My lovably ordinary brother Syd
The ??crazy diamond?? founder of Pink Floyd was no acid casualty or recluse.
He loved art and DIY, his sister Rosemary tells his biographer Tim Willis in
her first interview for 30 years
When the death of 60-year-old Roger ??Syd? Barrett was announced on Tuesday,
the media raised an astonishing last hurrah for the founder of Pink Floyd,
the ??crazy diamond? who had shunned the public gaze for decades.
The descriptions of him as a ??mad genius?, ??recluse? and ??acid casualty?
ere far off the mark, however, according to his sister Rosemary.
When I wrote Barrett??s biography, Madcap, four years ago I had
off-the-record guidance from Rosemary ?? his junior by two years and closest
friend. Last week, after his death, we spoke again and this time she went on
the record ?? the first time she has given a press interview for more than 30
years.
She described him as a loving man who ??simply couldn??t understand? the
continued interest in his distant Pink Floyd years and was too absorbed in
his own thoughts to spare time for fans.
While her account is naturally fond, one should remember that she has spent
much of her working life as a nurse and therefore sees no stigma in mental
illness. As children, she and Barrett shared a bedroom and she recalls him
leaping from his sheets to conduct an imaginary orchestra. He always had an
extraordinary mind, bordering on the autistic or Aspergic. He had a rare
talent to exploit ambiguities in language and also experienced synaesthesia
?? the ability to ??see sounds and hear colours? ?? which was to be a huge
influence on his music in his psychedelic phase.
As a performing artist, signed to a label, he was under enormous strain. Not
only did he find fame a two-edged sword, he was also deeply resistant to his
record company??s commercial demands. He was run ragged. Between January
1966, when the Floyd turned professional, and January 1968, Barrett played
220 gigs around Britain ?? not to mention broadcasting and performances
abroad ?? as well as writing, recording and co-producing two hit singles,
most of the band??s first album and part of the second.
While his enthusiastic ingestion of any drugs available might have triggered
some disturbing behaviour, such stress might tip anyone into nervous
collapse.
From 1981, when he returned from London to the suburbs of his native
Cambridge, resumed the name Roger and set up home in his mother??s modest
semi, he made faltering but significant progress.
Rosemary is adamant that he neither suffered from mental illness nor
received treatment for it at any time since they resumed regular contact 25
years ago. At first he did spend some time in a private ??home for lost
souls? ?? Greenwoods in Essex ?? but she says there was no formal therapy
programme there. (??And besides, he didn??t mix, because he was very content
to be basket weaving and making things.?) Later he agreed to some sessions
with a psychiatrist at Fulbourn psychiatric hospital, Cambridge, but neither
medication nor therapy was considered appropriate.
He might have continued to find social interaction difficult ?? when I
knocked on his door while writing my book he greeted me in his underpants
and avoided conversation by saying that he was just looking after the house
?? but the idea that he ??didn??t recognise he was Syd? is nonsense. His
troubled years had been so painful that even thinking about his former
incarnation upset him, so he made a conscious effort to avoid that trap.
Because he was so interested in his own thoughts, his sister said, he often
forgot about the mundane chores essential to comfort. To keep an eye on him,
she would visit or phone every day and sometimes accompany him on
expeditions into town.
Earlier this year an old friend saw the pair in Robert Sayles, the Cambridge
department store, and went up to renew their acquaintance. ??Hello, Syd,? he
said. ??Do you remember me??
??Yup,? replied Barrett. But Rosemary cut in with ??Roger is only interested
in buying some ties today?, and led her brother away. Now she admits she
might have been over-protective.
Barrett lived in the semi with his mother until her death in 1991 and then
remained there alone. ??So much of his life was boringly normal,? said
Rosemary. ??He looked after himself and the house and garden. He went
shopping for basics on his bike ?? always passing the time of day with the
local shopkeepers ?? and he went to DIY stores like B&Q for wood, which he
brought home to make things for the house and garden.
??Actually, he was a hopeless handyman, he was always laughing at his
attempts, but he enjoyed it. Then there was his cooking. Like everyone who
lives on their own, he sometimes found that boring but he became good at
curries.
??When Roger was working he liked to listen to jazz tapes. Thelonious Monk,
Django Reinhardt, Charlie Parker and Miles Davis were his favourites ?? he
always found something new in them ?? but apart from the early Rolling
Stones, he??d lost interest in pop music a long time ago.
??As for a television or radio, he didn??t feel the need to own one because he
didn??t want to waste any energy concentrating on it. It??s not that he
couldn??t apply his mind. He read very deeply about the history of art and
actually wrote an unpublished book about it, which I??m too sad to read at
the moment. But he found his own mind so absorbing that he didn??t want to be
distracted.
??He did have leisure interests. He took up photography, and sometimes we
went to the seaside together. Quite often he took the train on his own to
London to look at the major art collections ?? and he loved flowers. He made
regular trips to the Botanic Gardens and to the dahlias at Anglesey Abbey,
near Lode. But of course, his passion was his painting.
??Roger worked in a variety of styles ?? though he admired no one after the
impressionists ?? and you could say he came up with his own type of
conceptual art. He would photograph a particular flower and paint a large
canvas from the photograph. Then he would make a photographic record of the
picture before destroying the canvas. In a way, that was very typical of his
approach to life. Once something was over, it was over. He felt no need to
revisit it.
??That??s why he avoided contact with journalists and fans. He simply couldn??t
understand the interest in something that had happened so long ago and he
wasn??t willing to interrupt his own musings for their sake. After a while he
and I stopped discussing the times he was bothered. We both knew what we
thought and we simply had nothing more to add. It became easiest to pretend
those incidents never happened and just blank them out.
??Roger may have been a bit selfish ?? or rather self-absorbed ?? but when
people called him a recluse they were really only projecting their own
disappointment. He knew what they wanted but he wasn??t willing to give it to
hem.
??Roger was unique; they didn??t have the vocabulary to describe him and so
they pigeonholed him. If only they had seen him with children. His nieces
and nephews, the kids in the road ?? he would have them in stitches. He could
talk at length and he played with words in a way that children instinctively
appreciated, even if it sometimes threw adults.?
He was quite a sharp dresser, too. ??He didn??t follow fashion ?? he just
bought what he liked for himself ?? but he liked to look presentable. His
clothes were always clean and pressed. In fact, if he had an obsession, it
was with that.?
Barrett suffered from stomach ulcers for 30 years ?? which he managed by
drinking milk ?? and also developed diabetes. ??But he simply refused to admit
it to himself. For days at a time he wouldn??t take his pills ?? which, being
a nurse, could have worried me. But to be honest, it can??t have been very
severe because he never showed any ill effects.?
What he did show, she said, was love: ??I gave it to him and he gave it to
me. He was incredibly supportive when our mother died. And in the past week
I??ve been surprised to learn how popular he was with the local tradesmen. He
was simply a very lovable person.
??He showed his personality in lots of different ways ?? which some outsiders
found confusing ?? but underneath he was solid as a rock. It may have been a
responsibility to look out for him, but it was never a burden.?
