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Envoy, A Review of Literature and Art was a magazine published in Dublin, Ireland, from December 1949 to July 1951. It was founded and edited by John Ryan.
During its brief existence, it published the work of a broad range of writers, Irish and others. The first to publish J. P. Donleavy, Brendan Behan's first short stories and his first poem, and an extract from Samuel Beckett's Watt, Envoy was begun by John Ryan, a Dublin artist, who was editor and prime mover. Among the distinguished associate editors were Valentin Iremonger, Irish diplomat and poet who served as poetry editor, James Hillman (who began his career as associate editor for Envoy,[1] Michael Huron, and Owen Quinn. Envoy included Patrick Kavanagh's infamous monthly "Diary". Brian O'Nolan was also a contributor (once writing a "counter-diary" to Kavanagh's Diary[2]) and was "honorary editor"[3] for the special number commemorating James Joyce.
In December 1949 Envoy was inaugurated in response to Irish trade and censorship restrictions which had forced many writers to seek publication outside their homeland. Though the Envoy Publishing Company's goal of publishing books died with the magazine in July 1951, the short-lived enterprise succeeded, with the lone publication of Valentin Iremonger's prize-winning book of poetry, Reservations, and with its lively magazine, in breaching some of the barriers of Irish publication, as well as providing outstanding prose, poetry, criticism, and reviews of the contemporary Irish art scene during its twenty-month existence.
The Envoy offices were located at 39 Grafton Street but most of the journal's business was conducted in the nearby pub, McDaid's, according to Antoinette Quinn in Patrick Kavanagh: A Biography: "Around one o'clock the Envoy office would empty itself into John McDaid's, a small, narrow, high-ceilinged pub at 3 Harry Street, where much of the journal's business was conducted. The clientele was a mixture of working class and bohemian."[4]
- ^ "James Hillman". Irish Independent. 6 November 2011. Retrieved 2 May 2020.
- ^ ‘Baudelaire and Kavanagh’, Envoy 3.12 (November 1950): pp. 78–81 [A "counter-diary" to Patrick Kavanagh's Envoy Diary]. Other articles by O'Nolan include: ‘The Martyr’s Crown’, Envoy 1.3 (February 1950), pp. 57–62; ‘A Bash in the Tunnel’, Envoy, vol. 5, no. 17, April 1951, pp. 5–11; ‘Book Reviews’, Envoy, vol. 3, no. 12, November 1950, pp. 88–89; ‘Book Reviews’, Envoy, vol. 4, no. 15, February 1951, pp. 76–77
- ^ ‘In 1951, whilst I was editor of the Irish literary periodical Envoy, I decided that it would be a fitting thing to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the death of James Joyce by bringing out a special number dedicated to him which would reflect the attitudes and opinions of his fellow countrymen towards their illustrious compatriot. To this end I began by inviting Brian Nolan to act as honorary editor for this particular issue. His own genius closely matched, without in anyway resembling or attempting to counterfeit, Joyce’s. But if the mantle of Joyce (or should we say the waistcoat?) were ever to be passed on, nobody would be half so deserving of it as the man whom under his other guises as Flann O’Brien and Myles na gCopaleen, proved himself incontestably to be the most creative writer and mordant wit that Ireland had given us since Shem the Penman himself.' – John Ryan, Introduction to A Bash in the Tunnel (Brighton: Clifton Books, 1970) John Ryan (1925–92) Ricorso.net
- ^ Patrick Kavanagh: A Biography, by Antoinette Quinn, Gill & Macmillan Ltd, 2001, p: 295 (ISBN 071712651X / 0-7171-2651-X )