David Scott Biography

British poet, born in Cambridge; he studied theology at the University of Durham and at Cuddleston College, near Oxford, before entering the Anglican Ministry. In 1980 he became vicar of Torpenhow and Allhallows, near Wigton, Cumbria. His poetry attracted notice when his ‘Kirkwall Auction Mart’ won the Sunday Times/BBC poetry competition in 1978. A Quiet Gathering (1984), his first collection of verse, was followed by Playing for England in 1989; both books are illustrated with drawings by Graham Arnold, a member of the Brotherhood of Ruralists. Much of Scott's poetry employs an engagingly subdued tone for its treatments of his clerical duties and events in the lives of his parishioners. He has also produced numerous impressively concise poems on literary and ecclesiastical figures; these include ‘A Walk with St Teresa of Avila’, notable for the interplay of a witty spiritual surrealism with his characteristically precise use of local detail. His other works include How Does It Feel? (1989), a collection of poems for children, and a number of plays for the National Youth Music Theatre, including Bendigo Boswell, which was televised in 1983.