JAMES LANE ALLEN

by George Brosi

James Lane Allen was born on a farm near Lexington, Kentucky on December 21, 1849. As a young boy, he lived the life of the Southern ante-bellum gentry, but by the time he was a teenager the Civil War and Reconstruction had ushered in a new era for both himself and his family. James Klotter sums up Allen's background in The Kentucky Encyclopedia by saying, "His mother--to whom Laney (as he was known in childhood) dedicated six of his first eight books--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, ethics were replaced by greed, honor by corruption, purity by vulgarity."

Allen graduated from Transylvania University in 1872, giving the Salutatorian address in Latin. He received his Masters degree from Transylvania in 1877. Then he embarked upon a teaching career with took him not only back home to his own school district and his alma mater in Kentucky, but to Missouri and West Virginia as well. In West Virginia he taught at Bethany College where another well-known Kentucky author, Caroline Gordon, was later to be a student. By the 1880s he was publishing regularly in the most prestigious magazines. His fiction pieces were reprinted in book form in 1891. His non-fiction pieces appeared in 1892.

In 1893 James Lane Allen moved to New York City to pursue writing full time. He lived the rest of his life there. In 1894 his novel, A Kentucky Cardinal, was released, making him a commercial as well as a critical success. It was followed by the even more successful novel, The Choir Invisible in 1897. The Reign of Law (1900) also was successful, but because it was one of the first American novels to deal opening with religious doubt and Darwinism, it angered many churchmen and alienated Allen from some of his readership. The Mettle of the Pasture (1903) was his last commercial success. It was followed by almost a dozen lesser novels. In February 1925, James Lane Allen died. He was brought to Lexington, Kentucky, to be buried.

James Lane Allen was truly a literary writer even though he did achieve some fleeting commercial success as well. Although his works were very pleasing in their flowing style, they were also substantive, dealing with important themes of the day, often at the cutting edge of discourse. His obvious skill and depth make him an exemplary initiator of the Kentucky literary tradition. As Klotter said, he was "Kentucky's first important novelist" (14). William Ward in his Literary History of Kentucky reinforces and sharpens this observation by naming Allen as "The principal interpreter and last champion of [Kentucky's]...pre-Civil War gentry" (43).

Klotter, James C. "Allen, James Lane." in The Kentucky Encyclopedia. Kleber, John, ed. Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 1992, 14.

Ward, William S. A Literary History of Kentucky. Knoxville: The University of Tennessee Press, 1988.

by George Brosi

Flute and Violin and Other Kentucky Tales and Romances. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1891. A collection of fiction writings from the most influential magazines of the time.

The Blue-Grass Region of Kentucky. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1892. A collection of local color and travel writings, all non-fiction, which illuminate Allen's native region.

John Gray. Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1893. Allen's first novel, which introduces the title character, a Kentucky schoolmaster, who becomes a principal of Allen's first best-selling novel, The Choir Invisible.

A Kentucky Cardinal. New York: Macmillan, 1894. Set in 1850, this novel features a romance between a naturalist and a society girl. It established Allen as a writer both with readers and critics.

Aftermath. New York: Harper and Brother, 1895. A less successful sequel to A Kentucky Cardinal.

Summer in Arcady. New York: Macmillan, 1896. Set in Bourbon County, Kentucky, this novel makes a break with Allen's earlier works presenting more lower class characters and evincing Allen's first literary controversy over passages dealing with sex.

The Choir Invisible. New York: Macmillan, 1897. This was Allen's most popular book, a best-seller translated into many languages. It is an historical novel which begins in 1795 in Lexington. The protagonist is the John Gray of Allen's earlier novel who shares a mutual attraction with a married woman who is as reluctant as he to break prevailing codes of honor.

Two Gentlemen of Kentucky. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1899. This courageous book follows the careers of a white landowner and his slave through the Civil War and Reconstruction.

The Reign of Law: A Tale of the Kentucky Hemp Fields. New York: Macmillan, 1900. Reinforcing Allen's slide in popularity after The Choir Invisible, this novel of religious doubt and Darwinism alienated many of his readers.

The Increasing Purpose. New York: Macmillan, 1901.

The Mettle of the Pasture. New York: Macmillan, 1903. Allen's popularity rebounded somewhat with this book, another best-seller about the trauma caused when a sincere prospective groom reveals to his fiance that he has earlier fathered a child.

Bride of the Mistletoe. New York: Macmillan, 1909. Another step backward for Allen's career, this novel was considered merely vulgar by some reviewers.

The Doctor's Christmas Eve. New York: Macmillan, 1910.

The Heroine in Bronze. New York, Macmillan, 1912.

The Last Christmas Tree. Portland, ME: T. B. Mosher, 1914.

The Sword of Youth. New York: The Century Company, 1915.

A Cathedral Singer. New York: Century, 1916. This novel represented a minor rebound for Allen. It examined the concept of immortality as manifested both by fame on earth and religious notions of a spiritual reward.

The Kentucky Warbler. New York: Doubleday, Page, 1918.

One Night in a Garden: A Play in One Act. Charlottesville: Michie, 1919.

The Emblem of Fidelity: A Comedy in Letters. New York: Doubleday, Page, 1919.

The Alabaster Box. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1923.

The Landmark. New York: Macmillan, 1925. A posthumous publication.

Mountain Passes of the Cumberland. Lexington: King Library Press, 1972. A reprinting of one of Allen's early narratives of traveling in Eastern Kentucky.