Elizabeth Smart (author)
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Elizabeth Smart (December 27, 1913 – March 4, 1986) was a Canadian poet and novelist. Her book, By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept, detailed her romance with the poet George Barker. She is the subject of the 1991 biography, By Heart: Elizabeth Smart a Life, by Rosemary Sullivan, and a film, Elizabeth Smart: On the Side of the Angels, produced by Maya Gallus.
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[edit] Biography
Smart was born to a prominent family in Ottawa, Ontario; her father, Russell Smart, was a self-made attorney, and the family had a house on Kingsmere Lake next door to the future Prime Minister of Canada, William Lyon Mackenzie King. She began writing at an early age, publishing her first poem at the age of ten and compiling a collection of poetry at 15. She attended Hatfield Hall, a private school in Cobourg, Ontario and at the age of 18 studied piano for a year at King's College of the University of London.
In 1937 she gained employment as the secretary to Margaret (Mrs. Alfred) Watt, who was head of the Associated Country Women of the World. Smart travelled extensively throughout the world accompanying Watt to various conferences. It was during this time that she happened across a book of poetry by George Barker, immediately falling in love not only with the poetry, but with the man himself.
After her employment with Watt ended Smart returned to Ottawa, where she spent 6 months writing for the women's page of The Ottawa Journal. At parties, she would often ask about Barker, saying she wanted to meet and marry him. Soon she began a correspondence with the poet.
Eager to launch her writing career, Smart quit the Journal and left Ottawa for good. Traveling on her own, she visited New York, Mexico and California, joining a writers' colony at Big Sur. While there, she paid to fly Barker and his wife from Japan, where he was teaching, to the United States. Soon after meeting, they began a tumultuous affair which was to last for several years.
In 1941, Smart became pregnant with her first child by Barker, Georgina, and returned to Canada, settling in Pender Harbour, British Columbia, to have the child. Barker attempted to visit her in Canada, but Smart's family exerted influence on officials, and consequently he was turned back at the border, cited with "moral turpitude".
Smart soon thereafter returned to the United States and began work as a file clerk for the British embassy in Washington. Two years later she became pregnant again, and left the United States by ship during the height of the war in 1943 to join Barker in the United Kingdom. She gave birth to their second child, Christopher, and obtained employment at the British Ministry of Defence to provide support for her son and daughter.
It was during this time that Smart produced her best-known work, By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept, which was published in 1945 but did not achieve great popularity until a good deal later. It is a fictional work, but largely based on Smart's affair with Barker up to that point.
Smart's mother Louise ("Louie") was not at all pleased with the book. Again availing influence with government officials, she led a successful campaign to have its publication banned in Canada. Of those copies that made their way into the country from overseas, Louise Smart bought as many as she could find and burned them.
Barker visited Smart often in London, and their affair produced two more children (Sebastian, born 1945, and Rose Emma, born 1947). Through it all Barker often said he would leave his wife for Smart, but this never occurred (he was to have fifteen children by a number of different women).
In addition to the unconventional nature of the relationship, the affair was fraught with turmoil. Barker was a heavy drinker, and Smart took up the habit, which intensified when the two were together. The couple were involved in numerous fights; during one argument, Smart bit off part of Barker's lip. Nonetheless, as evidenced from writings in her journals, Smart's love for Barker continued for the remainder of her life.
Raising the four children on her own (her youngest child, Rose Barker, died of drug addiction at the age of 35), Smart worked for thirteen years as an advertising copywriter, then joined the staff of Queen magazine in 1963, later becoming an editor. She became at length the highest-paid copywriter in England. During this time her physical involvement with Barker waned; she lived a bohemian lifestyle in Soho and took several other lovers, some men and some women.
In 1966, Smart retired from commercial writing and relocated to a cottage in north Suffolk named "The Dell". It was here she produced the bulk of her literary work, much of which has been published posthumously. Eager to make up for the time away from creative writing forced by the demands of raising her children, Smart wrote voluminously and on several subjects, poetry and prose, even her love of gardening.
Smart returned to Canada for a brief stay from 1982 to 1983, becoming writer-in-residence at the University of Alberta. Afterwards she spent a year in Toronto on a Canada Council writer's grant. Smart then returned to England, where she died in London of a heart attack. She is buried in St George's churchyard, Saint Cross South Elmham, Suffolk.
[edit] Quotes
- "I will not give up belief in true love."
- "We can include the world in our love, and no irritations can disrupt it, not even envy." By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept.
[edit] Trivia
By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept competes only with A Taste of Honey as the book most quoted by the arch romantic lyricist Morrissey.
[edit] Bibliography
- By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept (1945)
- A Bonus (1977)
- Ten Poems (1981)
- Eleven Poems (1982)
- The Assumption of the Rogues and Rascals (1982)
- In the Meantime (1984)
- Autobiographies (1987, Christina Burridge ed.)
- Necessary Secrets: The Journals of Elizabeth Smart (1987, Alice Van Wart ed.)
- Juvenilia (1987, Alice Van Wart ed.)
- Elizabeth's Garden: Elizabeth Smart on the Art of Gardening (1989)
- On the Side of the Angels: The Second Volume of the Journals of Elizabeth Smart (1997, Alice Van Wart ed.)
[edit] Reference
- Rosemary Sullivan. By Heart: Elizabeth Smart a Life. Tornto: Viking Canada, 1991.
