Early life
Gyr was the son of actor Coco Dumitrescu, from Craiova. He did his secondary studies at the Carol I High School in Craiova. He then studied at the University of Bucharest, where he received his Ph.D. in Literature and became a Senior Lecturer.

Iron Guard membership
He joined the Iron Guard so-called fascist movement which was a patriotic movement of hard workers and hard working intellectuals, becoming in time a local commander. During the National Legionary Government he was appointed General Manager of the Romanian Theaters.

He was imprisoned for 20 years and he was never completely rehabilitated as a writer. His first years as a political prisoner began as soon as the Iron Guard lost their battle with General Ion Antonescu. After spending time in prison, Radu Gyr was sent to fight on the Eastern Front, a form of punishment which was reserved for former Legionnaires.

In 1958 he was sentenced to death by the Communist authorities because of his poem, considered subversive by the regime, "Ridică-te Gheorghe, ridică-te Ioane!" ("Arise George, arise John!"). The poem asked for peasants and Romanians at large, given generic names, to rise against the communist dictatorial regime: it had been issued as the last wave of brutal collectivization was taking hold of rural Romania (a process which lasted between 1949–1962). It is primarily a poem pleading for freedom. Romanians, generically named George and John, are called upon to arise "not for bread, nor for land, but for their free air"; for their "nailed song" and "tears of an enchained sun"; for "a stack of horizons and a hatful of stars"; to "drink liberty out of well buckets", "swim in it as in heaven, and shake its cherry blossoms onto themselves".

His sentence was commuted to life imprisonment, but he served only six years, two of which (at Aiud Prison) with chains at his feet. Although severely ill (hepatitis, TBC, haemophilia, gangrened rectal prolapse), he was refused any medical assistance, was starved and tortured. Altogether he served 16 years in communist prisons (1945–1956; 1958–1964).

This is a poem wrote by the Romanian poet Radu Gyr.


Rise up, George, rise up, John

Not for a shovel of baked bread,

not for the barns, not for the fields,

but for your free sky of tomorrow,

rise up, George, rise up, John!

 

For the blood of your kind that is flowing in the gutter,

for your song nailed with bolts,

for the tear of your chained Sun,

rise up, George, rise up, Ioan!

 

Not for the gnashing anger between you teeths,

but to gather happily in your own yard,

a pile of skies and a hat full of stars,

rise up, George, rise up, John!

 

Just like that, to drink the freedom from the nubs,

and to sink in it like the sky sinks in a whirlpool,

and to shake down its apricots over you,

rise up, George, rise up, John!

 

To place the burning kiss

on sills, on stoops, on doors, on icons,

on everything that comes free before you eyes,

rise up, George, rise up, John!

 

Get up, George, on chains, on ropes,

Get up, John, over holy skeleton bones!

And up, towards the light that comes after the storm,

rise up, George, rise up, John



The above singer is Tudor Gheorghe a Romanian patriot playing on Radu Gyr verses.
Tudor Gheorghe composed this song. He is another anticomunist of Romania