Martin Green (author)

Martin Green (10 July 1932 – 4 February 2015) was an English-born writer, editor and publisher.

Background

Born in Stockport, England, Green was schooled at A. S. Neill's Summerhill, while his parents fought in the International Brigades during the Spanish Civil War.[1] Green co-founded the literary periodical Nimbus (1951–58) with Tristram Hull and later worked as an editor at MacGibbon & Kee, where he published alongside Timothy O'Keeffe books including Nell Dunn's Up the Junction (1963). They went on to form their own publishing house, Martin Brian & O'Keeffe,[2] with the editor Brian Rooney. Here, Green collected and published Patrick Kavanagh, following the suggestion of the painter Patrick Swift and the poet Anthony Cronin.[3][4] Green also published books by Flann O'Brien, Hugh MacDiarmid, Francis Stuart, Colin MacInnes,[5] Robert Graves, Frank Sargeson, Paul Potts and many other writers.[6]

While living in London with his wife, the artist Fiona Green, Thabo Mbeki and the (then banned) African National Congress held their meetings in their house in Fitzrovia.[7] In 1969, with poet Paul Durcan, Green started the poetry quarterly Two Rivers, which was published from his home at 28 Tottenham Street, London. The title referred to the River Thames of London and the Liffey of Durcan's Dublin, Ireland.

Green published eight books of his own, as well as four plays, and contributions to numerous other publications including The Other Jerome K. Jerome (1984) and Myles Away from Dublin (1985). He had six children and eight grandchildren and lived in Newlyn, Cornwall, with his cat Nefertiti.

Green died on 4 February 2015 in St Austell, Cornwall, at the age of 82.[8]

References
  1. Preston, Paul, Doves of War: Four Women of Spain (London: Harper Collins, 2002; ISBN 978-0-00-255633-0): "The Aristocrat: PIP SCOTT-ELLIS fell in love with a Spanish prince and set off for Madrid in a chauffeur-driven limousine. She ended up nursing in front-line Francoist hospitals. The Communist: NAN GREEN, by contrast, travelled to war third class. Leaving her children behind in England, she went to fight for the International Brigade. The Intellectual: MARGARITA NELKEN was an art critic and novelist, who had translated Kafka into Spanish. Denounced as a whore by the Catholic Right, she became a radical politician. The Fascist: After her husband was killed in the fighting and miscarrying her baby on hearing the news, MERCEDES SANZ-BACHILLER set up a welfare organisation that was to change the face of Spain."
  2. Fiona Green, "Martin Green, Writer & publisher", Soho Memories. Retrieved 5 April 2012.
  3. Patrick Kavanagh (1964), Collected Poems, London: Martin Brian & O'Keeffe (ISBN 0 85616 100 4); see Author's Note.
  4. Martin Green in a letter to The Guardian, 2005.
  5. Gould, Tony (2003). Inside Outsider: The Life and Times of Colin MacInnes. Twentieth Century Classics. Allison & Busby. ISBN 978-0749001919.
  6. sources ISBN 0-85616-220-5
  7. Mike Pentelow & Marsha Rowe, Characters of Fitzrovia, Chatto & Windus, 2001.
  8. Tim Hilton (11 February 2015). "Martin Green obituary". The Guardian.
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