Edward Verrall Lucas (11/12 June 1868 – 26 June 1938) was an English humorist, essayist, playwright, biographer, publisher, poet, novelist, short story writer and editor.
Born to a Quaker family in Eltham, on the fringes of London, Lucas began work at the age of sixteen, apprenticed to a bookseller. After that he turned to journalism, and worked on a local paper in Brighton and then on a London evening paper. He was commissioned to write a biography of Bernard Barton, the Quaker poet. This led to further commissions, including the editing of the works of Charles Lamb.
Lucas joined the staff of the humorous magazine Punch in 1904, and remained there for the rest of his life. He was a prolific writer, most celebrated for his short essays, but he also produced verses, novels and plays.
From 1908 to 1924 Lucas combined his work as a writer with that of publisher's reader for Methuen and Co. In 1924 he was appointed chairman of the company.
Life and career Early years and marriage Lucas was born in Eltham, Kent, the second son of the four sons and three daughters of Alfred Lucas and his wife, Jane née Drewett. The Lucases were a Quaker family, and the young Lucas was educated at Friends School in Saffron Walden. His father's "laxity in financial matters" prevented Lucas from going to a university, and at the age of sixteen he was apprenticed to a Brighton bookseller.Knox, E V, revised by Katharine Chubbuck. "Lucas, Edward Verrall (1868–1938)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004, Retrieved 13 March 2013
In 1889 Lucas joined the staff of the Sussex Daily News. The following year he published, anonymously, his first volume of poems, Sparks from a Flint."Mr E V Lucas". The Times, 27 June 1938, p. 16 With financial help from an uncle he moved to London to attend lectures at University College, after which he joined the staff of The Globe, one of London's evening papers. His duties there allowed him a great deal of spare time, and he read extensively in the Reading Room of the British Museum.
In 1897 he married (Florence) Elizabeth Gertrude, daughter of Colonel James Theodore Griffin, of the United States army; there was one child of the marriage, Audrey Lucas, who became an actor, playwright and novelist. Elizabeth Lucas was a writer, and husband and wife collaborated on several children's books.
Career Lucas's Quaker background led to a commission from the Society of Friends for a biography of Bernard Barton, the Quaker poet and friend of Charles Lamb. The success of the book was followed by further commissions from leading publishers; the most important of these commissions was a new edition of Lamb's works, which eventually amounted to seven volumes, with an associated biography, all published between 1903 and 1905. His biographer Katharine Chubbuck writes, "These works established him as a critic, and his Life of Charles Lamb (1905) is considered seminal." In 1904, while in the middle of his work on Lamb, he joined the staff of Punch, remaining there for more than thirty years. Lucas introduced his Punch colleague A A Milne to the illustrator E H Shepard with whom Milne collaborated on two collections of verse and the two Winnie-the-Pooh books.Nickerson and Wootton, p. 199
Lucas was prolific; by Max Beerbohm's estimation he spoke fewer words than he wrote."E(dward) V(errall) Lucas", Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, 2003 Lucas's Punch colleague E V Knox commented, "Lucas's publications include many anthologies and about thirty collections of light essays, on almost any subject that took his fancy, and some of the titles which he gave to them, Listener's Lure (1905), One Day and Another (1909), Old Lamps for New (1911), Loiterer's Harvest (1913), Cloud and Silver (1916), A Rover I Would Be (1928), indicate sufficiently the lightness, gaiety, and variety of their contents."Knox, E V. "Lucas, Edward Verrall", Dictionary of National Biography, 1949, online edition, retrieved 13 March 2013. He wrote travel books, parodies, and books about painters. Of the last he said, "I know very little about pictures, but I like to write about them for the benefit of those who know less." In 1910 Lucas wrote the short article on Jane Austen in the 11th edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica.
Before the First World War, Lucas was for a while interested in the theatre. His play The Visit of the King was produced at the Palace Theatre in 1912, but was not well received.
Lucas was athletic and enjoyed billiards as well as cricket. He was a member of J. M. Barrie's team the "Allahakbarries", along with Henry Herbert La Thangue and Arthur Conan Doyle. Rupert Hart-Davis collected and published a collection of Lucas's essays, Cricket All His Life, which John Arlott called "the best written of all books on cricket".Arlott, p. 188
Lucas had a long association with the publishing house Methuen and Co, which published his edition of Lamb. From 1908 to 1924 he was a reader for the firm; in 1924 he was appointed its chairman, a post he occupied with considerable success.
Later years Lucas received honorary degrees from the Universities of St Andrews and Oxford, and was appointed Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour in 1932. He was appointed a member of the Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England in 1928, and from 1933 until his death he was a member of the Crown Lands Advisory Committee."Lucas, Edward Verrall", Who Was Who, A. & C. Black, 1920–2008; online edition, Oxford University Press, December 2007, Retrieved 13 March 2013
In his later years Lucas cut his domestic ties and lived alone, spending his evenings in restaurants and clubs, and developing a wide collection of pornography. He was a member of the Athenæum, Beefsteak, Buck's and the Garrick. When he was stricken with his final illness he steadfastly refused to allow his friends into his sickroom."E. V. L., Autocrat", The Times 17 February 1939, p. 9
Lucas died in a nursing home in Marylebone, London, at the age of 70.
Reception and legacy Frank Swinnerton wrote of him:
Lucas's fluency was thought by some to dilute his skill. Although Swinnerton declared Lucas's essays "among the most agreeable of our age", Agnes Irene Smith wrote in The Sewanee Review of Lucas that despite his huge output "he seems to have left no finger prints. Eminently readable, he is read without being remembered; unusually quotable, he was never quoted much and seems never to be quoted any more."Smith, Agnes Irene. "E V Lucas", The Sewanee Review, Volume 48 (1940), p. 222
His study of Highways and Byways in Sussex continues to influence postmodern explorations of the local; while his 1932 memoirs Reading, Writing and Remembering retained their interest longer than most of his other essays.D. Daiches, ed. The Penguin Companion to Literature 1 (1971) p. 324
Works
The Face on the Wall Sparks from a Flint: Odd Rhymes for Odd Times (1891) As "E. V. L." Songs of the Bat (1892) Bernard Barton and his friends: a record of quiet lives (1893) A Book of Verse for Children (1897) The Flamp, the Ameliorator, and the Schoolboy's Apprentice (1897) All the World Over (1898), illustrated by Edith Farmiloe The War of the Wenuses (1898) with C. L. Graves (a parody of H. G. Wells's The War of the Worlds) Charles Lamb and the Lloyds (1898) Willow and Leather (1898), cricket essays The Open Road (1899), anthology The Book of Shops (1899) Four And Twenty Toilers (1900), poems What Shall We Do Now? (1900) with Elizabeth Lucas, games book Domesticities: A Little Book of Household Impressions (1900) The Visit to London (1902) Wisdom While You Wait (1903) with C. L. Graves, parody encyclopaedia England Day by Day (1903) with C. L. Graves Works and Letters of Charles and Mary Lamb (1903–05), editor Highways and Byways in Sussex (1904) The Life of Charles Lamb (1905), biography (revised editions 1907 and 1921) The Friendly Town (1905) A Wanderer in Holland (1905) A Wanderer in London (1906) Fireside and Sunshine (1906) Listener's Lure (1906) An Oblique Narration (1906) Change for a Halfpenny (1906) with C. L. Graves Signs of the Times, with C. L. Graves The Doll Doctor (1907) Character and Comedy (1907) A Swan and her Friends (1907), about Anna Seward The Hambledon Men (1907), cricket history The Gentlest Art (1907), anthology of letters Another Book of Verses for Children (1907) Anne's Terrible Good Nature (1908) Over Bemerton's (1908), novel If: A Nightmare in the Conditional Mood (1908) with C. L. Graves Hustled History, Or, As It Might Have Been (1908), with C. L. Graves The Slowcoach (1908), fiction Mr Coggs and other songs for children (1908), with Liza Lehmann A Wanderer in Paris (1909) One Day and Another (1909) Farthest from the Truth (1909) Good Company – A Rally of Men (1909) Sir Pulteney (1910), as E. D. Ward, fantasy Mr Ingleside (1910), novel The Slowcoach (1910), illustrated by M.V. Wheelhouse The Second Post (1910), anthology of letters Old Lamps for New (1911) Harvest Home (1911, Macmillan (1913) What a Life! (1911), with George Morrow William Cowper's Letters (1911), editor A Wanderer in Florence (1912) London Lavender (1912) A Little of Everything (1912) Loiterer's Harvest (1913), essays A Group of Londoners, privately printed (Minneapolis) (1913) British Pictures and Their Painters (1913) Swollen Headed William (1914), parody A Wanderer in Venice (1914) All the Papers (1914), with C. L. Graves Landmarks (1914) A Picked Company: being a selection of writings (1915), editor Guillaumism, privately printed (London) (1915) Her Infinite Variety: A Feminine Portrait Gallery (1915), anthology In Gentlest Germany (1915) The Hausfrau Rampant (1916), novel Cloud and Silver (1916) The Vermilion Box (1916), novel London Revisited (1916) Variety Lane (1916) His Fatal Beauty: or, The Moore of Chelsea, privately printed (London) (1917) A Boswell of Baghdad (1917), essays Outposts of Mercy: The Record of a Visit to Various Units of the Red Cross in Italy (1917) Twixt Eagle & Dove (1918) The Phantom Journal and Other Essays and Diversions (1919) Quoth the Raven (1919) Mixed Vintages (1919) Traveller's Joy (1919) Adventures and Enthusiasms (1920) David Williams: Founder of the Royal Literary Fund (1920) Specially Selected (1920) Verena in the Midst (1920) Roving East and Roving West (1921) Urbanities (1921) Edwin Austin Abbey, Royal Academician, The Record of His Life and Work (1921), biography Rose and Rose (1922) Vermeer of Delft (1922) Giving and Receiving (1922) You Know What People Are (1922) Ginevra's Money (1922) Advisory Ben (1923) Luck of the Year (1923) Michael Angelo (1924) Rembrandt (1924) A Wanderer among Pictures (1924) As the Twig Is Straightened (1924) Encounters and Diversions (1924) The Same Star (1924), play Chardin and Vigee-Lebrun (1924) Michael Angelo (1924) Zigzags in France (1925) Playtime and Company (1925) John Constable the Painter (1925) Introducing London (1925) A Wanderer in Rome (1926) Wanderings and Diversions (1926) Events and Embroideries (1926) 365 Days and One More (1926) Frans Hals (1926), biography Giorgione (1926) Leonardo da Vinci (1926) Van Dyck (1926) Velasquez (1926) Selected Essays, edited by E. A. Woodhouse (1926) Twelve Songs From "Playtime & Company" (1926) A Cat Book (1927) The Joy of Life (1927), anthology of popular poetry A Fronded Isle (1927) The More I See of Men: Stray Essays on Dogs (1927) A Rover I Would Be (1928) Out of a Clear Sky (1928) Mr Punch's County Songs (1928) The Colvins and their Friends (1928), biography Introducing Paris (1928) Windfall's Eye (1929) Turning Things Over (1929), essays If Dogs Could Write: A Second Canine Miscellany (1929), anthology Vermeer the Magical (1929) Down the Sky (1930) Lippincott (1930) Traveller's Luck (1930), essays The Pekinese National Anthem (1930) And Such Small Deer (1931)