Barker, George Granville (1913-1991) poet

George Barker was born in Loughton, Essex, England, to George Barker, a constable, and Marion Frances Taaffe Barker. He attended secondary school in London but dropped out at the age of 14. He then held a series of jobs ranging from garage mechanic to wallpaper designer. At 16, Barker decided he would be a poet. From 1930 onward he supported himself through writing and teaching at universities around the world. Barker had a long affair with novelist and poet Elizabeth Smart with whom he had four children.

Barker was 20 when he published his first book of poetry, Thirty Preliminary Poems (1933). Influenced by the poet Louis MacNeice, Barker had a despairing concern for the social conditions of the time. In the poem “Elegy Number 1,” he writes, “Lovers on Sunday in the rear seats of the cinemas / Kiss deep and dark, for is it the last kiss?”

T. S. Eliot helped Barker publish his second collection of verse, Poems (1935). This volume, like his first, reflects his despair about life and his thoughts of death. The next year William Butler Yeats made Barker the youngest contributor in his Oxford Book of Modern Verse (1936).

One of Barker’s most successful collections, Eros in Dogma (1944), combines love poems with elegiac laments about the burdens that external forces place on individuals. He sparked controversy for his use of erotic images in his long autobiographical poem The True Confession of George Barker (1950). This poem covered many of his common themes: the distortion of sex, an impenitent loss of faith in God, and the loss of love for other humans. Critic E. G. Burrows noted that while Barker often treated those themes with a lack of respect, “Behind the clever lines there is a tense battle being waged and it is Barker’s genius to show us the value of this struggle and the toll it has taken even in the midst of his most urbane verses.”

Although Barker won a handful of poetry awards in his career, including the Guinness prize and Poetry magazine’s Levinson Prize, he remained overshadowed by the other acclaimed poets of his day, such as Dylan Thomas. By the 1970s Barker’s poetry volumes were attracting little attention.

Neglected for much of his career, Barker finally enjoyed a widespread critical reappraisal of his work four years before his death when he published Collected Poems (1987). Reflecting on his merits, biographer Martha Fodaski wrote that Barker created “. . . poetry of conscience. And, as the conscience of his times, he explores the effects of the people, the events, and the ideas of an era and a life upon the human heart.”

Other Works by George Barker:
- III Hallucination Poems. New York: Helikon Press, 1972.
- Villar Stellar. Boston: Faber and Faber, 1978.

Works about George Barker:
- Fodaski, Martha. George Barker. Boston: Twayne, 1969.
- Heath-Stubbs, John, and Martin Green, eds. Homage to George Barker on his 60th Birthday. London: Brian and O’Keefe, 1973.