Maria Jolas

Maria Jolas

Editor and translator. Born in Kentucky, as a music student she met Eugene Jolas in Paris and they were married in New York in 1926. The two collaborated in the editing of the literary review transition, a venue for avant-garde writing between the wars and especially for some two dozen pieces of JJ's "Work in Progress." In the 1930s she became involved in care for Lucia Joyce and, in Saint-Gérand-le-Puy provided a home for the Joyce family for several months in 1940 before the family escaped to Switzerland. After spending the WWII years in the United States, she with her husband returned to Paris where she worked as a translator and provided support for Nora Joyce. With her editorship of A James Joyce Yearbook (Paris: Transition Workshop, Transition Press, 1949) she became a voice for JJ's literary legacy, involved in the publication of Joyce's letters and the disposition of his papers. William Brockman