Joseph Pearce | |
|---|---|
 Pearce in 2007 | |
| Born | (1961-02-12)February 12, 1961 (age 64) East London, England |
| Occupation | Biographer |
| Website | |
| jpearce | |
Joseph Pearce (born February 12, 1961), is an English-born American writer, and as of 2014[update] Director of the Center for Faith and Culture[1] atAquinas College inNashville, Tennessee, before which he held positions atThomas More College of Liberal Arts inMerrimack, New Hampshire,Ave Maria College inYpsilanti, Michigan and Ave Maria University inAve Maria, Florida.
He is a co-editor of theSt. Austin Review.
Pearce has written biographies of literary figures, often Christian, includingWilliam Shakespeare,J. R. R. Tolkien,Oscar Wilde,C. S. Lewis,G. K. Chesterton,Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn andHilaire Belloc.
Joseph Pearce was born inBarking, London, and brought up inHaverhill, Suffolk.[P 1] His father, Albert Arthur Pearce, was a heavy drinker with a history of brawling inpubs with Irishmen and non-Whites, had an encyclopedic knowledge ofEnglish poetry andBritish military history, and an intensenostalgia for the vanishedBritish Empire.[2] In 1973 the family moved back to Barking in theEast End of London, so that the Pearce boys would grow up withCockney accents. Pearce had been a compliant pupil at the school in Haverhill, but at Eastburycomprehensive school in Barking he led theracist disruption of the lessons taught by a youngPakistani British mathematics teacher.[P 2]
At 15, Pearce joined theyouth wing of theNational Front, anantisemitic andwhite supremacistpolitical party advocating the compulsory repatriation of all legalimmigrants and British-born non-Whites. He came to prominence in 1977 when he set upBulldog, the NF's openly racist newspaper.[2] Like his father, Pearce became an enthusiastic supporter ofUlster Loyalism duringthe Troubles from 1978,[2] and joined theOrange Order, aProtestantsecret society closely linked to Ulster Loyalistparamilitary organizations.[2] In 1980, he became editor ofNationalism Today, advocatingwhite supremacy.[3] Pearce was twice prosecuted and imprisoned under theRace Relations Act of 1976 for his writings, in 1981 and 1985.[2][4] At one stage, he contactedJohn Tyndall to suggest coalition talks with theBritish National Party, but Tyndall rejected the plan.[5] Pearce was a close associate ofNick Griffin, whom he helped to oustMartin Webster from the NF's leadership.[6] As a spokesman for theStrasserite Political Soldier faction within the NF, Pearce argued for white supremacy, publishing theFight for Freedom! pamphlet in 1984.[7] At the same time, however, Pearce adopted the group's support forethnopluralism, contacting theIranian embassy in London in 1984 in a vain attempt to secure funding from the Government of theIslamic Republic of Iran.[8] Pearce became a leading member of a new NF political faction known as the Flag Group, writing for its publications and contributing to its ideology. Pearce notably argued, based on the writings ofG.K. Chesterton andHilaire Belloc, fordistributism as an alternative to bothMarxism andLaissez faireCapitalism in a 1987 article for the party magazineVanguard.[9]
Pearce decided to convert to Catholicism during his second prison term (1985-1986).[10] He was received into the Catholic Church duringMass at Our Lady Mother of God Church inNorwich, England onSaint Joseph's Day, 19 March 1989. Following the Mass, the women of the parish held a surprise party for Pearce, accompanied by a cake with, "Welcome Home, Joe", emblazoned on it.[4][11] Pearce has attributed his conversion to reading books by Catholic authorsG. K. Chesterton,[2]John Henry Newman,J.R.R. Tolkien, andHilaire Belloc.[12]
As a Catholic author, Pearce has focused mainly on the life and work of English Catholic writers, such asJ. R. R. Tolkien,G. K. Chesterton andHilaire Belloc.[13]The Guardian commented thatOld Thunder: A Life of Hilaire Belloc "skates over" Belloc'santisemitism, "the central disfiguring fact of his oeuvre".[14]
He chose thepen name "Robert Williamson" after a character in theUlster Loyalist balladThe Old Orange Flute, who, like Pearce, is anOrange Order member who converts toRoman Catholicism.[P 3] Pearce's biography ofG. K. Chesterton,Wisdom and Innocence: A Life of G. K. Chesterton, was published, under thepseudonym of Robert Williamson, byHodder and Stoughton in 1996. Jay P. Corrin, reviewing the book forThe Catholic Historical Review, called it "a venture of love and high praise", but which adds little to existing biographies. Its contribution, Corrin wrote, is its focus on Chesterton's religious vision and personal relationships, contrasting his friendly style with the combative Belloc.[15]
Pearce's 2000 biographyThe Unmasking of Oscar Wilde focused on the conflict betweenOscar Wilde'shomosexuality and his lifelong attraction to theRoman Catholic Church and how it was finally settled by his reception into the Church on his deathbed inParis.
In a review forThe Wildean Michael Seeney described Pearce's biography as "badly written and muddled", "woefully poorly annotated" and using "odd sources without question".[16] Seeney wrote that it "does not 'unmask' anything", but contains too much "cod psychology" and "hyperbolic cliché" to be a "workmanlike biography".[16]
In 2001, Pearce published a biography ofAnglo-South African poet and Catholic convertRoy Campbell, followed in 2003 by an edited anthology of Campbell's poetry and verse translations.
Pearce has written and published a variety of books ofTolkien studies. His essayLetting the Catholic Out of the Baggins discusses why. In 1997, the British people, in a nationwide poll by theFolio Society, votedThe Lord of the Rings the greatest book of the 20th-century and theoutraged reactions of literary celebrities such asHoward Jacobson,Griff Rhys Jones, andGermaine Greer, inspired Pearce to write the books[17]Tolkien: Man and Myth (1998),Tolkien, a Celebration (1999) andBilbo's Journey: Discovering the Hidden Meaning in The Hobbit (2012). All of Pearce's Tolkien-themed books consider his subject's person and writings from a Catholic perspective.Bradley J. Birzer writes inThe J. R. R. Tolkien Encyclopedia that scholars had hardly discussedTolkien's Catholicism until Pearce'sTolkien: Man and Myth, describing the book as "outstanding", treatingThe Lord of the Rings as a "theological thriller" that "inspired a whole new wave of Christian evaluations".[18]
Pearce has credited his previously published books ofTolkien studies and "the wave of Tolkien enthusiasm" caused byPeter Jackson'sfilm adaptation ofThe Lord of the Rings, with making him into a celebrity intellectual following his 2001 emigration from England to theUnited States.[19]
Pearce married Susannah Brown, anIrish-American woman with family roots inDungannon,County Tyrone, in St. Peter's Roman Catholic Church inSteubenville, Ohio in April 2001.[P 4] They have two children. He then received a telephone call and a job offer from the President ofAve Maria College inMichigan. The Pearces arrived in theUnited States on September 7, 2001. Pearce recalls that his first day of teaching coincided with theSeptember 11 attacks, "making my arrival in the States something of a baptism of fire."[P 4] The first issue of the Catholicliterary magazine theSt. Austin Review, which Pearce has coedited ever since alongsideRobert Asch, was also published in September 2001.[20]
Pearce was the host of the 2009EWTN television seriesThe Quest for Shakespeare. Based upon his eponymous book, the show is concerned with Pearce's belief that Shakespearewas a Catholic.[21]
In a 2014 essay, Pearce announced that he had become an American citizen.[22]
In his 2017stage playDeath Comes for the War Poets, according toCatholic Arts Today, Pearce weaves "a verse tapestry," about the military and spiritual journeys ofwar poetsSiegfried Sassoon andWilfred Owen.[23]
In a 2022 interview with Pearce, Polish journalist Anna Szyda from theliterary magazineMagna Polonia explained that thenihilism of modernAmerican poetry is widely noticed and commented upon in theThird Polish Republic as reflecting, "the deleterious influence of the contemporary civilisation on the American soul." In response, Pearce described "theneo-formalist revival" inspired by the lateRichard Wilbur and how it has been reflected in recent verse by the Catholic poets whom he andRobert Asch publish in theSt. Austin Review. Pearce said that the Catholic faith andoptimism of the younger generation of Catholic poets made him feel hope for the future.[24]
In July 2022, Pearce was a speaker at the 41st Annual Conference of the American Chesterton Society inMilwaukee,Wisconsin. Pearce's lecture was titled "How Chesterton Saved Me fromanti-Semitism".[25]
