Norman Frederick Hidden (24 October 1913 – 17 April 2006) was an English teacher, poet and author. He is best known for his involvement in the
Poetry Society and as an editor and publisher of poetry magazines and books, from the later 1960s.
Early life and background
He was born on 24 October 1913 in
Portsmouth,
the son of Frederick Charles Hidden (Fred) and his wife Ethel Victoria Kightley, who were married in 1911.
His father had "staunch socialist beliefs".
In 1944 Fred Hidden published a booklet British Honduras, the Forgotten Colony in Belize, through the National Business Agency;
Norman Hidden's mother Ethel died on 23 September 1955, and his father, described as a business consultant, on 9 December that year, at Frinton-on-Sea.
Education and teacher training
Hidden was educated at St John's School,
Porthcawl, from 1921 to 1926, and then at Hereford Cathedral School, from 1926 to 1932.
He entered Brasenose College, Oxford in 1932 to read English, where he was taught by Charles Leslie Wrenn.
There, according to his memoirs, he knew Bob Willcock (Henry Douglas Willcock, whom he calls Willcocks), as his tutorial partner with Wrenn. Willcock had been taught at Gresham's School by
Denys Thompson. With
Norman Cohn, Willcock and Hidden edited a magazine
Rejected MSS;
over two issues in 1934, it published Eíthne nic Liamóg and
Ian Serraillier.
Peter Alan Martin's dissertation on British
noted the period left-wing politics in contributions by
Gavin Ewart, Ronald Procter Hewett, and Harry Vincent Kemp (1911–1994) attacking
Scrutiny from a Marxist perspective.
Hidden mentioned
Jack Winocour (1913–1978)) at
Magdalen College as an organiser of anti-war protests.
In an interview with Dick Russell, Hidden stated that, while he wrote poetry as an undergraduate, he was not encouraged.
Exchange visit
In 1939 Hidden and his wife Trude moved to the United States, where he had an exchange teaching post through the English-Speaking Union, at Kenton High School,
Ohio.
In 1941 they moved again, to begin a period at
Adrian College in
Michigan. The
Michigan Education Journal noted that the couple had arrived there just ahead of the Pearl Harbor attack, a week before the United States declaration of war on Japan, and commented on Hidden's training as an air raid warden.
Trude was enrolled at Adrian College in Kappa Kappa Gamma. An account by her of the couple's circumstances appeared in 1944, in
The Key, the Kappa Kappa Gamma magazine.
The couple returned to the United Kingdom in 1943.
Teacher
After military service and his period in business, Hidden returned to teaching in 1953, at Goole Grammar School. He taught at Hornchurch Grammar School. His teaching career ended as a Senior Lecturer at the College of All Saints, Tottenham, a teacher training college, from 1964 to 1973.
Poetry
After moving to
Hornsey, Hidden founded a monthly series of pub
at the Lamb and Flag, Covent Garden, the first being on 9 June 1966. It ran to the early 1970s.
became involved as an organiser,
and a group "Workshop Two" of poets arose from these events. Of Workshop Two it was said that its "foremost raison d'être" was to provide a "remedy for what its founder diagnosed in
Labour Monthly as the real literary disease at the time, i.e. "the creative writer's lack of audience"."
Hidden was Chairman of The Poetry Society, from 1968 to 1971.
Workshop Press
Hidden set up Workshop Press, at 2 Culham Court, Granville Road in London N4.
It is known particularly for the quarterly magazine
New Poetry (its title from 1974) for which Hidden became General Editor.
ceased publication in 1981, while the Press continued, and the run ended in 1981.
New Poetry continued a series begun in 1967 as Writer's Workshop, which Hidden edited with John Pudney and the teacher Michael Johnson (1936–1972). Hidden introduced the first issue, writing that Writer's Workshop "was formed to bring poet and audience together."[ Writer's Workshop, first issue.] Guest editors included: Ivor Cutler; G. S. Fraser; John Horder (1936–2017); Edward Lucie-Smith; Charles Osborne; William Plomer; Anthony Rudolf; Jon Stallworthy; and Philip Toynbee.[ New Poetry Winter 1980/81, p. 77.] With many well-known contributors such as Jeni Couzyn, it continued to publish unknown poets. An anthology Hidden Talent: the Workshop poets, edited by Dick Russell, was published in 1993.
Hidden wrote the introduction to Madonna of the Unknown Nation by A. L. Hendriks, published by the Press in 1974.
Political candidate
Hidden was the Common Wealth Party candidate at in 1944. He was then "a former schoolmaster of Bradfield, Essex, now serving with the forces".
During the campaign he contacted Bob Willock, his Oxford friend who had become a teacher, about an
opinion poll. Willock from 1940 was deputy to
Tom Harrisson of
Mass-Observation, after the departure of
Charles Madge.
A Labour Party candidate in the 1950 general election at , Hidden was defeated by Oliver Lyttleton. He was then described as "manager of a commercial firm". Since demob in 1947, he had been involved in running the National Business Agency, a family company.
Works
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These Images Claw (1966).
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Say it Aloud (1972), editor.
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Dr. Kink & His Old-style Boarding School (1973), autobiographical.
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Over to You (1975), anthology, editor.
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Many People, Many Voices: Poetry from the English-speaking world (1978), editor, with Amy Hollins.
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The State of Poetry Today: A Survey Sponsored by New Poetry Magazine (1978), compiler.
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For My Friends (1981)
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Liaison Officer: Germany and the Anglo-US Occupation, 1946-47 (1993), autobiographical.
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Caravan Summer: And Other Stories (1999).
Hidden edited the Workshop Poets Series of 1970–1.
Family
Hidden was three times married.
-
Firstly, in 1938 in London, to Gertrud (Trude) Gerson, daughter of the lawyer Artur Gerson of Cologne.
-
Secondly, in 1947, to Liesel Carritt née Mottek, other married name Alexander, given names Lisbeth or Ruth.
[
]
She had previous been married to
Noel Carritt. The marriage was shortlived, and she returned to
East Germany in 1954.
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Thirdly, in 1960, to Joyce Collett, met in his time teaching in Goole.
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Notes
