Douglas Goldring

Douglas Goldring (1887-1960), from Streets, and other verses, 1920. Courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Douglas Goldring (7 January 1887 - 9 April 1960) was an English poet, prose writer, and journalist.

Life

Youth and education

Goldring was born in Greenwich, England. He was educated initially at Hurstpierpoint, Magdalen College SchoolTemplate:Disambiguation needed and for his secondary education Felsted. He went on to Oxford in 1906; having inherited a legacy he left Oxford without a degree, and moved to London to write.

Career

He first took an editorial position at Country Life magazine. He was then in 1908 a sub-editor for English Review edited by Ford Madox Ford (at that time still named Hueffer). Goldring edited his own literary magazine, The Tramp, in 1910, publishing early work by Wyndham Lewis, and the Futurist Marinetti.

From 1912 he was associated with Max Goschen, a troubled London publisher. He there produced Ford's Collected Poems (1913), principally as a financial arrangement. In 1913 he was in close contact with Wyndham Lewis and the Vorticist group, helping with getting the literary magazine BLAST printed.

He volunteered for the British Army in 1914, at the outbreak of World War I, but was discharged for medical reasons. Subsequently he took a more critical attitude towards the war, from a socialist position. He joined the 1917 Club, the mixed gender Bohemian radical equivalent of a "gentlemen's club", at 4 Gerrard Street, Soho; the name celebrated the Bolshevik revolution in Russia.

He moved to Dublin, Ireland, and married there his 1st wife, Betty Duncan. The couple had 2 children - the 0lder, Hugh, was killed as a soldier in World War II.

In 1919 he visited Germany for Clarté, Henri Barbusse's organisation.

On returning to London, he intended in 1919 to establish a People’s Theatre Society and publish a series of dramas; but let down D.H. Lawrence, in the end only getting his own Fight for Freedom into print. He became more involved in the 1917 Club, meeting there not only the President of the Club, Ramsay Macdonald, but also Aldous Huxley, C.E.M. Joad, and E.D. Morel, until it petered out in the 1930s. He witnessed the destruction in 1924 of the John Nash facades on Regent Street, leading to his later interest in the preservation of Georgian period architecture. He spent much of the 1920s on the French Riviera or in Paris. He taught in Gothenburg, Sweden from 1925 to 1927.

He became known mostly as a travel writer. In the late 1930s he came to prominence in two ways. He was Secretary of the Georgian Society, which he helped to found after writing in the Daily Telegraph in 1936, with Lord Derwent and Robert Byron. It became in 1937 the Georgian Group, a section within the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, on the advice of Lord Esher.

He was also noted, at the same period, as a radical journalist and prolific contributor to left-wing publications. He attacked George Orwell, for Orwell's reporting of the machinations on the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War. In return, Goldring was later on Orwell's list of crypto-Communists.

Publications

Poetry

• A Country Boy, and other poems. London: Adelphi, 1910; London: Andrew Melrose, 1912.
• Streets: A book of London verses. London: Max Goschen, 1912.
• In the Town: A book of London verses. London: Selwyn & Blount, 1916.
• On the Road: A book of travel songs. London: Selwyn & Blount, 1916.
• Streets, and other verses. London: Selwyn & Blount / New York: T. Seltzer, 1920.

Play

• The Fight for Freedom: A play in four acts. London: C. Daniel, 1919; New York: T. Seltzer, 1920.

Novels

• The Permanent Uncle. London: Chapman & Hall, 1912; New York: Dutton, 1912.
• It's an Ill Wind—. London: G. Allen & Unwin, 1915.
• Margot's Progress. London: Eveleigh Nash, 1916; New York: T. Seltzer, 1920.
• Polly. London: Eveleigh Nash, 1917.
• The Fortune: A romance of friendship. Dublin & London: Maunsel, 1917; New York: Scott & Seltzer, 1919; London: D. Harmsworth, 1931.
• The Black Curtain. London: Chapman & Hall, 1920.
• The Solvent (with Hubert Nepean). London: C.W. Daniel, 1920.
• Nobody Knows. London: Chapman & Hall, 1923; Boston: Small, Maynard, 1923.
• Miss Linn. London: Chapman & Hall, 1924.
• Cuckoo: A comedy of adjustments. London: Chapman & Hall, 1925; New York: R.M. McBride, 1926.
• The Merchant of Souls. London: Jarrolds, 1926.
• The Façade. London: Jarrolds, 1927; New York: R.M. McBride, 1928.
• The Coast of Illusion. London: John Lane, 1932.

Short fiction

• The Adventuress, and other stories. London: Max Goschen, 1913.

Non-fiction

• Reputations: Essays in criticism. London: Chapman & Hall, 1920; New York: T. Seltzer, 1920; Port Washington, NY: Kennikat, 1968.
• James Elroy Flecker: An appreciation, with some biographical notes. London: Chapman & Hall, 1922.
• Liberty & Licensing (pamphlet). London: D. Harmsworth, 1932.
• Pacifists in Peace and War. London: Wishart, 1932.
• Odd Man Out: The autobiography of a 'propaganda novelist'. London: Chapman & Hall, 1935.
• Facing the odds. London: Cassell, 1940.
• Artist Quarter: reminiscences of Montmartre and Montparnasse in the first two decades of the twentieth (with Charles Beadle, as "Charles Douglas). London: Faber & Faber, 1941.
• South Lodge: Reminiscences of Violet Hunt, Ford Madox Ford and the 'English Review' circle. London: Constable, 1943.
• The Nineteen Twenties: A general survey, and some personal memories. London: Nicholson & Watson, 1945.
• Marching with the Times, 1931–1946. London: Nicholson & Watson, 1947.
• The Last Pre-Raphaelite: a record of the life and writings of Ford Madox Ford. London: Macdonald, 1948
  • published in U.S. as Trained for Genius: The life and writings of Ford Madox Ford. New York: Dutton, 1949.
• Life Interests. London: Macdonald, 1948.
• Regency Portrait Painter: The life of Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A. London: Macdonald, 1951.
• Privileged Persons. London: Richards Press, 1955.

Travel

• Ways of Escape. A book of adventure. London: Andrew Melrose, 1911.
• The Loire: the record of a pilgrimage from Gerbier de Joncs to St. Nazaire (illustrated by A.C. Collins). London: Constable, 1913.
  • published in U.S. as Along France's River of Romance, the Loire: The chateau country: Its personality, its architecture, its people and its associations New York: McBride & Nast, 1913.
• Dream Cities. Notes of an autumn tour in Italy and Dalmatia. London & Liepsig: T.F. Unwin, 1913.
• Dublin: Explorations and reflections (as "An Englishman"). Dublin: Maunsel, 1917.
• A Stranger in Ireland. Dublin: Talbot Press, 1918.
• Nooks and Corners of Sussex and Hampshire. London: Eveleigh Nash, 1920.
• Gone Abroad – A story of travel chiefly in Italy and the Balearic Isles. London: Chapman & Hall, 1925; Boston: Houghton, 1925.
• Northern Lights and Southern Shade. London: Chapman & Hall, 1926; Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1926.
• The French Riviera, and the valley of the Rhône from Avignon to Marseilles. London: G.G. Harrap, 1928; New York: Farrar & Rinehart, 1928.
• People and Places. Boston & New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1929.
• Sardinia: the island of the Nuraghi. London: G.G. Harrap, 1930.
• Impacts: The trip to the States, and other adventures of travel. London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1931.
• To Portugal. London: Rich & Cowan, 1934.
• Royal London. London & New York: The Studio, 1935.
• Pot Luck in England: Reminiscences of rural England. London: Chapman & Hall, 1936.
• A Tour In Northumbria. London: G. Allen & Unwin, 1938.
• Journeys in the Sun: Memories of happy days in France, Italy and the Balearic islands. London: Macdonald, 1946.
• Home Ground: A journey through the heart of England. London: Macdonald, 1949.
• Foreign Parts: An autumn tour in France. London: Macdonald, 1950.
• Three Romantic Countries: Reminiscences of travel in Dalmatia, Ireland, and Portugal. London: Macdonald, 1951.
• The South of France. The lower Rhone valley and the Mediterranean seaboard from Martigues to Menton. London: Macdonald, 1952.

Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.

See also

• List of British poets

References

• Alec Waugh, The Early Years (1962)

Fonds

• Douglas Goldring fonds at University of Victoria, Special Collections

External links

Poems

• "Voyages" in The New Poetry: An anthology
• Goldring in Poetry: A magazine of verse, 1912-1922: "Calle Memo O Loredan," "Hill House"

Books

• Douglas Goldring at Amazon.com