Walter Starkie - British Institute, Madrid

British Institute, Madrid

Sent to Spain as the British cultural representative he was the founder and first director of the British Institute in Madrid (1940–1954), and went on to open branches in Barcelona, Bilbao, Seville and Valencia. The Institute was backed by the British Council and through lectures and exhibitions worked to influence Spanish opinion during World War II and help maintain Spanish neutrality. Upon accepting this position he made a promise to Lord George Lloyd not to write any new books and to put the Raggle-Taggle Gypsies to rest for the duration of the war. However, Spain, owing to her non-belligerent status, became an asylum for refugees from all over Europe, so his promise to curtail hobnobbing with Gypsies became impractical. The Institute stood apart from the British Embassy which, like most embassies, tended to be stand-offish toward their local nationals. It was in itself an embassy to the survivors of Spain's intellectual eclipse following the Spanish Civil War. One Starkie's early triumphs was organizing a recital by the Czech pianist Rudolf Firkušný who, in October, 1940, was passing through Madrid on his way to the United States. Finding a grand piano for Firkušný in war-torn Madrid was no easy task, but Starkie was able to locate a new Steinway and the concert went ahead bringing together a significant gathering of Madrid Society as well as representatives from the American Embassy and Dutch, Polish, Egyptian, Turkish and Czech Ministers. In May, 1943, the actor Leslie Howard came to Madrid to present a lecture on Hamlet in which he showed similarities between the play and the actions of Adolf Hitler. On his return trip to London from Lisbon the plane on which he was traveling, BOAC Flight 777, was shot down by the German Luftwaffe over the Bay of Biscay. Among the 4 crew and 13 passengers who perished was the prominent Jewish activist Wilfrid B. Israel, Francis German Cowlrick and Gordon Thomas MacLean, all of whom had lunched together at the Madrid British Institute the week before. On any one evening one could count on finding in the Institute at Calle Almagro 5, a great novelist such as Pío Baroja, a rising star like Camilo José Cela (Winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, 1989), that prince of essayists, Azorín, composers like Joaquín Rodrigo and painters such as Ignacio Zuloaga. He left behind him a thriving institute which now has a school of more than 2,000 students. During the war he also helped organize and operate an escape route across the Pyrenees for British airmen shot down over France. Walter and Augusta also allowed their large flat at number 24 Calle del Prado to be used as a safe house for escaping prisoners of war and Jewish refugees.

He was professor of comparative literature at the University of Madrid, from 1947 to 1956. After he retired from the British Institute he accepted a university position in the United States. It was his third American tour, taking him to the University of Texas, Austin (1957–58), New York University (1959), Kansas University (1960), Colorado University (1961), and finally to the University of California, Los Angeles (1961–70) where as Professor-in-Residence he was assigned to lecture in six Departments (English, Folklore-Mythology, Italian, Music, Spanish-Portuguese, and Theatre).

After his retirement from U.C.L.A. he returned with his wife, Italia Augusta, to live in Madrid. After suffering from a severe cardiac asthma attack he died on November 2, 1976. Italia followed him six months later on May 10, 1977. They are buried in the British Cemetery in Madrid.

The academic Enid Starkie was his sister.