Harry James Barker

Harry with baby Jillian, early 1933.

For the next 74 years, that date never went uncelebrated. Many of the books you gave me as a child still have space on my bookshelves: a magnificent edition of Peter Pan; Alice in Wonderland and the Water Babies; The Odyssey, The Iliad, and Legends of Greece and Rome. In later years, your letters reflected the all-embracing perspectives of a Renaissance man. Allusions to French writers and poets, German philosophers, Roman sages, the Bible rubbed elbows with commentary on politics, the law, mountaineering, gardening, family news—plums in the pudding of life for me, Jack Horner-like, to delightedly, or thoughtfully, examine on my thumb. You set an epistolary standard that the advent of email has rendered all but extinct. Who, these days, would (or could) decline in such eloquent terms an invitation to visit?

“You remember the Roman Governor in the Acts of the Apostles? If you don’t, his name was Felix—a happy name—and he tried St Paul when the Jews accused Paul, and left him in prison till he was brought before Agrippa, who, having listened to Paul, exclaimed, ‘Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian.’ Well, this is all to introduce my next remark: ‘Almost thou persuadest me to travel to America.’”

I did not remember Felix or Agrippa, but then you always credited me with a depth of knowledge I could seldom live up to. And, sadly, I never had an opportunity to share with you our country of adoption. You would have reveled in New England’s rugged coastline and fall colors, but would have had to travel 3,000 miles to the Rockies to find mountains worthy of your climbing skills.

From your earliest years you were a climber. Despite a childhood of penury and deprivation, you were somehow aware of heights of the mind, and you thirsted to scale them. I see that sensitive six-year-old, torn without warning from home and family, and my heart weeps in incomprehension. And yet, in the loveless and often vicious environment of Redhill Orphanage, you developed the courage and determination that were to serve you so well. Thanks to one man who recognized your potential, you found a precarious foothold on those heights. From then on, you clawed your way up, negotiating chasms of despair, thorny outcrops of ill-health, and treacherous screes of love-sickness, learning the obligatory Latin in two months and obtaining a London University BA with honors. You were on your way.

But all this was long before I knew you. Memories of early visits to Doveton Road are of Margot’s sunny presence, my cousins’ lively company, the serenely colorful garden, with Sellina’s welcoming smile and Schatzi’s bustling little persona rounding out the picture. Later, the gentle and gracious Meg was there to greet us, with Brutus as backup host, and I could look forward to discussions with you about Cezanne or English history or South African politics, or just this and that. On our most recent visits, the latest only last year, we were thankful for Barbra’s cheerful and solicitous concern for your welfare.

2005 at Doveton Road

I also treasure recollections of my all-too-short membership of the Transvaal Mountain Club, when I met some of your friends: Fenger, Paul Houmoller, Doyle Liebenberg, Arthur Harris, and had the pleasure of singing the campfire songs you composed—some rollicking, some pensive—for which you are justly renowned in mountaineering circles. Doubtless they will echo in the kloofs of your beloved mountains for many years to come. Indeed, you mention in your Post Epilogue meeting a teenager whose mother sang your songs to her—the third generation!

I was happy to receive your Post Epilogue, which gave me insights on South African political events that I haven’t thought about for years. I marveled at the stream of letters you wrote to editors of newspapers and journals, including the Rand Daily Mail, The Star, the Financial Mail, and, your old favorite, the New Statesman. In addition to fearlessly analyzing and attacking the abuses of apartheid, you wrote eloquently and convincingly on subjects as diverse as knocking down the old Johannesburg post office, press freedom, releasing Mandela, structural changes in education, the use of language, the hazards of smoking. All this in addition to writing a landmark treatise on wills and learned articles in professional publications!

I marveled, too, at the tenacity with which you struggled against the WWII affliction that caused you so much discomfort for decades. Most of all, though, I marvel at the richness of your life, marked by the respect and affection of so many. Last week, Peter and I and our entire family gathered on the deck of a house we were renting on Cape Cod. Overlooking the tranquil beauty of Wellfleet Bay, we raised our glasses to you as an inspiration to us all, and the western sky, tinted with rose and lilac and peach, reminded me of a photograph you sent me in 1981 of daisies on the terrace of your garden, accompanied by this quotation:

“Dans les jardins de mon oncle,
Les paquerettes sont fleuries.”
(In my uncle’s garden,
The daisies are blooming.”)

May their essence accompany you in your new dimension, dear Uncle Harry, and may you find peace.

# posted by Peter @ 9:03 pm