Image from Samuel M. Wilson Photographic Collection, ca. 1899-1947
From The Kentucky Encyclopedia -
James Lane Allen, whose books
achieved both popular success and critical acclaim, was Kentucky's first
important novelist. Born December 21, 1849, near Lexington,
Kentucky, the seventh and last child of
Richard and Helen (Foster) Allen, "Laney" (as he was known in
childhood) grew to manhood near Lexington and did not leave Kentucky until he was twenty-two years
old.
Though of sound heritage, the Allens
never had the financial standing of the upper class, and Laney worked hard as
a youth. His mother -- to whom Laney dedicated six of his first eight books
-- nevertheless brought him up in an idealistic, romantic world filled with
stories of honor and chivalry, where gallant and noble gentlemen courted
women of spotless virtue. Yet, in adulthood, Allen saw around him a new
industrial America where, it seemed to him, ethics were replaced by greed,
honor by corruption, purity by vulgarity. Allen was over six feet tall, slim
and handsome, an immaculately dressed, reserved Victorian gentleman. He gave
many the impression of being cold, repressed, and formal. His sensitivity to
anything he perceived as a slight caused him to strike out at even his few
friends. Nor did he have any close female attachments, except within his
family. He cared for his mother until her death, when Allen was nearly forty,
as well as for his reclusive sister Anne.
Educated in local schools, Allen
received a degree from what is now Transylvania
University in 1872 and as the salutatorian
delivered his address in Latin. In 1877 he earned a master's degree from the
same institution. For a dozen years after earning his first degree, Allen
taught in Missouri, West Virginia, and Kentucky before turning to full-time
writing. The subject for fourteen of his ensuing nineteen books was Kentucky.
Allen's Victorian Age readers were hungry for local color, and he immersed
them in the atmosphere of the old commonwealth, a vanishing world of romantic
ideals and genteel traditions. After publication of numerous short stories in
the 1880s in the leading magazines of the day, Allen collected some of them,
including the well-known " King Solomon Of Kentucky," for
his first book, Flute And Violin And Other Kentucky Tales And Romances
(1891). Other works followed quickly: The Blue-grass Region Of Kentucky
(an 1892 collection of articles that form a kind of travelog); John Gray
(1893); his popular and well-written Kentucky Cardinal (1894); and its
thin sequel Aftermath (1895). The next year, Allen's Summers In
Arcady, with its realism and focus on lower-class subjects, aroused some
controversy because of passages dealing with sexual matters. No such outcry
greeted Allen's enormously popular The Choir Invisible (1897), which
sold almost a quarter-million hardback copies within three years and was
translated into several languages. An accurate historical novel set in
frontier Lexington, it deals with the conflict of honor, love, and duty as
schoolmaster John Gray realizes his forbidden love for a married woman.
Acclaimed as one of America's
great writers, Allen chose to depart from the formula that had given him so
much recognition. The Choir Invisible, together with Two Gentlemen
Of Kentucky (1899), marked the end of his first phase, as he tried to
write more about the questions troubling modern America. But in so doing, he
left behind the audience faithful to his earlier books. His next work,
produced at age fifty in 1900, was The Reign Of Law: A Tale Of The
Kentucky Hemp Fields. Dealing with religious doubt and Darwinism, the
work proved popular but angered churchmen in Kentucky. Allen's success continued
with his complex The Mettle Of The Pasture (1903), another national
best seller. Allen sought new themes, but as he tried to change, he never
again was so successful. Even when he returned to romantic themes, the
criticisms continued and sales dropped. The cold and humorless Bride Of
The Mistletoe (1909) scandalized reviewers with what they perceived as
the vulgar frankness of its descriptive passages. Although some of his later
work had real merit, only cursory public and critical attention was given to The
Doctor's Christmas Eve (1910), The Heroine In Bronze (1912), The
Last Christmas Tree (1914), The Sword Of Youth (1915), A
Cathedral Singer (1916), The Kentucky Warbler (1918), The
Emblems Of Fidelity: A Comedy In Letters (1919), The Alabaster Box
(1923), and the posthumous The Landmark (1925).
Allen lived in New York after
1893, and his literary output declined. He died on February 18, 1925, and was
buried in the Lexington
Cemetery . His will specified that his
royalties and estate go to the city of Lexington, to be used for the young.
Allen's writing often seems
romantic and sentimental, but so was his time. He met perfectly the reading tastes
of his age, wrote some outstanding literature, and made America aware that
the Bluegrass State could produce fine writers.
JAMES
C. KLOTTER,
Entry Author
Selected Sources from UK Libraries:
Allen, James Lane. James Lane Allen Papers, 1892-1925. (1892). Print.
Allen, James Lane. King Solomon of Kentucky. New York, 1888. Print.8M52, Room 019, Special Collections Research Center - Manuscripts Collection
F AL53ki, Special Collections Research Center - Fiction Collection
Allen, James Lane. Homesteads of the Blue-grass. S.l.: S.n., 1892. Print.
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