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Vernon Scannell (23 January 1922 – 16 November 2007) was a British poet and author. He was at one time a professional boxer, and wrote novels about the sport. His published poem count stands at 53. ==Personal life== Vernon Scannell, whose birth name was John Vernon Bain, was born in 1922 in Spilsby, Lincolnshire. The family, always poor, moved frequently: Ballaghaderreen in Ireland, Beeston, Eccles, before settling in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, where his father, who had fought in the First World War, developed a reputation as a good portrait photographer and the family's severe financial difficulties began to ease. Scannell attended the local Queen's Park Boys' School, an elementary council school〔Scannell, Vernon, ''Drums of Morning'', London: Robson Books, 1992. ISBN 1861052464〕 and left at the age of 14 for a job in an accountant's office. His real passions, however, were for the unlikely combination of boxing and literature. He had been winning boxing titles at school and had been a keen reader from a very early age, although not properly attaching to poetry until about aged 15, when he picked up a Walter de la Mare poem and was "instantly and permanently hooked". In 1940 Scannell enlisted in the Argyll and Sutherland highlanders but two years later was transferred to the Gordon Highlanders, part of the famous 51st Highland Division.〔Cover note, ''Not Without Glory'', London: Woburn Press. ISBN 0713000945〕 The war took him into action in the North African desert. He deserted (from revulsion at his colleagues' behaviour rather than cowardice) in a forward area, was caught and sent to one of the harshest military penal institutions in Alexandria. Released on a suspended sentence, to take part in the Normandy invasion, where he was wounded near Caen and shipped back to a military hospital at Winwick in Lancashire 〔Cover note ''An Argument of Kings'', London: Robson Books. ISBN 978-0-86051-444-2〕 before being sent on to a convalescent depot. Scannell had always very much disliked army life, finding nothing in his temperament which fitted him for the part of a soldier. So "on impulse", after V.E. Day, with the war over as far as he was concerned, he deserted again and spent two years on the run, earning his living with jobs in the theatre, professional boxing bouts and tutoring and coaching, all the while teaching himself by reading everything he could. During this evasive time Scannell was writing poetry and was first published in ''Tribune'' and ''The Adelphi''. He was also boxing for Leeds University, winning the Northern Universities Championships at three weights. In 1947 he was arrested and court-martialled and sent to Northfield Military Hospital, a mental institution near Birmingham. On discharge he returned to Leeds and then went to London, where, supporting himself with teaching jobs and boxing, he settled down to writing. Scannell, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature 〔 won many poetry awards, including for war poems such as his collection ''Walking Wounded''. A. E. Housman said that "the business of poetry is to harmonise the sadness of the universe" and Scannell quoted this with approval. Scannell's poems, with their themes of love, violence and mortality, were shaped and influenced by his wartime experiences. Scannell was awarded a Writing Fellowship in 1975 as Resident Poet in Berinsfield, Oxfordshire, an experience he recounts in ''A Proper Gentleman''〔Cover note, ''New & Collected Poems 1950 - 1980'', London: Robson Books, 1980. ISBN 0860511049〕 and later, in 1979 he spent a term as Poet in Residence at the King's School, Canterbury.〔James Andrew Taylor, ''Walking Wounded: The Life and Poetry of Vernon Scannell'', Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. ISBN 9780199603183〕 His final collection, ''Last Post'', was published in 2007; he had been working on it until not long before his death. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Vernon Scannell」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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