HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

George Mann MacBeth (19 January 1932 – 16 February 1992) was a
Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...
poet and novelist.


Biography

George MacBeth was born in
Shotts Shotts is a town in North Lanarkshire, Scotland. It is located almost halfway between Glasgow () and Edinburgh (). The village has a population of about 8,840. A local story has Shotts being named after the legendary giant highwayman Bertram de ...
,
Lanarkshire Lanarkshire, also called the County of Lanark ( gd, Siorrachd Lannraig; sco, Lanrikshire), is a historic county, lieutenancy area and registration county in the central Lowlands of Scotland. Lanarkshire is the most populous county in Scotlan ...
,
Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...
. When he was three, his family moved to
Sheffield Sheffield is a city status in the United Kingdom, city in South Yorkshire, England, whose name derives from the River Sheaf which runs through it. The city serves as the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is Historic counties o ...
in England. He was educated in Sheffield at King Edward VII School where he was Head Prefect in 1951
photo
, before going up to
New College, Oxford New College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1379 by William of Wykeham in conjunction with Winchester College as its feeder school, New College is one of the oldest colleges at th ...
, with an Open Scholarship in Classics. He joined
BBC Radio BBC Radio is an operational business division and service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a royal charter since 1927). The service provides national radio stations covering th ...
on graduating in 1955 from the
University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...
. He worked there, as a producer of programmes on poetry, notably for the
BBC Third Programme The BBC Third Programme was a national radio station produced and broadcast from 1946 until 1967, when it was replaced by Radio 3. It first went on the air on 29 September 1946 and quickly became one of the leading cultural and intellectual f ...
, until 1976. He was a member of
The Group The Group may refer to: Film and television * ''The Group'' (Australian TV series), 1971 situation comedy produced by Cash Harmon Television for ATN7 * ''The Group'' (Canadian TV series), 1968–70 music variety on CBC Television * ''The Group ...
. He resigned from the BBC to take up novel-writing; he introduced a series of thrillers involving the spy, Cadbury. In his later post-BBC years, after divorcing his first wife, he married the novelist
Lisa St Aubin de Terán Lisa St Aubin de Terán (born 2 October 1953) is an English novelist, writer of autobiographical fictions, and memoirist. Her father was the Guyanese writer and academic Jan Carew. Life and career Lisa St Aubin de Terán was born in 1953 to ...
, with whom he had a child, Alexander Morton George MacBeth. After a divorce, he moved with his new wife, Penny, to Ireland to live at Moyne Park,
Abbeyknockmoy Abbeyknockmoy () is a village and parish in County Galway, Ireland. It is known for the nearby ruins of the 12th century Cistercian abbey, established with the Kings of Connacht as its benefactors. The abbey was the burial site of King Catha ...
, near Tuam in
County Galway "Righteousness and Justice" , anthem = () , image_map = Island of Ireland location map Galway.svg , map_caption = Location in Ireland , area_footnotes = , area_total_km2 = ...
. A few months later, George MacBeth was diagnosed as suffering from
motor neurone disease Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as motor neuron disease (MND) or Lou Gehrig's disease, is a neurodegenerative disease that results in the progressive loss of motor neurons that control voluntary muscles. ALS is the most comm ...
, of which he died in early 1992. In the last poetry he wrote, MacBeth provides an anatomy of a cruel disease and the destruction it caused two people deeply in love. Penny and George had two children, Diana ("Lally") Francesca Ronchetti MacBeth and George Edward Morton Mann MacBeth. ''Poems from Oby'' (1982) was a Choice of the
Poetry Book Society The Poetry Book Society (PBS) was founded in 1953 by T. S. Eliot and friends, including Sir Basil Blackwell, "to propagate the art of poetry". Eric Walter White was secretary from December 1953 until 1971, and was subsequently the society's chair ...
. He wrote the compilation whilst living at The Old Rectory, Oby; Oby is a
Norfolk Norfolk () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and south-west, and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the No ...
hamlet. He received a
Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize The Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize is a British literary prize established in 1963 in tribute to Geoffrey Faber, founder and first Chairman of the publisher Faber & Faber. It recognises a single volume of poetry or fiction by a United Kingdom, Irish ...
for his work. MacBeth died in Tuam,
County Galway "Righteousness and Justice" , anthem = () , image_map = Island of Ireland location map Galway.svg , map_caption = Location in Ireland , area_footnotes = , area_total_km2 = ...
, Ireland.


Works

Poetry *''A Form of Words'' (1954) *''Lecture to the Trainees'' (1962) *''The Broken Places'' (1963) *''A Doomsday Book: Poems and Poem-games'' (1965) *''Missile Commander'' (1965) *''The Calf'' (1965) *''The Twelve Hotels'' (1965) *''The Colour of Blood'' (1967) *''The Screens'' (1967) *''A Death'' (1969) *''A War Quartet'' (1969) *''Night of Stones'' (1969) *''The Burning Cone'' (1970) *''Poems'' (1970) *''The Bamboo Nightingale'' (1970) *''The Hiroshima Dream'' (1970) *''The Snow Leopard'' (1970) *''Two Poems'' (1970) *''A Prayer Against Revenge'' (1971) *''The Orlando Poems'' (1971) *''Collected Poems 1958–1970'' (1972) *''A Farewell'' (1972) *''A Litany'' (1972) *''Lusus: A Verse Lecture'' (1972) *''Shrapnel'' (1972) *''Prayers'' (1973) *''A Poet's Year'' (1973) *''The Vision'' (1973) *''Elegy for the Gas Dowsers'' (1974) *''In the Hours Waiting for Blood to Come'' (1975) *''The Journey to the Island'' (1975) *''Last Night'' (1976) *''Buying a Heart'' (1978) *''The Saddled Man'' (1978) *''Poem for Breathing'' (1979) *''Poems of Love and Death'' (1980) *''Typing a Novel About the War'' (1980) *''Poems from Oby'' (1982) *''The Long Darkness'' (1983) *''The Cleaver Garden'' (1986) * ''Anatomy of Divorce'' (1988) * ''Collected Poems, 1958–1982'' (1989) * ''Trespassing: Poems from Ireland'' (1991) * ''The Patient'' (1992) * ''Selected Poems'' (2002), edited by
Anthony Thwaite Anthony Simon Thwaite (23 June 1930 – 22 April 2021) was an English poet and critic, widely known as the editor of his friend Philip Larkin's collected poems and letters. Early years and education Born in Chester, England, to Yorkshire par ...
Novels *''The Transformation'' (1975) *''The Samurai ''(1976), also published as ''Cadbury and the Samurai'' *''The Survivor'' (1977) *''The Seven Witches'' (1978), also published as ''Cadbury and the Seven Witches'' *''The Born Losers'' (1982), also published as ''Cadbury and the Born Losers'' *''The Katana: A Novel Based on the War Diaries of John Beeby'' (1982), also published as ''A Kind of Treason'' *''Anna's Book'' (1983) *''The Lion of Pescara'' (1984) * ''Another Love Story'' (1991) * ''The Testament of Spencer'' (1992) As Editor *''Penguin Book of Sick Verse'' (1963) *''Penguin Modern Poets 6'' (1964) with Jack Clemo and Edward Lucie-Smith *''Penguin Book of Animal Verse'' (1965) *''Poetry 1900 to 1965'' (1967) *''The Penguin Book of Victorian Verse'' (1969) *''The Falling Splendour, Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson'' (1970) *''Free Form Poetry Two'' (1971), with Bob Cobbing *''The Book of Cats'' (1976), editor with
Martin Booth Martin Booth (7 September 1944 – 12 February 2004) was an English novelist and poet. He also worked as a teacher and screenwriter, and was the founder of the Sceptre Press. Early life Martin Booth was born in Lancashire England, the son of ...
*''Poetry 1900–75'' (1980), anthology, editor *''Facts and Feelings in the Classroom'' (1983), editor with Martin Booth Books for Children *''Noah's Journey'' (1966) *''Jonah and the Lord'' (1970) *''Noah and the Lord'' (1970) *''The Rectory Mice'' (1982) *''The Story of Daniel'' (1986) Non-Fiction *''My Scotland: Fragments of a State of Mind'' (1973) *''Dizzy's Woman'' (1986) * ''A Child of the War'' (1987) Short Fiction *''Crab Apple Crisis'' (New Worlds, October 1966) Drama *''The Humming Birds: A Monodrama'' (1968)


References


External links


Book Rags
*Materials related to MacBeth can be found in the Turret Books records at the
University of Maryland Libraries The University of Maryland Libraries is the largest university library in the Washington, D.C. - Baltimore area. The university's library system includes eight libraries: six are located on the College Park campus, while the Severn Library, an of ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Macbeth, George Scottish novelists People educated at King Edward VII School, Sheffield Alumni of New College, Oxford 1932 births 1992 deaths People from Shotts 20th-century British novelists 20th-century Scottish poets Scottish male poets 20th-century British male writers