Collection: David Scott

David Scott was born in 1947 in Cambridge. He was educated at Solihull School, and studied Theology at Durham and then at Cuddesdon College near Oxford. He spent two years as a curate in Harlow, and then became School Chaplain at Haberdashers’ Aske’s School, Elstree, where he taught religious education. He was vicar of Torpenhow and Allhallows in Cumbria for eleven years, and since 1991 has been Rector of St Lawrence with St Swithun in Winchester and Warden of the Diocesan School of Spirituality. He is an Honorary Canon of Winchester Cathedral. In 1978 David Scott won the Sunday Times/BBC national poetry competition with his poem ‘Kirkwall Auction Mart’. A Quiet Gathering, his first book of poems, was published by Bloodaxe Books in 1984, and won him the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize in 1986. His second collection, Playing for England (Bloodaxe Books, 1989) was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. Both books were illustrated by Graham Arnold of the Brotherhood of Ruralists. The poems from the two collections were republished with new work in David Scott’s Selected Poems (Bloodaxe Books, 1998). His latest collection is Piecing Together (Bloodaxe Books, 2005). David Scott’s collection of poems for children, How Does It Feel?, was published by Blackie in 1989. He has also written several plays for the National Youth Music Theatre with Jeremy James Taylor. These include Captain Stirrick, which was staged at the National Theatre’s Cottesloe Theatre in 1981; and Bendigo Boswell, which was commissioned by the BBC and screened in 1983. Jack Spratt VC was performed in the 1986 London International Opera Festival, and Les Petits Rats was performed at the Edinburgh International Festival and Sadlers Wells in 1988. He has written four religious books, Moments of Prayer (SPCK, 1997), Building Common Faith (Canterbury Press, 1997), Sacred Tongues (SPCK, 2001) and The Private Prayers of Lancelot Andrewes (SPCK, 2002).