James Clarence Mangan

James Clarence Mangan, born James Mangan (1 May 1803, Dublin - 20 June 1849) was an Irish poet.

Memorial bust of Mangan in St. Stephen's Green, sculpted by Oliver Sheppard.

Early life

Mangan was the son of a former hedge school teacher who took over a grocery business and eventually became bankrupt.

Born in Dublin, he was educated at a Jesuit school where he learned the rudiments of Latin, Spanish, French, and Italian. He attended three different schools until the age of fifteen. Obliged to find a job in order to support his family, he became a lawyer's clerk, and was later an employee of the Ordnance Survey and an assistant in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin.

Literary career

Mangan began submitting verses to various Dublin publications, the first being published in 1818. From 1820 onwards he adopted the middle name Clarence. In 1830 he began producing translations from German, a language he had taught himself.Of interest are his translations of Goethe. From 1834 his contributions began appearing in the Dublin University Magazine. His translations from the German were generally free interpretations rather than strict transliterations. In 1840 he began producing translations from Turkish, Persian, Arabic, and Irish.

Although his early poetry was often apolitical, after the Great Famine he began writing poems with a strong nationalist bent, including influential works such as My Dark Rosaleen or Róisín Dubh and A Vision of Connaught in the Thirteenth Century.

Grave of James Clarence Mangan, Glasnevin, Dublin.

Mangan was a lonely and difficult man who suffered from mood swings, depression and irrational fears, and became a heavy drinker. His appearance was eccentric, and later in life he was often seen wearing a long cloak, green spectacles and a blond wig. In 1849, weakened by poverty, alcoholism and malnutrition, he succumbed to cholera, aged 46, and was buried in Glasnevin Cemetery.

James Joyce wrote a significant essay on Mangan, and also used his name in his works, e.g. Araby in Dubliners. The significance, it is said, lies in part in Joyce's reluctance to acknowledge influence from the Irish literary tradition: he was otherwise chary of adopting any artistic predecessors.

He was addicted to opium and alcohol and was friends with fellow Irish Nationalists, Thomas Osborne Davis and John Mitchel. Mitchel even wrote a biography after Mangan's death.

His poems were published in The Nation (Irish newspaper), a Nationalist newspaper first published in October 1842. Yeats considered Mangan one of the best Irish poets, along with Thomas Osborne Davis and Samuel Ferguson, claiming, "To the soul of Clarence Mangan was tied the burning ribbon of Genius."

His most famous poems include Dark Rosaleen, Siberia, Nameless One, A Vision of Connaught in the Thirteenth Century, The Funerals, To the Ruins of Donegal Castle, Pleasant Prospects for the Land-eaters and Woman of Three Cows. He also wrote a brief autobiography on the advice of his friend, Father C. P. Meehan, which ends cutoff mid-sentence. He must have been writing in the last months of his life since he mentions his narrative poem of the Italian Gasparo Bandollo which was published in the Dublin University Magazine in May 1849. A sensationally discovered continuation of the autobiography appeared in the Dublin journal Metre in 2001, but was later discovered to be a fake.

Among the contemporary Irish writers he has influenced are Thomas Kinsella, Michael Smith, James McCabe (author of the hoax autobiography) and David Wheatley, author of a sonnet sequence on Mangan. He is also cited by the song writer Shane MacGowan as an inspiration, both for his work and his lifestyle.

Private papers of Mangan are held in the National Library of Ireland, the Royal Irish Academy, and the archives of Trinity College, Dublin.

Bibliography

James Clarence Mangan: Selected Writings ISBN 978-1900621922

References

Books by Young Irelanders (Irish Confederation) 

• An Apology for the British Government in Ireland, John Mitchel, O Donoghue & Company 1905, 96 pages
• Jail Journal: Commenced on Board the "Shearwater" Steamer, in Dublin Bay ..., John Mitchel, M.H. Gill & Sons, Ltd 1914, 463 pages
• Jail Journal: with continuation in New York & Paris, John Mitchel, M.H. Gill & Son, Ltd
• The Crusade of the Period, John Mitchel, Lynch, Cole & Meehan 1873
• Last Conquest Of Ireland (Perhaps), John Mitchel, Lynch, Cole & Meehan 1873
• History of Ireland, from the Treaty of Limerick to the Present Time, John Mitchel, Cameron & Ferguson
• History of Ireland, from the Treaty of Limerick to the Present Time (2 Vol), John Mitchel, James Duffy 1869
• Life of Hugh O'Neil John Mitchel, P.M. Haverty 1868
• The Last Conquest of Ireland (Perhaps), John Mitchel, (Glasgow, 1876 - reprinted University College Dublin Press, 2005) ISBN 1-905558-36-4
• The Felon's Track, Micheal Doheny, M.H. Gill & Sons, Ltd 1951 (Text at Project Gutenberg)
• The Volunteers of 1782, Thomas Mac Nevin, James Duffy & Sons. Centenary Edition
• Thomas Davis, Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co, Ltd 1890
• My Life In Two Hemispheres (2 Vol), Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, T. Fisher Unwin. 1898
• Young Ireland, Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, Cassell, Petter, Galpin & Co 1880
• Four Years of Irish History 1845-1849, Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, Cassell, Petter, Galpin & Co 1888
• A Popular History of Ireland: from the Earliest Period to the Emancipation of the Catholics, Thomas D'Arcy McGee, Cameron & Ferguson (Text at Project Gutenberg)
• The Patriot Parliament of 1689, Thomas Davis, (Third Edition), T. Fisher Unwin, MDCCCXCIII
• Charles Gavan Duffy: Conversations With Carlyle (1892)
• Davis, Poem’s and Essays Complete, Introduction by John Mitchel, P. M. Haverty, P.J. Kenedy, 9/5 Barclay St. New York, 1876.

• Cousin, John William: A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature. (London, J.M. Dent & sons; New York, E.P. Dutton, 1910)
• Boylan, Henry, A Dictionary of Irish Biography, (Dublin, Gill and Macmillan, 1978)
• Anton, Brigitte, "Mangan, James Clarence", on the website of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Subscription or UK public library membership required), http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/17930 
•  "James Clarence Mangan". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. 1913. 

External links

• James Clarence Mangan Resource
• Ten poems by James Clarence Mangan

Persondata
Name	Mangan, James Clarence
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1 May 1803
Place of birth
Date of death	20 June 1849
Place of death