(Francis James) Ronald Bottrall (2 September 1906,
Camborne
Camborne ( kw, Kammbronn) is a town in Cornwall, England. The population at the 2011 Census was 20,845. The northern edge of the parish includes a section of the South West Coast Path, Hell's Mouth and Deadman's Cove.
Camborne was formerl ...
,
Cornwall
Cornwall (; kw, Kernow ) is a historic county and ceremonial county in South West England. It is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, and is the homeland of the Cornish people. Cornwall is bordered to the north and west by the Atlantic ...
– 25 June 1989) was a
Cornish poet. He was praised highly by
F.R. Leavis
Frank Raymond "F. R." Leavis (14 July 1895 – 14 April 1978) was an English literary critic of the early-to-mid-twentieth century. He taught for much of his career at Downing College, Cambridge, and later at the University of York.
Leavis ...
,
Anthony Burgess
John Anthony Burgess Wilson, (; 25 February 1917 – 22 November 1993), who published under the name Anthony Burgess, was an English writer and composer.
Although Burgess was primarily a comic writer, his Utopian and dystopian fiction, d ...
and
Martin Seymour-Smith
Martin Roger Seymour-Smith (24 April 1928 – 1 July 1998) was a British poet, literary critic, and biographer.
Biography
Seymour-Smith was born in London and educated at Highgate School and St Edmund Hall, Oxford, where he was editor of ''Isi ...
, and deprecated by
Ian Hamilton and
Martin Amis
Martin Louis Amis (born 25 August 1949) is a British novelist, essayist, memoirist, and screenwriter. He is best known for his novels ''Money'' (1984) and ''London Fields'' (1989). He received the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for his memoir '' ...
.
Bottrall was educated at
Redruth Grammar School
Redruth Grammar School in Redruth, Cornwall, was a boys school between 1907 and 1976.
History
The school was opened on 5 October 1907 by General Sir Redvers Buller. It was originally built to accommodate 150 pupils and to serve the Camborne- R ...
and at
Pembroke College, Cambridge
Pembroke College (officially "The Master, Fellows and Scholars of the College or Hall of Valence-Mary") is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. The college is the third-oldest college of the university and has over 700 ...
.
Career
* Lector in English, University of
Helsingfors
Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...
,
Finland
Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...
, 1929–31
*
Commonwealth fund fellowship
The Harkness Fellowship (previously known as the Commonwealth Fund Fellowship) is a program run by the Commonwealth Fund of New York City. This fellowship was established to reciprocate the Rhodes Scholarships and enable Fellows from several cou ...
,
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...
, USA, 1931–3
* Johore Professor of English Language and Literature,
Raffles College
The National University of Singapore (NUS) is a national public research university in Singapore. Founded in 1905 as the Straits Settlements and Federated Malay States Government Medical School, NUS is the oldest autonomous university in the c ...
,
Singapore
Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...
, 1933–37
* Assistant Director, British Institute,
Florence, Italy
Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico an ...
, 1937–38
* Secretary,
SOAS
SOAS University of London (; the School of Oriental and African Studies) is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the federal University of London. Founded in 1916, SOAS is located in the Bloomsbury are ...
, 1939–45
* Air Ministry: Temporary Administrative Officer, 1940; Priority Officer, 1941
*
British Council
The British Council is a British organisation specialising in international cultural and educational opportunities. It works in over 100 countries: promoting a wider knowledge of the United Kingdom and the English language (and the Welsh lan ...
Representative: in
Sweden
Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...
, 1941; in
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...
, 1945; in
Brazil
Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...
, 1954; in
Greece
Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders with ...
, 1957; in
Japan
Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...
(and Cultural Counsellor, HM Embassy, Tokyo), 1959
* Controller of Education, British Council, 1950–54
* Chief, Fellowships and Training Branch,
Food and Agriculture Organization
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)french: link=no, Organisation des Nations unies pour l'alimentation et l'agriculture; it, Organizzazione delle Nazioni Unite per l'Alimentazione e l'Agricoltura is an intern ...
, 1963–65.
Honours and awards
*
OBE, 1949.
* Coronation Medal, 1953
* Syracuse International Poetry Prize, 1954
* Fellow of the
Royal Society of Literature
The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820, by George IV of the United Kingdom, King George IV, to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, th ...
, 1955
* Knight of St. John, 1972
* Grande Ufficiale dell'Ordine al Merito della Repubblica Italiana, 1973
* Knight Commander, Order of St. John of Jerusalem,
Malta
Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...
, 1977
Personal life
He was the father of
Anthony Bottrall
Anthony Bottrall (15 May 1938 – 16 December 2014) was a British diplomat, expert in developmental agriculture and a Liberal Democrat, Lambeth London Borough Council, Stockwell ward politician.
He stood against incumbent Labour MP Kate Hoey at ...
, the diplomat, expert in developmental agriculture and politician.
Publications
Poetry
* The Loosening and other Poems, 1931
* Festivals of Fire, 1934
* The Turning Path, 1939
* Farewell and Welcome, 1945
* Selected Poems, 1946
* The Palisades of Fear, 1949
* Adam Unparadised, 1954
* Collected Poems, 1961
* Day and Night, 1974
* Poems 1955–73, 1974
* Reflections on the Nile, 1980
* Against a Setting Sun, 1983
Other
* (with Gunnar Ekelöf) T.S. Eliot: Dikter i Urval, 1942
* (with Margaret Bottrall) The Zephyr Book of English Verse, 1945
* (with Margaret Bottrall) Collected English Verse, 1946
* Rome (Art Centres of the World), 1968.
References
1906 births
1989 deaths
Harkness Fellows
Officers of the Order of the British Empire
Alumni of Pembroke College, Cambridge
Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature
People educated at Redruth Grammar School
20th-century English poets
People from Camborne
Poets from Cornwall
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