JAMES, E. O. (1888–1972), was an English academic anthropologist, folklorist, and historian of religions. Edwin Oliver James was born in London on March 30, 1888. He was educated at Exeter College, Oxford, where he took a diploma in anthropology under R. R. Marett, and at University College, London. From 1911 to 1933 he served as a priest of the Church of England, chiefly in parishes in London and Oxford, while maintaining a scholarly interest in anthropology, comparative religion, and folklore. During the 1920s and 1930s he was associated with the diffusionist school of Elliot Smith and William James Perry, and with the "myth and ritual school" that emerged out of it. Thus he became one of the earliest British "myth and ritual" writers, contributing to the school's first two symposia. For Myth and Ritual, edited by S. H. Hooke (London, 1933), he wrote "Initiatory Rituals," and for its sequel, The...