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Frederick Philip Grove (FPG) (Feb. 14, 1879 - 1948) was born Felix Paul Greve in Radomno, West Prussia, German Empire (now in Poland). He was best known as a prolific translator before he left Berlin for start a new life in North America in late July 1909. In 1912, he came to Manitoba, where he first taught school in Haskett, Winkler, Virden, Gladstone, & finally Rapid City, from where he emerged as a Canadian author in 1922. He died in 1948 on his estate in Simcoe, Ontario, where he had resided since 1930.

FPG Portrait "Solar Grove" & Collage "Six Times Solar Grove"

"Solar Grove" (UMA 1996)

"Six Times Solar Grove" (UMA 2005)

About FPG (Greve/Grove)

The Canadian author Frederick Philip Grove (February 14, 1879-August 19, 1948) was actually a German-Canadian author after the fact: he was born Felix Paul Greve in Radomno, West Prussia (Poland after 1918), and grew up in Hamburg. When he arrived in Manitoba in 1912, he adopted the name Grove along with his new Canadian identity. In his autobiographies he claimed to be of Anglo-Swedish descent, and only twenty-five years after his death did D. O. Spettigue, Queen's University, uncover who he really was.

Early life in Germany & Europe

He was born in Radomno, West Prussia, but was brought up in Hamburg where he graduated with the "Abitur" from the famous Gymnasium Johanneum in 1898. After studying Classical Languages & Archaeology in Bonn, he became a prolific translator of World Literature and a minor literary figure in Stefan George's group, the George-Kreis, around 1900. During his year in Munich, he courted Karl Wolfskehl, and briefly shared an address with Thomas Mann at the Pension Gisels in Aug./Sept. 1902.In early 1903, he "eloped" with Else Endell, wife of his friend August Endell, the well-known Jugendstil architect, to Palermo. He was imprisoned in Bonn in 1903-04 for having defrauded another friend, Herman Kilian, whose Anglo-German ancestry he would later appropriate for himself in his Canadian autobiographies. From 1904 to early 1906, when he returned to Berlin, he lived with Else in voluntary exile, first in Wollerau, Switzerland, then in Paris-Plage, France, from where paid H. G. Wells a few visits in his Sandhurst villa just across the Channel.

Emigration: USA, 1909

From Berlin he hurriedly transferred to North America on the White Star Liner Megantic in late July 1909. He had double-sold his latest translation, Swift's Prosa Werke in four volumes (from Temple Scott's ed. which is extant in Grove's Library Collection at the UMA). Four details planted on the very opening pages of Grove's 1927 Search for America led to the discovery of FPG's passage in October 1998, shortly after the "In Memoriam FPG: 1879-1948-1998" Symposium commemorating the 50th Anniversary of his death.His wife Else joined him a year later in Pittsburgh, and in her papers at the University of Maryland, College Park, it is attested that the couple farmed near Sparta, Kentucky, until 1911, when Greve left her permanently. She modeled in nearby Cincinnati, and later became well-known in New York dada circles as Baroness von Freytag-Loringhoven. Greve moved west and stayed on a huge Bonanza Farm near Fargo in the late summer of 1912 (it could be identified from the author's autobiographical descriptions as the Amenia & Sharon Land Company in 1996).

Emigration: Canada, 1912

Grove arrived in Manitoba, Canada, in 1912. He first taught in rural areas, but devoted himself entirely to writing after he settled in Rapid City, Manitoba, in 1922. In 1927, Grove and his wife Catherine Wiens lost their only child Phyllis May shortly before her twelfth birthday.In 1928-29, Grove went on three coast-to-coast lecture tours, and then the couple moved to Ontario in the fall of 1929. There, their son Arthur Leonard Grove was born on October 14, 1930 (He died in Toronto in October 2006, just a few days shy of his 76th Birthday). Grove briefly became an editor with Graphic Publishers, who had published his first autobiographical novel A Search for America in 1927, before moving to Simcoe, Ontario. From there, he continued to write despite increasing ill-health, until he suffered a crippling stroke in late 1946.

FPG (Greve/Grove) Chronology in three parts, 1879-1948

Detailed Chronicle of FPG's two lives in Europe & America:

• Greve in Germany & Europe, 1879-1909
• FPG in the USA, 1909-1912
• Grove in Canada, 1912-1948

Pseudonyms

Though Greve used so many false names that Karl Wolfskehl called him a "Pseudologe" & referred to his "Munchhausiaden", only two are attested with certainty (2.4 below) so far. Grove offered "potboilers" & erotic fiction under assumed names as well, but one highly revealing pseudonym is on file in his UM mss poetry (2.3).It is more than likely that further pen-names will eventually come to light in Europe & North America.

FPG

Grove's most clever and obvious pseudonym is FPG: he used these initials on both sides of the Atlantic, for his legal birth name Felix Paul Greve and his Canadian name Frederick Philip Grove. Queen's University Professor D. O. Spettigue, who discovered Grove's true identity in October 1971 in the British Museum, published his sensational finding in his 1973 book FPG: The European Years.

Grove

The name Grove itself is an elegant modification of the author's real name Greve. On the Immigration Manifesto of the White Star Liner Megantic on July 31, 1909, it appears that Grove's name was smudged, leaving the nature of the central vowel uncertain, though it looks like an "o". Possibly, the German Gothic writing in Greve's passport left it open to a variety of interpretations, & Grove was non-committal as to its true spelling.

Andrew R. Rutherford

Grove suggested the name "Andrew R. Rutherford" as a pseudonym for his first Canadian book publication Over Prairie Trails (1922). The same name appears in relation to his unpublished typescript in the University of Manitoba Archives, Jane Atkinson (ca. 1923, e-publ. 2000). This name is a direct reference to Grove's friend Herman Kilian's maternal grandfather, a renowned Scottish judge. Though Kilian had Grove arrested, tried & sentenced for fraud in May 1903, Grove appropriated Kilian's entire family background for his invented Canadian autobiography in the early 1920s, except that he claimed to be of Scottish-Swedish rather than Scottish-German origin.

Gerden & Thorer

Only two pseudonyms are attested in Grove's correspondence with Insel Publishers: he used F. C. Gerden for translations of decadent literature (Dowson, Browning), and Konrad Thorer for translations of Cervantes & Lesage.

Fanny Essler

In 1904-05, Greve published an accomplished, Petrarchan poetry cycle with his lover Else Endell, under the joint pseudonym Fanny Essler in Die Freistatt. In a revealing letter to Gide [Oct. 17, 1904], Greve explained daring plans concerning the so-called 'Fanny Essler' complex, which included his first novel about Else's life, which was entitled Fanny Essler (1905).

FPG Bibliography

Bibliography: Felix Paul Greve, 1901-1909

• Wanderungen (Poems) - 1902
• Helena und Damon (Play) - 1902
• Gedichte / Ein Portrait: Drei Sonette / Gedichte. Von Fanny Essler (joint pseud. for F. P. Greve & Else von Freytag-Loringhoven) - Die Freistatt, 1904/5 - (e-Ed. with Eng. transl., UMA 2005)
• Fanny Essler: ein Berliner Roman (about Else von Freytag-Loringhoven) - 1905
• Fanny Essler: [a novel] (Eng. Transl., 2v.) - 1984
• Maurermeister Ihles Haus (about Else von Freytag-Loringhoven) - 1906
• The Master Mason's House (Eng. Transl.) - 1976
• [Der Sentimentalist] (Novel, announced ca. 1907)]
• [Der heimliche Adel] (Drama, announced ca. 1907)]

Bibliography: Frederick Philip Grove, 1914-1948

• Rousseau als Erzieher (Essay by "Fred Grove", Winkler, Manitoba) - Der Nordwesten (Winnipeg), 1914
• Over Prairie Trails (Essays) - 1922
• Turn of the Year (Essays) - 1923
• Settlers of the Marsh (Novel)- 1925
• A Search for America (Autobiogr. Novel) - (1927, e-Ed. UMA, 2000/5)
• Our Daily Bread (Novel) - 1928
• It Needs to Be Said (Essays) - 1929
• The Yoke of Life (Novel) - 1930
• Fruits of the Earth (Novel) - 1933
• Two Generations (Novel) - 1939
• The Master of The Mill (Novel) - 1944
• In Search of Myself (Autobiography) - 1946 (Won Governor General's Award; e-Ed. UMA, 2007)
• Consider Her Ways (Novel) - 1947

Posthumous:

• Tales from the Margin (Short Stories) - 1971
• Letters of Frederick Philip Grove (Correspondence, contains letters by Felix Paul Greve) - 1976
• Poems/Gedichte by/von Frederick Philip Grove, Felix Paul Greve, und 'Fanny Essler' - 1993
• Jane Atkinson (ts. Novel, ca. 1923, e-Ed., UMA) - 2000

e-Editions by/about FPG (Greve/Grove) at the UM Archives

• Gedichte / Ein Portrait: Drei Sonette / Gedichte von Fanny Essler (joint pseud. for FPG/Felix Paul Greve & Else von Freytag-Loringhoven) -- Die Freistatt, 1904/5. ( Centennial e-Ed., UMA 2005).

*Related criticism: "Greve's & Freytag-Loringhovens 'Fanny Essler' Poems: FPG's or Else's?" (gd, e-Ed., UMA 2005)

• In Search of Myself(Autobiography), (1946, e-Ed. UMA 2007).
• Jane Atkinson(ms. Novel, ca. 1923, e-Ed. UMA 2000).
• A Search for America(Autobiographical Novel, 1927; UMA e-Ed., with critical apparatus, 2000/5).

*Related criticism: Introduction, Chapter Summaries, Links

• Poems/Gedichte, by F. P. Greve/F. P. Grove & "Fanny Essler" (1993; UMA e-Ed., 2007).

*Related criticism: 1993 Introduction, 63p.

Grove e-Editions at Gutenberg Projects

In addition to the UMA e-Texts listed above, the following texts are provided by Gutenberg Project of Australia or, like Over Prairie Trails, Project Gutenberg.Org. The recently established Gutenberg Project Canada has, so far, no original contribution in its list.

• Consider Her Ways (1947): http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0201151.txt
• Fruits of the Earth (1933): http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0300861.txt
• It Needs to be Said (1929, eTxt 2mar08): http://www.gutenberg.ca/ebooks/grove-needs/grove-needs-00-h-dir/grove-needs-00-h.html
• The Master of the Mill (1944): http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0300171.txt
• Our Daily Bread (1928): http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0300091.txt
• Over Prairie Trails (1922): http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/6111]
• A Search for America (1927): http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0300631h.html
• Settlers of the Marsh (1925): http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0200861.txt

FPG (Greve/Grove) Source- & Research Collections at the University of Manitoba

The FPG (Greve/Grove) & FrL Collections Website at the University of Manitoba Archives (UMA) contain numerous big & small e-texts by/about FPG and FrL, notably:

• A List of the FPG (Greve/Grove) Sources & Documents held at the University of Manitoba Archives
• A Description of the FPG (Greve/Grove) Sources & Documents held at the University of Manitoba Archives (based on a 1996 promotional Brochure)
• A Brief History of UMA e-Projects

The Frederick Philip Grove Papers (Mss 2, 24 Boxes)

contain many published and unpublished manuscripts and typescripts and six mss. German poems, were acquired by the University of Manitoba from his widow Catherine Wiens Grove in the early 1960s.

• An online Finding-Aid of this pivotal Collectionis available on the archival websites.

Professor D. O. Spettigue's Research Papers (Mss 57, 1985 & 1995)

document the sensational discovery of the FPG identity in 1971, were added in 1986. They also included two letters Thomas Mann sent to Grove in 1939.

• An additional Spettigue cluster was acquired in January 1995. It included Greve's correspondence with André Gide, Karl Wolfskehl, O. A. H. Schmitz et al., and most importantly, [Else Baroness von Freytag-Loringhoven]'s autobiographical writings which are full of reflections of her life with Greve, 1902-ca. 1912 (both: Mss 57, 16 Boxes).

Professor Margaret Stobie's Collection (Mss 13)

documents Grove's early teaching activities in Manitoba, and contains Grove's first Canadian publication, the sprawling article "Rousseau als Erzieher" in the German newspaper Der Nordwesten (Nov./Dec. 1914).

Dr. Gaby Divay's Research Papers (Mss 12, 1986-)

contain many documents pertaining to FPG & FrL discoveries such as:

*Greve's mss. poems submitted in 1902 for publication in Stefan George's prestigious Blätter für die Kunst

*six sonnets he translated from Dante's Vita Nuova in 1898[both clusters were found in the Stefan-George-Archiv, Stuttgart, in May 1990, copies courtesy of Dr. Ute Oelmann]

*Claude Martin's 1976 masterly edition of Gide's 1904 Conversation avec un allemand (with two confessional letters by Greve)

*Centennial e-Ed. in Germ & Eng. of seven poems published in 1904/5 under the joint pseud. 'Fanny Essler' in Die Freistatt

* Greve's passage to North America from Liverpool to Montreal in July 1909[found shortly after the 1998 international FPG Anniversary Symposium in the Ottawa NL Archives & published in W. Pache's Festschrift, Jan. 2000]

*the Bonanza Farm "in the Dakotas" described in A Search for America (1925)[found in March 1996 at the NDSU archives, Fargo, & video-recorded as LCMND Presidential Dinner Address in Oct. 1996]

*Else & Greve's Sparta, Kentucky, location in 1910/11 [known ONLY from her poem "Schalk" in the University of Maryland, College Park, FrL Collection[found there in April 1991, & published in FPG's Dec. 1993 Poetry Ed. (facsim 49b, and n159)

*two NYT articles about FPG & FrL[found in 2004 via ProQuest: Pittsburgh arrest for cross-dressing & smoking in public, Sep. 1910,and about FrL's 1915 modelling jobs in NY

*two FrL images showing her in exotic garb & pose [found in 2006 at the Library of Congress' Bain Collection]: one showing FrL alone, the other showing FrL leaning on Jamaican poet Claude McKay

and much more...

FPG Book Collections: Greve's Translations & Grove's Library

The UMA own all of Grove's & as well as all of Greve's known Publications.Canadian & some foreign Theses are also extant in various formats.The Grove Library- & the Greve Translations Collections are available online:

• The Grove Library Collection of some 500 titles contains many of the incredible number of books Greve translated into German when he was Greve. Most notable are perhaps certain Meredith titles, & a complete set of Temple Scott's Swift edition.
• The FPG Translations Collection reflects a complete record of Greve's titanic efforts, 1898-1909, starting out with Dante Sonetts, Oscar Wilde texts & criticism, Browning, Dowson, Pater, Meredith, Swinburne [both of whom died in 1909 when Greve chose voluntary exile], H. G. Wells, Balzac, Flaubert, & Gide, as well as all 12 v. from Burton's Arabian Nights.

"In Memoriam FPG": 1998 Anniversary Symposium

The international anniversary symposium "In Memoriam FPG: 1879-1948-1998" was recorded on 12 videos, which could be viewed at the UML since early 1999.

• In 2007, they were digitized & thus became available online for even wider public viewing.

FPG & FrL Endowment (1995ff)

An FPG & FrL Endowment Fund devoted to FPG (Greve/Grove) & Else von Freytag-Loringhoven projects was established in 1995/96. Promotional brochures, various e-text publications, and the FPG & FrL Website were partly or entirely funded by this endowment.

This author page uses material from the Wikipedia article "Frederick Philip Grove", which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike License 3.0