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On March 25, 1920, Paul Scott was born in Palmers Green, England (north London), the
second
son of Tom and Frances Scott. Tom Scott was a self-employed commercial artist who,
together
with his two sisters, designed advertisements for the latest fashions. He came from
a family
of painters and designers while his wife, Frances, was from a more humble background.
The
family lived on the fringes of middle class respectability and constantly struggled
to
maintain their position during this period of rigid social mores. Paul maintained
high
grades while in school but at the age of sixteen had to quit Winchmore Hill Collegiate
School in London in order to help the family financially. This was to affect Paul's
self-esteem and presented obstacles to his continuing sense of himself as a poet.
His father
suggested he work as an accountant and he thus apprenticed himself to an accounting
firm. He
studied in the evenings, completed exams, and rose to more responsibility and more
complex
duties. The dreamy, creative side could not be ignored, however, and he continued
to write
poems, read the works of other poets, and developed friendships with other aspiring
poets. |
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In 1940 Scott was drafted to serve in the British Army. In 1941 his poem, "I Gerontius," had been included in the Resuram Series of poetry
pamphlets. While stationed in Torquay, he met Penny Avery, a nurse, at one of the
company
dances; after a short time they fell in love and were married on October 23, 1941.
In
February 1943 Scott received orders that he was to be stationed in India, and in March
sailed from Liverpool. By the time he arrived it was the beginning of the end for
the
British Raj in India. He was as surprised at the superior attitude he observed in
the
British toward their Indian subjects, as he was of the hostile and resentful attitude
of the
Indian population toward the British, issues Scott was to explore in depth in his
later
novels. Shortly after his arrival he came down with dysentery which was not diagnosed
as
amoebiasis until 1964, when it was successfully treated in Paris. The disease had
a
pronounced effect on Scott during the twenty years in which the parasite remained
in his
body; it accounted for his mood swings, his irritability, lassitude, and feelings
of
alienation, and had a marked effect on the style of his writing. |
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After serving with the British Army in India and Malaya as an air supply officer,
Scott
returned to London. He had continued to write poetry while in the Army, and though
he
thought of himself as a poet first, he began to write plays and experienced success
with
"Pillars of Salt" which won a prize in a Jewish playwriting
competition. It, and the three other winners, were published in 1948 as "Four Jewish Plays." Job prospects all over London were bleak at the
time of his return but Scott used his training in accounting to secure a position
as
secretary for the Falcon Press and Grey Walls Press. He left this position in 1950
to become
a director and literary agent for Pearn, Pollinger and Higham (later David Higham
Associates) where he successfully represented writers such as John Braine, Gerald
Hanley,
Morris West, M.M. Kaye, Roland Gant, and Chris Almedingen. During those years of encouraging
other writers to do their best, he wrote five novels himself but felt torn by the
demands of
his job and his desire to devote more time to his own writing, and thus resigned in
1960 to
work at his craft full time. |
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Scott's first novel, Johnnie Sahib, was rejected seventeen times before
being published in 1952, and went on to win the Eyre & Spottiswoode Literary Fellowship
Prize. This was followed by Alien Sky, published in 1953.
India had penetrated Scott's heart deeply; most of his novels are set in India, or
use India
as a backdrop, as in A Male Child (1956), The Mark of the Warrior (1958), and The Chinese Love Pavilion (1960). Two radio scripts were produced at
this time: "Sahibs & Memsahibs" was broadcast in the
summer of 1958, and "The Mark of the Warrior" in 1960. The Alien Sky aired on B.B.C. television in London in 1956. |
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The Birds of Paradise (1962) continued Scott's preoccupation with
India, whereas The Bender (1963) is set solely in London and
explores the importance of work in defining one's role in life and in society. The Corrida at San Felíu (1964) uses fragments of the life story of
a novelist, Edward Thornhill, to piece together the artist's world of the creative
imagination in which illusion and fact often vie with each other. |
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Scott returned to India in 1964 and from that visit came the raw material he needed
to
write his next five novels, all of which centered on the end of British rule in India.
The
first four novels, The Jewel in the Crown (1966), The Day of the Scorpion (1968), The Towers of Silence (1971), and A Division of the Spoils (1975) comprise "The Raj Quartet." The fifth and final novel, Staying On (1977), which is a coda to the Raj Quartet, centers on
the lives of the British who elected to remain in India after independence. Scott
won the
Yorkshire Post book of the year award for finest fiction in 1971 for The Towers of Silence, and the Booker Prize in 1977 for Staying On. Scott taught writing and modern literature at the
University of Tulsa in the fall terms of 1976 and 1977. Paul Scott died from cancer
on March
1, 1978 in London. |
