Bounce Magazine 79

MAY 2019 MAY | ISSUE 2019 | #79 ISSUE | #79 HISTORY
George Grenville Baker
A Tormented Poet...
George Granville Barker
was born in Loughton,
Essex in 1913; the elder
brother of painter Kit
Barker. Raised by his Irish
mother and English father
in Battersea, London.
He was educated at an L.C.C.
school and later at Regent
Street Polytechnic. He
had many odd jobs before
becoming a writer.
During the last decade few
have read of him, the majority
of his work is out of print, and
very little of him has been
mentioned in literary histories.
This is unacceptable for a
writer who was passionate,
intellectually challenging and
highly original. At the young
age of 22, Barker was known
as a literary phenomenon.
Whilst T.S. Eliot declared him
a genius Yeats claimed him
the finest poet of the times.
George was a drinker,
womaniser and a user of
Benzedrine. A fraudulent
estate agent stole his entire
savings leaving him without
a fixed address. He was
part of the bohemian crowd
in London’s Soho and he
fathered 15 children by four
different women.
His life was somewhat violent
with friends and lovers and
one argument led him to hit
his friend over the head with
a shovel, a partner threw an
ashtray at him and broke
his teeth and another bit his
upper lip where he required
40 stitches. His poems, read
on the BBC Third Programme,
were criticised for obscenity,
and he always liked to cause
outrage. After a period of
thirty years he told a priest
during confession that he had
broken every commandment
except the sixth, ‘thou shalt
not kill’.
For the last 24 years of his
life he settled with second
wife Elspeth at Bintree House
Itteringham, near the River
Bure 15 miles from Norwich.
It was purchased with
help from novelist Graham
Green. Elspeth wrote about
the property in her essay
‘Thoughts in a Garden’.
George was never asked by
the University of East Anglia
to take a single class in the
creative writing course,
and Elspeth stated that her
husband did nothing to
promote himself.
In 1969 whilst visiting All
Saints Church in Thurgarton
near his home, George wrote
one of his best poems ‘At
Thurgarton Church’ about his
fear of Judgement day.
George Granville Barker
is buried at St Mary’s
Churchyard, Itteringham.
His headstone states:
‘No Compromise’. This was
erected by a bank robber that
George befriended, and it
became a saying that George
used many times in a life that
was as extraordinary as his
writings.
The last part of ‘At Thurgarton
Church’ by George Grenville
Baker.
I hear the old bone in me
cry and the dying spirit call:
I have forfeited all and once
and for all must die and this is
a that I know.
For now, in a wild way we
know that justice is served
and that we die in the clay we
dread, desired, and deserved,
awaiting no Judgement Day.
Photograph of Plaque ©
Naomi Y Lyons 2019 and used
with kind permission.
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May 2019.indd 76 16/04/2019 18:21