (1931). *''Countries of the Mind: Essays in Literary Criticism. Second Series'' (1931). *''The Necessity of Communism'' (1932). *''Reminiscences of D.H. Lawrence'' (1933). *''William Blake'' (1933). *''The Biography of Katherine Mansfield'' (1933) with Ruth E. Mantz *''Between Two Worlds'' (1935) (autobiography) *''Marxism'' (1935). *''Shakespeare'' (1936). *''The Necessity of Pacifism'' (1937). *''Heaven and Earth'' (1938). *''Heroes of Thought'' (1938). *''The Pledge of Peace'' (1938). *''The Defence of Democracy'' (1939). *''The Price of Leadership'' (1939). *''Europe in Travail'' (1940). *''The Betrayal of Christ by the Churches'' (1940). *''Christocracy'' (1942). *''Adam and Eve'' (1944). *''The Free Society'' (1948). *''Looking Before and After: A Collection of Essays'' (1948). *''The Challenge of Schweitzer'' (1948). *''Katherine Mansfield and Other Literary Portraits'' (1949). *''The Mystery of Keats'' (1949). *''John Clare and other Studies'' (1950). *''The Conquest of Death'' (1951). *''Community Farm'' (1952). *''Jonathan Swift'' (1955). *''Unprofessional Essays'' (1956). *''Love, Freedom and Society'' (1957). *''Not as the Scribes'' (1959). *''John Middleton Murry: Selected Criticism 1916–1957'' (1960) editor Richard Rees Fiction *''Still Life'' (1916). *''The Things We Are'' (1922). *''The Voyage'' (1924). Verse *''Poems: 1917–18'' (1918). *''The Critic in Judgement'' (1919). *''Cinnamon & Angelica'' (1920). *''Poems: 1916–1920'' (1921). As editor *''Journal of Katherine Mansfield'' (1927). *''The Letters of Katherine Mansfield'' (1928).

Notes

References

* Carswell, J. P. (1978). ''Lives and Letters: A. R. Orage, Katherine Mansfield, Beatrice Hastings, John Middleton Murry, S. S. Koteliansky, 1906–1957'', New York : New Directions Pub. Corp. * Cassavant, Sharron Greer (1982). ''John Middleton Murry, the Critic as Moralist'', University of Alabama Press. * Chaney, Edward (2015). ''Genius Friend: G. B. Edwards and The Book of Ebenezer le Page'', Blue Ormer, Exeter. * Griffin, Ernest G. (1968). ''John Middleton Murry'', Twayne Publishers. * * Mais, S. P. B. (1923)
"John Middleton Murry."
In ''Some Modern Authors'', Grant Richards Ltd.

External links

* * * * Letters from John Middleton Murry to Lord and Lady Glenavy in th

Woolf disregards John Middleton Murry's criticism – Modernism Lab

* ttps://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/we-believe-in-life/ Berry, Neil, "We believe in life: The contentious career of John Middleton Murry," ''TLS'', January 3, 2020. {{DEFAULTSORT:Murry, John Middleton 1889 births 1957 deaths English anti-communists English Christians English socialists People educated at Christ's Hospital English literary critics English male non-fiction writers English essayists 20th-century British essayists 20th-century English male writers Katherine Mansfield