John Rety, born Janos Réty (8 December 1930 – 3 February 2010) was a Hungarian-British

anarchist Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not neces ...

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or writte ...

, publisher and chessplayer.

Life

Born in Budapest, Hungary, Rety attended an English nursery school in Budapest. A child when

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

broke out, he was separated from his

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

parents in 1944, and carried messages for the Resistance,"Obituary: John Rety"
''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally. It was fo ...

'', 1 March 2010. His grandmother was shot on the last day of the war.

Harry Eyres Harry Eyres (born 1958) is a British journalist, writer and poet Biography and Career Eyres was educated as a King's Scholar at Eton College, where he won the Newcastle Scholarship in 1975, and at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he studied ...

"Tribute to a well-versed soul"
5 March 2010. In 1947, after performing an anti-war play on the steps of the Budapest parliament,Dan Carrier
"Tributes to John Rety, celebrated poet from Torriano Meeting House who has died from a heart attack"
''Camden New Journal'', 11 February 2010. he left for a holiday with his aunt in Britain, and was forced to stay after the aunt burnt his passport. After a job translating for a Czech publisher who spoke no English, he started a Soho underground paper, ''Intimate Review'', with contributions from young writers including

Doris Lessing Doris May Lessing (; 22 October 1919 – 17 November 2013) was a British-Zimbabwean novelist. She was born to British parents in Iran, where she lived until 1925. Her family then moved to Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), where she remain ...

, Bill Hopkins, Laura del Rivo,

Frank Norman Frank Norman (9 June 1930 – 23 December 1980) was a British novelist and playwright. His reputation rests on his first memoir ''Bang to Rights'' (1958) and his musical play ''Fings Ain't Wot They Used T'Be'' (1960), but much of the remainder ...

Alun Owen Alun Davies Owen (24 November 1925 – 6 December 1994) was a Welsh playwright, screenwriter and actor, predominantly in television. However, he is best remembered by a wider audience for writing the screenplay of The Beatles' debut feature fi ...

, Cressida Lindsay and

Bernard Kops Bernard Kops (born 28 November 1926) is a British dramatist, memoirist, poet and novelist. Early life Born in the East End of London, the son of Dutch-Jewish immigrants, Kops was evacuated from London in 1939, and recounted that experience in ep ...

Feliks Topolski Feliks Topolski RA (14 August 1907 – 24 August 1989) was a Polish expressionist painter and draughtsman working primarily in the United Kingdom. Biography Feliks Topolski was born on 14 August 1907 in Warsaw, Poland. He studied in the Acade ...

and

Ralph Steadman Ralph Idris Steadman (born 15 May 1936) is a British illustrator best known for his collaboration and friendship with the American writer Hunter S. Thompson. Steadman is renowned for his political and social caricatures, cartoons and picture b ...

produced artwork. In 1953 he published a comic

epistolary novel An epistolary novel is a novel written as a series of letters. The term is often extended to cover novels that intersperse documents of other kinds with the letters, most commonly diary entries and newspaper clippings, and sometimes considered ...

, ''Supersozzled Nights''. After the threat of libel action forced ''Intimate Review'' to close, he co-edited other short-lived publications, ''Cheshire Cat'' and ''Fortnightly'': Rety was the first to publish

Colin Wilson Colin Henry Wilson (26 June 1931 – 5 December 2013) was an English writer, philosopher and novelist. He also wrote widely on true crime, mysticism and the paranormal, eventually writing more than a hundred books. Wilson called his phil ...

. He contributed the essay "So Much Work to Do" in ''Colin Wilson, a Celebration'' (Cecil Woolf,1988). This was reprinted in ''The Sage of Tetherdown: personal recollections of Colin Wilson by his friends'' published by Paupers' Press in 2020. After meeting his partner Susan Johns in 1958, they opened a second-hand furniture shop in

Camden High Street The A400 road is an A road in London that runs from Charing Cross (near Trafalgar Square, in London's West End) to Archway in North London. It passes some of London's most famous landmarks. The Northern line ( Charing Cross and High Barne ...

, and Rety also trained as a painter at City and Guilds Art School. Politically involved in the anti-nuclear Committee of 100, from 1964 to 1969 he edited the anarchist weekly ''

Freedom Freedom is understood as either having the ability to act or change without constraint or to possess the power and resources to fulfill one's purposes unhindered. Freedom is often associated with liberty and autonomy in the sense of "giving on ...

'', increasing its circulation and smoothing over sectarianism in British anarchism with his cheerfully inclusive editorial approach. (At the time, he later confessed, he'd never read any of the anarchist classics - and though he later found

Kropotkin Pyotr Alexeyevich Kropotkin (; russian: link=no, Пётр Алексе́евич Кропо́ткин ; 9 December 1842 – 8 February 1921) was a Russian anarchist, socialist, revolutionary, historian, scientist, philosopher, and activist ...

readable, he could never really understand

Proudhon Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (, , ; 15 January 1809, Besançon – 19 January 1865, Paris) was a French socialist,Landauer, Carl; Landauer, Hilde Stein; Valkenier, Elizabeth Kridl (1979) 959 "The Three Anticapitalistic Movements". ''European Social ...

Bakunin Mikhail Alexandrovich Bakunin (; 1814–1876) was a Russian revolutionary anarchist, socialist and founder of collectivist anarchism. He is considered among the most influential figures of anarchism and a major founder of the revolutionary ...

.) He was active against the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...

, participating in the

Grosvenor Square Grosvenor Square is a large garden square in the Mayfair district of London. It is the centrepiece of the Mayfair property of the Duke of Westminster, and takes its name from the duke's surname "Grosvenor". It was developed for fashionable re ...

demonstration as well as a 13-day fast at

Speaker's Corner A Speakers' Corner is an area where open-air public speaking, debate, and discussion are allowed. The original and best known is in the northeast corner of Hyde Park in London, England. Historically there were a number of other areas design ...

. Initially convinced of the innocence of

Stuart Christie Stuart Christie (10 July 1946 – 15 August 2020) was a Scottish anarchist writer and publisher. When aged 18, Christie was arrested while carrying explosives to assassinate the Spanish caudillo, General Francisco Franco. He was later alleged ...

, accused of carrying explosives to assassinate

Francisco Franco Francisco Franco Bahamonde (; 4 December 1892 – 20 November 1975) was a Spanish general who led the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalist forces in overthrowing the Second Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War ...

, Rety helped coordinate an international solidarity campaign, despite a personal feeling of betrayal on learning the truth. In 1982 he co-founded the Torriano Meeting House in

Kentish Town Kentish Town is an area of northwest London, England in the London Borough of Camden, immediately north of Camden Town. Less than four miles north of central London, Kentish Town has good transport connections and is situated close to the ope ...

, hosting weekly poetry readings.

Stephen Spender Sir Stephen Harold Spender (28 February 1909 – 16 July 1995) was an English poet, novelist and essayist whose work concentrated on themes of social injustice and the class struggle. He was appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry by the ...

and

Adrian Mitchell Adrian Mitchell FRSL (24 October 1932 – 20 December 2008) was an English poet, novelist and playwright. A former journalist, he became a noted figure on the British Left. For almost half a century he was the foremost poet of the country's Cam ...

were among the hundreds of poets who performed at Torriano. A 2003 anthology included the work of

Dannie Abse Daniel Abse CBE FRSL (22 September 1923 – 28 September 2014) was a Welsh poet and physician. His poetry won him many awards. As a medic, he worked in a chest clinic for over 30 years. Early years Abse was born in Cardiff, Wales, as the young ...

John Arden John Arden (26 October 1930 – 28 March 2012) was an English playwright who at his death was lauded as "one of the most significant British playwrights of the late 1950s and early 60s". Career Born in Barnsley, son of the manager of a glass f ...

Oliver Bernard Oliver Bernard (6 December 1925 – 1 June 2013) was an English poet and translation, translator. He is perhaps best known for translating Arthur Rimbaud into English as part of the Penguin Classics collection. Bernard was born in London, to t ...

John Heath-Stubbs John Francis Alexander Heath-Stubbs (9 July 1918 – 26 December 2006) was an English poet and translator. He is known for verse influenced by classical myths, and for a long Arthurian poem, ''Artorius'' (1972). Biography and works Heath-Stub ...

and Dilys Wood.John Pilgrim, "John Rety obituary", ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'', 18 March 2010. The anthology appeared with his Hearing Eye Press, founded in 1987, which ultimately published over 150 books. He also became poetry editor of the '' Morning Star'': an anthology of work that appeared there, ''Well Versed'', went into two editions. As a chess player, reaching a FIDE rating of 2034,

Milan Rai Milan Rai (born 1965) is a British writer and anti-war activist from Hastings. He is co-editor with anti-war artist Emily Johns of the magazine ''Peace News''. Along with fellow activist Maya Evans, he was arrested on 25 October 2005 next to t ...

John Rety: "The point is this"
26 February 2010. he played for Middlesex and London University as well as representing England in the

European Senior Chess Championship The European Senior Chess Championship is a chess tournament for senior chess players organised by the European Chess Union (ECU). Beginning in 2001, entry was open to men aged sixty or over (60+) by January 1 of the year the tournament starts. The ...

. For most of his life he travelled on a stateless person's document, but finally obliged to obtain a British passport in his late seventies, after Hungary joined the EU.Richard Bagley
"Obituary: John Rety 1930 to 2010"
'' Morning Star'', 26 March 2010. Rety died in London, survived by his partner and two children: his daughter Emily Johns is editor of ''

Peace News ''Peace News'' (''PN'') is a pacifist magazine first published on 6 June 1936 to serve the peace movement in the United Kingdom. From later in 1936 to April 1961 it was the official paper of the Peace Pledge Union (PPU), and from 1990 to 2004 w ...

''.

References

External links

Four-part interview
with

Ian Bone Ian David Bone (born 28 August 1947 in Mere, Wiltshire) is an English anarchist and publisher of anarchist newspapers and tabloids, such as ''Class War'' and '' The Bristolian''. He has been involved in social campaigns since the 1960s, inclu ...

*
Hearing Eye Press
*

Life

References

External links

Further reading