Graves, Alfred Perceval and Robert Van Ranke

(1846-1985)

   • Alfred Perceval, the father, 1846-1931

   Graves was born in Dublin, son of Charles Graves, Bishop of Limerick, and educated at Windermere College and Trinity College, Dublin, where he studied classics, English literature, history, and language. From 1875 to 1910 he was inspector of schools in Lancashire, Yorkshire, Somerset and London. He pushed for the provision of playing fields for children in urban schools and the educational use of the cinema. He was a leading figure in the London Irish Literary Society. His autobiography, To Return to All That (1930), was in the nature of a reply to an autobiography by his son Robert, entitled Good-bye to All That (1929). He spent his last years at Harlech in North Wales and died there. Some of his other publications: Songs of Killarney, 1873. Songs of Old Ireland, 1892. Songs of Erin, 1892. Some of his songs/poems: "An Irish Lullaby," "Father O'Flynn," "Shamrock Leaves," "The Black '46," "The Fairy Host," "The Girl I Left Behind Me," "The Little Red Lark," "'Twas Pretty to Be in Ballinderry."

   • Robert Von Ranke, the son, 1895-1985.

   Born in London, he started writing poetry while at Charterhouse School, London. He saw service in World War I, being twice mentioned in dispatches. In 1919 he began to read English at St. John's College, Oxford, but illness prevented him from graduating; he was awarded a B.Litt. in 1925. Apart from the war years he spent most of his life in Majorca, except when he gave the Clark lectures at Cambridge in 1954 and as professor of poetry at Oxford (1961-1966). St. John's College, Oxford, elected him an honorary fellow in 1971. He died in Majorca, and he is one of the poets of WWI memorialized in Poets' Corner of Westminster Abbey. Although a prolific poet, he was a versatile writer, covering many different genres, as well as being a literary critic, especially of poetry. Some of his best known works are: I, Claudius and Claudius the God (1934). Greek Myths (1955). Some of his poetry publications: Over the Barzier, 1916. Collected Poems, 1938. Poetic Craft and Principle, 1967. On Poetry: Collected Talks and Essays, 1969. Poems 1968-1970, 1970. Some of his poems: "Counting the Beats," "Country at War," "Grotesques," "The Avengers," "The Bards," "Two Fusiliers."

   Sources: An Anthology of Irish Verse: The Poetry of Ireland from Mythological Times to the Present. Padraic Colum, ed. Liveright, 1948. Chief Modern Poets of Britain and America. 5th edition. Gerald DeWitt Sanders and John Herbert Nelson, eds., Macmillan, 1970. Collected Poems, 1975, Robert Graves. Oxford University Press, 1988. Dictionary of National Biography. Electronic Edition 1.1. Oxford University Press, 1997. Encyclopædia Britannica Ultimate Reference Suite DVD, 2006. English Poetry: Author Search. Chadwyck-Healey Ltd., 1995 (http://www.lib.utexas.edu:8080/search/epoetry/author.html). Irish Songs and Ballads of Alfred Perceval Graves. Alexander Ireland and Co., 1880. Poemhunter (www.poemhunter.com). The Columbia Granger's Index to Poetry. 11th ed. The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry, Columbia University Press, 2005 (http://www.columbiagrangers.org). The Complete Poems of Robert Graves in One Volume. Beryl Graves and Dunstan Ward, eds. Carcanet Press, 2000. The Home Book of Modern Verse. Burton Egbert Stevenson, ed. Henry Holt, 1953. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 6th edition. Margaret Drabble, ed. Oxford University Press, 2000. The Penguin Book of Irish Verse. Brendan Kennelly, ed. Penguin Books, 1981. Westminster Abbey Official Guide (no date).