The George Garrett Archive Project

Module Four. The Subterranean Theatre 1918-1955. 

Workshop Three. The Writer as Activist 1926-1939.

In the later 1930’s George, although working on his own writing, still sees the role of the artist in a more collective way. We know in this period, from the letters exchanged between George and the editor of The Left Review, John Lehmann, that George is writing copiously. In this moment, when all of his short stories are published between 1934 and 1937, that he is at the top of his game. But this burst of activity, when he is writing during a long, long period of unemployment, takes its toll, and is finally cut short in 1937 when he suffers what appears to be a breakdown. He spends, in his own words, four weeks in hospital, ‘half-lunatic’.

The success of having his short stories published brings him offers of work; the writer, jack Common, invites him to contribute to a ‘Seven shifts’, a book of working class writers exploring and documenting their working lives, and Tom Harrisson, the founder of the Mass Observation movement, offers him a salary to become one of their writers. George’s piece for ‘Seven shifts’ was torn up by one of his baby sons, after he turned his back with three thousand words complete, and he was unable to complete it. Likewise, he refused the offer from Tom Harrisson. In the workshop Tony speculated upon the reasons for George turning down what appears to be the chance of a lifetime, to finally be paid to do what he loves doing most; to write.

The Mass Observation movement was founded in 1937, with the aim, through interview, observation, and listening in to conversations, to document the views and attitudes of the working class. The idea was to subvert to popular view as represented in the national press of the time. They worked with up to 500 volunteers, and also paid some people as investigators for particular projects. Their work was centred in Bolton, Blackpool and London’s East End, but also had a national focus during the war when it was utilised by the government to record the popular mood.

There was a mixed reception to their work, and they were often viewed with some suspicion. The majority of the observers were middle class students, although there were some workers and left-wing individuals who took part. Garrett would have viewed the whole project with some suspicion. Garrett lived the life of the worker and documented it through his fiction and reportage. He was both observer and participant. It’s likely he would have viewed it in the same way he viewed Orwell’s ‘The Road to Wigan Pier’, which he felt excluded the informed, or intellectual working class; as Orwell explored the poverty of workers in Britain he bypassed those such as garrett were setting up the Unity Theatre and both politically and culturally active in their response to the Civil War in Spain, who were being arrested in Chester for staging Odett’s play, ‘Waiting for lefty’. So it appears likely, regardless of his illness, that George would have rejected Mass Observation in principal.

When he recovered he moved away from writing his short stories, and became engaged once again in theatre, this time into the collective endeavour of establishing the Left Theatre/Unity Theatre alongside Jerry Dawson and other activists. By this point you could say that George had lived at least three lives. A stoker on the ships, a writer and activist in America, a writer and activist in the UK; he could have been forgiven for being tired. But he throws all of his energy into the theatre, as a writer and actor; like all those involved he does what he can to make it a success. He seems to have had a clear sense of the audience he wanted to reach, and reaching a working class audience through theatre would compensate for his disappointment at reaching a mainly middle class audience with his short stories.

But George, maybe better than many, can see the signs of the next war approaching. And when it does arrive he again signs on and goes back to sea. He’s 42 year of age. Other writers, like James Hanley and Jim Phelan get jobs working for the BBC. George could have looked for an alternative role at home. But it may well have been a sense of relief for him once again to get away. Was his wife Grace disappointed? We know from Alan O’Toole’s memoir that she was disappointed that George never followed the path into political office she felt his talents demanded. George never took the easy path, and viewed any attempted patronage with suspicion.

George was great friends with the Irish ‘tramp’ writer, Jim Phelan, a prolific writer who served fifteen years in Jail in Manchester for his role in an IRA raid on a post office in Bootle, Liverpool, that lead to the death of the postal clerk. In 1937 Phelan, in a dedication to George in the inside cover of his novel ‘Museum’, used the phrase ‘Some come through’. And, although there is far more to come with George’s activities after the war, this phrase could some up how George may have felt on returning to sea - he had made it through, still intact, with his family, and with a body of work to be proud of.

Blog created and written by Mike Morris & Tony Wailey, based upon a series of introductions by Tony Wailey to the George Garrett Archive course.

The George Garrett Archive project workshops are free and open to all. We meet every Monday, 6-8pm in Liverpool John Moores University’s Aldham Robarts Library, Maryland Street, L1 9DE (off Hope Street). The next meeting will be on Monday 27th January 2014. All welcome.