Ira Victor Morris

Ira Victor Morris or I.V. Morris (1903–1972) was an American writer and journalist.[1]

Ira Victor Morris
Born	1903 Chicago, Illinois
Died	1972 (age 69)
Nationality	American
Education	B.A. Harvard University
Occupation	Writer
Spouse(s)	Edita Toll
Children	Ivan Morris
Parent(s)	Constance Lily Rothschild Morris Ira Nelson Morris
Relatives	Nelson Morris (grandfather) Abram M. Rothschild (grandfather) Edward Morris (uncle) Helen Swift Morris (aunt) Muriel Gardiner (cousin) Ruth Morris Bakwin (cousin) Nobuko Uenishi (daughter-in-law)

Biography

Morris was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1903 to a Jewish family, the son of Constance Lily (née Rothschild) and Ira Nelson Morris.[2] His mother was the daughter of Victor Henry Rothschild; and his father was the son of Nelson Morris, the founder of Morris & Company, one of the three main meat-packing companies in Chicago. He graduated with a B.A. from Harvard University.[2] As his father was a diplomat who was named the Minister to Sweden (1914–1923), the younger Morris was raised abroad.[2] Morris wrote both fiction and non-fiction works which focused on international politics and Americans living abroad.[2] After visiting the countries devastated by World War II, Morris started writing many articles criticizing the conduct of the war and later, the cold war.[1] His wife wrote The Flowers of Hiroshima (1959) which exposed the aftereffects of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.[1] They founded the Edita and Ira Morris Hiroshima Foundation for Peace and Culture which assisted victims of the bombings.[1]

Personal life

In February 1925, he married Sweden-native Edita (née Toll).[2] In 1930, she began a long-term affair with fellow Swede and artist, Nils Dardel despite her marriage to Morris (Dardel died in 1943).[3] Their son Ivan Morris was a British author and Japanologist whose third wife was author and theatrical producer Nobuko Uenishi (later married to impresario Donald Albery).

He died in 1972.[2]

Works

• A Tale from the Grave (1926)
• The Kimono (1931)
• The Sampler (1932)
• Covering Two Years (1933)[4]
• Marching Orders (1938)
• The Beautiful Fire (1939)
• Liberty Street (1944)
• Livaaqaa (1944)
• La mort est moins pressée (1947)
• The Tree Within (1948)
• The Chicago Story (1952)
• The Bombay Meeting (1955)
• The Road to Spain (1966)

References

1. "Ira Victor Morris Papers". University of Iowa Libraries. Retrieved February 5, 2019.
2. "Ira and Edita Morris Papers, 1892–1988". Columbia University Archival Collections.
3. "Spanish, Scandinavian, Czech and Austrian 19th century masters at Sotheby's in London this May". artdaily.org. March 15, 2019.
4. "Covering two years, by I. V. Morris". Haithi Trust Digital Library.