George Hounslow Character Analysis

In the black notebook, George Hounslow is an intense, humble, and romantic road repairman who has an affair with (among others) the Mashopi Hotel cook Jackson’s wife, Marie, while he is away from his wife and family for work. This relationship plays a central role in Anna’s plot for Frontiers of War; George agonizes over Marie’s fate and especially that of the son he has with her, whom he cannot acknowledge to the world because of colonial Africa’s strict racial segregation. He lives miserably in cramped quarters with his wife, children, parents, and wife’s parents, but loves and works tirelessly to provide for them all. He is also strongly dedicated to socialist organizing, which leads him to idolize and spend as much time as possible talking to Willi Rodde, the only other person at the Mashopi Hotel who truly believes in socialism. Unlike the rest of the socialists, George insists on living out his principles, which leads Willi and Paul Blackenhurst to mock and look down on him. His emotional depth and impassioned pursuit of women make both Anna and Maryrose (who are much younger) feel that he is their only legitimate chance at romance and regret turning him down. After Mrs Boothby fires Jackson, sending him, Marie, and their children (including George’s son) back to Nyasaland, George is devastated; he eventually manages to contact them and send them money. As one of the only working-class, honest, and emotionally self-aware men in The Golden Notebook, George is both an anomaly and perhaps an exemplar of the “real man” Anna seeks.