Thomas Blackburn

Thomas Eliel Fenwick Blackburn (10 February 1916 – 13 August 1977) was a British poet. His work is noted for its self-examination and spiritual imagery. His memoir, A Clip of Steel (1969), portrays the effects of a childhood under a repressive clergyman father. Early life Blackburn was born in Hensingham, Cumberland, England. He had mixed ancestry. His father, Eliel, was the product of an affair his missionary grandfather had with a Mauritian woman. The mother, who was supposedly beautiful but unstable, disappeared once she returned to Mauritius and the young Eliel was given to the care of an Uncle, where he was brought up to be a passionate Anglican. When Thomas Blackburn was a young boy, Eliel forced him to wear a painful chastity contraption on his groin, to prevent him from being tempted by masturbation. He also had to put up with his father, haunted by feelings of racial inferiority, repeatedly scrubbing his face with peroxide in order to lighten his complexion. The poet Alan Morrison, discussing this experience, noted that 'Blackburn' is "a cruelly apt surname for someone whose father used to literally try to burn the black off his skin". Blackburn studied law at Selwyn College, Cambridge – which he did not enjoy – at the insistence of his father. He made himself unpopular with some students after inviting visiting black musicians into his dorm to socialise. Numerous incidents of misbehaviour, culminating in the discovery of a contraceptive in his room, saw him expelled from college during his third year. This was followed by a short spell as an articled clerk at a law firm; then Brookfield Hall, a treatment centre for alcoholics and drug-addicts, where he was expelled for drunkenly attempting to seduce the wife of one of the medical staff; and finally several months of shock therapy at the hands of a Harley Street doctor. He completed a course in psychology at Birkbeck, University of London, before going on to study English at Durham University (Hatfield College) – the same university where his father had undertaken his theological training. On graduating from Durham in June 1940, he moved down to London and became involved with the Soho literary scene. Here he was called up to the Merchant Navy but left after suffering jaundice and instead worked as a lecturer with the National Fire Service, which proved to be his first steps into the world of teaching.