The death of Lorca

The great Spanish poet and playwright Federico García Lorca was assassinated 80 years ago today by right wing military forces at the start of the Spanish Civil War. The circumstances of his death have always been controversial, indeed Lorca’s biographer, Ian Gibson, has written an entire book on the subject. Although Lorca himself was not a diarist, in 2012 the diary of a young male lover surfaced, shedding new light on Lorca’s last days. On a personal note, my own diary reveals not only that I met Gibson several times, but how I realised that his book on the death of Lorca had played a part in inspiring me to be a writer.

Lorca was born in 1898 near Granada, Spain, into a wealthy landowning family. He was educated at Granada and Madrid universities. While studying in Madrid, he lived within the Residencia de Estudiantes, one of Spain’s first cultural centres, where he became friends with Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dalí among many other creative types. In 1919-1920, he wrote his first play, The Butterfly’s Evil Spell, which was not well received, and, in 1921, published his first book of poems. Collaborations with the composer Manuel de Falla and more poems followed before Lorca’s second play, Mariana Pineda, with sets designed by Dalí, opened in Barcelona in 1927, to great acclaim.

In 1929-1930, Lorca travelled to New York, where he studied English and continued writing poetry; he also visited Vermont and Cuba. Back in Madrid, the newly established Second Spanish Republic appointed him director of a student theatre company, Teatro Universitario La Barraca, charged with bringing theatre to rural areas of Spain. During the next few years he wrote his most famous plays, Blood Wedding, Yerma and The House of Bernarda Alba. But, when the Spanish Civil War broke out, he was assassinated, on 19 August, by fascist supporters of General Franco - the leader who, in 1939, would win the war and rule Spain for more than 30 years. The circumstances of Lorca’s death have long been controversial, and his body was never found. Biographers continue to argue about whether it was Lorca’s left-wing political beliefs (though he had friends in both factions of the emerging civil war) or personal animosities to his homosexuality that was most to blame for his death warrant.

In the 1960s, the Irish-born Ian Gibson, a Spanish literature academic working in Britain, moved to Granada for a year to write a doctoral thesis on Lorca, but ended up publishing (in Paris) a Spanish-language book about the playwright’s death - La represión nacionalista de Granada en 1936 y la muerte de Federico García Lorca (1971). It was banned in Spain; and subsequently it was also published in English as The Death of Lorca (1973). Gibson concluded that Lorca was, indeed, shot by nationalist militia, along with others, as part of a wider campaign to eliminate left-wing radicals. Gibson, by this time domiciled near Granada, went on to publish his major, and very highly respected, two-volume Spanish biography of Lorca in 1985-1987, and then two years later, a one volume edition in English.

In 2015, the Guardian claimed that documents it had obtained (written in 1965 at the Granada police headquarters) contained ‘the first ever admission by Franco-era officials’ of their involvement in Lorca’s death. The article goes on: ‘The resulting documents suggest García Lorca was persecuted for his beliefs, describing him as a “socialist and a freemason,” about whom rumours swirled of “homosexual and abnormal practices”. After police carried out two searches on his home in Granada, he fled to a friend’s house out of fear. In August 1936, just one month after the civil war broke out, officers surrounded the house where García Lorca was hiding, while his friends tried to intervene on his behalf. García Lorca was arrested and taken by car to an area close to the place known as Fuente Grande, along with one other detainee, said the documents. He was then “executed immediately after having confessed, and was buried in that location, in a very shallow grave, in a ravine”. No details were given as to the content of his confession.’ Further biographical information is available from Wikipedia, Andalusia.com or Poets.org.

There is no evidence that Lorca was a diarist (see A Companion to Federico García Lorca by Federico Bonaddio, 2007, Tamesis). However, in 2012, the 91 year old Juan Ramirez de Lucas, who had been Lorca’s last lover, died leaving behind a box of mementoes including letters and a diary - instructing his family to make them public. As was widely reported at the time (see El País for example), the letters (from Lorca) and de Lucas’s diary prove that Lorca, 38 years old, and de Lucas, only 19, had been planning in the summer of 1936 to flee to Mexico. Lorca, though, insisted that de Lucas seek permission from his family - permission that was not forthcoming, his father refusing to issue the necessary papers. Had the lovers left Spain at that moment in time, Lorca would not have died so young, and who knows what literary works he might have produced.

The Telegraph, for its take on the de Lucas story, contacted Gibson, who said: ‘It’s terribly exciting to learn new material exists that may shed light on his final days’, and ‘Lorca was very promiscuous and prone to infatuation but we never definitively knew who his last lover was or why he delayed leaving.’ Gibson revealed de Lucas’s name had come up during his own research on Lorca (which had begun while Franco was still in power), but that he had refused to be interviewed. ‘One can only guess that he wanted to keep his association a secret especially during the Franco years. It wasn’t easy being gay and especially if it was a relationship with someone as famous as Lorca.’ The Telegraph article concluded with another quote from Gibson: ‘We can only hope that the papers will be made available soon.’

Unfortunately, since 2012 there has been no sign that the letters/diary might be published, as was suggested at the time. In 2014, the British theatre critic Nicholas de Jongh, when writing a play on the death of Lorca, inspired by the de Lucas find, tried to find out what had happened to his papers, but was stonewalled at every turn. The play - The Unquiet Grave of Garcia Lorca - premiered in London in October 2014 - see The Evening Standard.

On a personal note, I met Ian Gibson several times at his home in Restabal, near Granada. My friend Rosy, and her husband Andy, had bought a holiday villa in the area, but it was only after being there for a while that Rosy discovered a cousin, whom she had not previously met, living nearby - Ian Gibson - and they soon became firm friends. One winter, I visited Rosy, with my seven-year old son, Adam, and she took us to Ian’s place. It was not until I was in his house, and browsing his bookshelves that I realised Ian had played a part, some 20 years earlier, in inspiring me to become a writer. Here is my diary entry:

15 January 1995
‘Ian proved a hearty fellow and quite charming. He loved Adam and the way he’d fallen asleep in his house without disturbing anyone, and he seemed on good form the thrice I saw him - on this evening, later in the week at a party, and then on New Year’s Eve at his party. But I must recount why my meeting with him was so significant.

In the mid-1970s, after my travels and when I was living in London with Harold, I think, I saw a modern ballet at Sadlers Wells, created by Lindsay Kemp and performed by Ballet Rambert. I can remember parts of the ballet to this day. It was called Cruel Garden and it so inspired me in some way that I wrote my first ever piece of fiction (apart from the shorts in my travel diaries) and I called it Cruel Garden, although it had nothing to do with the ballet or its subject (at least I don’t think it did). The point is that the ballet Cruel Garden was based on the life of Lorca and, in part, on Ian’s book The Death of Lorca. I did not even realise I had read the book until I started delving into my memories surrounding The Cruel Garden.’

The first Astronomer Royal

John Flamsteed, the first ever Astronomer Royal who catalogued hundreds of stars and laid the foundation stone of the Royal Greenwich Observatory, was born 370 years ago today. Later in life, he was in conflict with Isaac Newton, and with fellow astronomer Edmund Halley. He left behind an autobiography, many letters and a short diary, all of which were compiled, in the 19th century, into a large volume which included his catalogue of the stars.

Flamsteed was born on 19 August 1646 in Derbyshire, England, and educated in Derby, though from the age of 14 he suffered from chronic bouts of rheumatic illness, and, leaving school at 15, was unable to go to university. During his late teens and into his 20s he seems to have helped in his father’s brewing and malting business, and to have taught himself much about astronomy, through books and observations. In 1665, he presented, to William Litchford an expert on planets, his first essay, concerning the design, use and construction of an astronomer’s quadrant, including tables for the latitude of Derby. Around this time, he accurately predicted the solar eclipses of 1666 and 1668. He is also credited with the earliest recorded sightings of Uranus.

By this time, Flamsteed was corresponding with astronomers, such as Vincent Wing, and other learned figures, not least Henry Oldenburg, the secretary of the Royal Society, who had published a set of his astronomical projections in Philosophical Transactions. In 1670, Flamsteed visited Cambridge, and arranged to enter Jesus College, succeeding to an MA in 1674, the same year he first heard Isaac Newton’s Lucasian Lectures. Subsequently, he was ordained deacon, and was about to take up a living in his home county, when his patron Jonas Moore, Surveyor-General of the Ordnance, invited him to London. Moore had recently offered the Royal Society to pay for the establishment of an observatory. However, when Charles II set up a commission (including such notables as Christopher Wren and Robert Hooke) designed to investigate a specific proposal to calculate longitude by the position of the moon, Flamsteed was appointed as an official assistant to the commission, and supplied observations to test the idea.

Although the Commission found the specific idea was not worth pursuing, it recommended that the King should consider establishing an observatory in order to better map the stars and the motions of the moon in order to further investigate the lunar-distance method. Flamsteed was appointed by royal warrant ‘The King’s Astronomical Observator’ - the first English Astronomer Royal, with an allowance of £100 a year. A few months later, another royal warrant provided for the establishment of the Royal Greenwich Observatory, and it was Flamsteed who laid the foundation stone. The following year he was made a Fellow of the Royal Society, and he moved to live at the Observatory where he stayed until 1684, when he was also appointed priest to the parish of Burstow, Surrey, not far from Greenwich. In 1692, he married Margaret Cooke, the granddaughter of his predecessor at Burstow.

Flamsteed contributed much data, requested by Newton for his work Principia, but, when the latter was published it was Edmund Halley, then secretary of the Royal Society, who received much credit as sponsor of the work. Flamsteed, who had long disliked Halley, felt slighted by the lack of recognition for his contribution. This had a negative effect on Flamsteed’s relations with Newton, and the two thereafter were often in conflict. Indeed, when Flamsteed refused to publish his star data until properly verified, Newton and Halley conspired to obtain and publish them. Flamsteed managed to gather several hundred - but not all - of the published copies and burn them. Flamsteed died in 1719. Further information is available form Wikipedia, Encyclopaedia.com, MacTutor, The Messier Catalog, or Jesus College.

More than a century after Flamsteed’s death, in 1835, the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty printed An Account of the Revd John Flamsteed: The First Astronomer Royal; compiled from his own manuscripts, and other authentic documents, never before published. Edited by Francis Bailey, this included Flamsteed’s History of his own Life, many letters, a few reports and memoranda, and a short ‘diary of events’ with entries between 1704 and 1713 - the latter having been found scattered through several pages of a letter-book containing a variety of other documents. Half the book, around 350 pages is taken up with the autobiographical material, the diary absorbing only a dozen or so page, and the other half of the book is taken up with Flamsteed’s Catalogue of Stars, consisting of table lists of stars and many associated notes. The work can be read freely online at Internet Archive or Googlebooks.

Here are three extracts from the Flamsteed’s ‘Diary of events’.

18 April 1706
‘Mr. Hudson here told me, if I would go up, Sir I. Newton would go to the Prince’s treasurer with me; urged me much: I went on the 19th mane: Sir Isaac was very grave: told me that, the Prince having subscribed a great sum to the Emperor’s loan, the whole money could not be received: that he had taken up monies for Mr. Churchill: would say nothing, when I asked if he had taken up also to pay me for my calculators; but that he must give bond to Mr. Churchill: I told him he had my catalogue and papers in his hands: he answered slightingly, that the catalogue was imperfect, which he knew when he received it sealed up, and was contented with it: I desired my MSS back, to correct the faults of the press: he told me we must go on slowly at first, quicker after, that in a few weeks he would return my MSS: Dr. Grey is at Oxford; suppose will not return till after term time: he must be paid for the needless collations, and they cannot be finished till his return: all this insincere practice I must bear, so long as God thinks fit: may his goodness deliver me speedily.’

19 July 1706
‘At London: waited on Sir I. Newton about printing 100 or 150 more copies: represented that I thought it needless, contrary to our agreement, &c.: he seemed to assent, and that we should go on, on the old foot: I suggested that it was probable Mr. Churchill had caused more to be printed than he ought, by 200: that if any besides myself had copies to sell, I should not make anything of mine: he agreed that nobody but I ought to have any copy to sell; and that, as I desired, the plates should be put into my hands, that I might cause them to be engraved and drawn off: promised to pay me £100, and I to send J. Hudson to him, to inform him about the Prince’s treasurer: promised to wait on him next week.’

1 August 1713
‘Sir Isaac Newton having, as I was told, presented his book of Principia, new printed, to the Queen, came to Greenwich, attended by Dr. Thorp, Dr. Halley, and his sons, Mr. Machin and Mr. Rowley. Mr. Hudson was with them, who had given me an intimation of it, the night before. But I had a letter of advice of it, directly from Mr. Machin. Sir I. Newton came first, about 3 o’clock; the others, half an hour after. Sir I. Newton said little till they entered; then he rose up and told me that by a Royal Order, by word of mouth, they were come down to visit the Observatory; to see what repairs were wanting, and what instruments. I gave them leave to go where they pleased, and sent my servant to wait on them, and show them all the places where repairs were wanting: and Mr. Clark and Mr. Ryley (whom I had sent for, on purpose to be witnesses of all that passed) accompanied them. I kept in my chamber: for I could not walk about with them. But, before they went out, I told them that the cogs in the greater semicircle were much worn; and that the instrument, for several reasons, was not very serviceable. And because Sir I. Newton had asked how we could observe a comet without it, I told him I could easily observe any comet that was visible in any part of the heavens, by a particular method that I knew of; but it was not now a time to talk of it; and that that instrument was my own. My friends and servants remember all that passed: I trouble not myself to report it. At parting, Sir I. Newton told me he had a Ptolemy of mine, and the minutes or night-notes of my observations, which he would return. I was glad to hear it; and told him I would retain his receipt for them. I pray God he be as good as his word.’

Casement’s black reputation

Roger Casement - an Irish-born British diplomat, human rights activist, and, ultimately, an Irish nationalist - was executed for treason exactly a century ago today. His journals - which revealed him as a promiscuous homosexual - were successfully employed by the British government to blacken Casement’s name and undermine calls for clemency. However, subsequently, the diaries were kept secret by the government, leading some biographers and many others to believe they were a forgery. It was not until 2002 that an independent forensic examination proved, finally, they were genuine.

Casement was born in 1864 in Sandymount, near Dublin, the youngest son of an Ulster protestant and soldier. The family moved frequently, but both parents died young and the children became dependent on relatives. Casement went to live with his uncle in County Antrim, and was schooled until 1880, when he went to Liverpool to live with an aunt. After working in a shipping office, he signed up, aged 19, as a purser on board a ship heading for the Congo. The following year, he returned to stay in the Congo working as a surveyor on a rail project. There he met the writer Joseph Conrad and also the explorer (and sculptor) Herbert Ward who he then accompanied on a tour of the US.

Casement returned to Ireland where he took a job in the British customs department, before, in 1895, gaining a first consul appointment in Portuguese East Africa. Thereafter, he took similar posts in Angola (1898-1900), Congo Free State (1901-1904) and Brazil (1906-1911). He gained international recognition, though, for a report (published in 1904), commissioned by the Foreign Office, into the state of government in the Congo, which revealed atrocious cruelty in the exploitation of native labour by white traders - for more on this see Conrad, Hottot and the Congo. And, after producing a similarly disturbing report in 1912 on the Putumayo River region in Peru, he was awarded a knighthood.

Ill-health forced Casement to return to Ireland in 1912, and he retired from the British consular service in the summer of the following year. Thereafter, his views on Irish nationalism having strengthened, he helped form the Irish Volunteers. In 1914, he went to the US promoting the cause and seeking funds, and there, at the outbreak of the war, began scheming to gain German support for an Irish revolt. This led him to travel to Germany, seeking to recruit a brigade from Irish prisoners-of-war captured in the first months of the war. However, German support proved minimal, and his plans never materialised in any substantial way. The few German munitions he did manage to secure for shipment to Ireland were intercepted by the British; and he, himself, was arrested a few days after being transported to Ireland by a German submarine.

Casement was charged with treason, sabotage and espionage against the Crown, and was remanded, on suicide watch, at Brixton prison. The prosecution had some legal trouble arguing its case, and resorted to circulating extracts from Casement’s diaries, which contained details of his (illegal) homosexual activities, to influence those calling for clemency (among which were notables such as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and George Bernard Shaw). Casement was hanged at Pentonville prison at 9am on 3 August 1916. Further information is available at Wikipedia, BBC, Stephen Stratford’s website, Irish Historical Mysteries. The Times report of the execution is also available at Stratford’s website.

Casement, it seems, was an intermittent diarist, keeping an account of himself from time to time in pocket diaries (with space for each day of the year) or cash agenda note-books. The term ‘Black Diaries ’ was coined by by Peter Singleton-Gates and Maurice Girodias in their 1959 book of the same name. Some 20 years earlier (in 1936), though, William J. Maloney had published a work claiming that he had proved the diaries used to blacken Casement’s name had been a forgery - something many people had people believed since his execution. It was not until 2002, following a detailed and independent forensic examination of the diaries, that it was proved, beyond reasonable doubt, that they were genuine.

The same year, Belfast Press, brought out Jeffrey Dudgeon’s Roger Casement: The Black Diaries with a study of his background, sexuality, and Irish political life. It contains Casement’s diaries from 1903, 1910 and 1911. This was the first time, the Black Diaries, with all of Casement’s promiscuous thoughts and actions laid bare, had been published. Dudgeon includes a large amount of additional information, in fact creating more of a biography supplemented by a few chapters on the diaries. The book runs to 650 pages less than half of which are diary texts, and the diary extracts themselves are heavily adulterated with Dudgeon’s notes in bold font enclosed by square brackets, often doubling or more Casement’s own words.

Some pages of Roger Casement’s Diaries - 1910: The Black and the White edited by Roger Sawyer can be read at Googlebooks (Pimlico, 1997). Extracts from One Bold Deed of Open Treason: The Berlin Diary of Roger Casement 1914-1916 (Irish Academic Press, 2016) can be read at The Irish Times. The following extracts, though, are from Dudgeon’s The Black Diaries (some pages of which can be previewed at Amazon).

20 November 1911
‘. . . Stopped at Mucuà at 4 p.m. and saw two rubber trees in tapping. Young Cearense of Sobral still there - splendid stern, thighs and testeminhos - a lovely boy. . . Fonseca at Santa Theresa higher  up - it is Peruvian territory. [On blotter] Got some mails by “Manco” today at 10.30 a.m. meeting “Hamburgo” on her way up . . . Saw fine Indian boy in Janissius canoe that brought him over. A big strong fellow - nice face and great thick stiff one which he felt often under grey pants.’

21 November 1911
‘Arr. Nazareth at 10 and after some hours there up to Marius Levy’s where shipped 65 cases rubber (101⁄2 tons weight) . . . Back to Nazareth - young Italian, stout but very nice face, huge stern, thighs and immense big one, long, thick, soft, he fingered often and one could see it hanging down 6” or 7” inches long - through very thick trousers too. Left Nazareth at 5 with “Le Journal” from Belém. Up to 5 Oct. giving Italy-Turkey war and strike in Ireland. At union and mouth of Javari at 9.30 and on to Leticia.’

22 November 1911
‘At Leticia since 11.30 p.m. Left only at 7.30 a.m. taking up Peruvian officer and family and enormous mass of rubbish of furniture including 5 jerrys! Cold is again very bad. Left letters to Tom, Gallwey, O’Reilly and Bernardino. . . Clock on church is painted strip of canvas always at 11.45 a.m.! . . . Met “Elisa” and got papers - including a “Truth” with part of Paredes’ summing up. José came and asked me for photo in Iquitos - looking lovely and then at 8.30 for cigarette papers and later I called and pulled mine and asked for water. Also with Pilot’s boy.’

23 November 1911
‘Lovely day. We are steaming very well and expect to be in Iquitos before 10 a.m. tomorrow. Read letters and drafted a long despatch to F.O. giving as my opinion the unlikelihood of Peruvian Government acting seriously . . . lots of logs still - often striking them hard. At 8 p.m. a huge one nearly swept away a man and case of rubber. . . Return to Iquitos.’

24 November 1911
‘Arr. 9.55. Antonio Cruz came on wharf and will come Sunday 8 a.m. Saw some big ones on Indian boys and then up ladder at top a young Spaniard with huge soft big one under blue pants. At my corner the lovely 6 foot young Inca policeman and his up at full half cock! Simply enormous, all down left thigh and thick too - fully 71⁄2 and huge testeminhos too. I now am sure of the Indians! Many letters from Mrs Green and others. Saw the Cholo policeman again going to lunch and it was huge, half down his thigh and he 6 foot and lovely. Then the small policeman passed and his too enormous. Then Paredes young Editor also very big. José came at 3.15 looking very nice and it was half up and showed big. Gave 5/8 for Spanish boo. Saw the young policeman while talking to José and it was simply huge. Both pure Cholos.’