A. S. T. Fisher Explained

Arthur Stanley Theodore Fisher
Pseudonym:Michael Scarrott
Birth Date:1906
Death Date:1989
Nationality:British
Alma Mater:Christ Church, Oxford
Occupation:clergyman, writer, poet, novelist

Arthur Stanley Theodore Fisher (1906–1989)[1] was a mid-20th-century Church of England priest and writer. He wrote a number of poems, religious works and local histories as A. S. T. Fisher and one novel under the pseudonym Michael Scarrott.

Family

Fisher was the son of Reverend Arthur Bryan Fisher (1870–1955),[2] a Church of England priest who was a Church Missionary Society missionary in the Uganda Protectorate.[3] Fisher was married and had a daughter.[4]

Education

Fisher studied at Christ Church, Oxford, where he lived on the same stair as W. H. Auden.[5] The two students had frequent late-night arguments about religion,[6] and in 1925, Fisher reintroduced Auden to Christopher Isherwood.[7] In 1926, Auden's mother, Constance, was concerned about her son, so Fisher wrote to her "the fact that he is naturally more self-sufficient than most people explains why he finds so little need for a personal God – or for a Mother".[5] [6]

In 1928, the journal Oxford Poetry published three of Fisher's poems.[6]

Career

By early 1934,[8] Fisher was chaplain of the recently founded Bryanston School, a public school in Dorset, but had left by February 1935.[9] By 1952, he was chaplain of Magdalen College School, Oxford,[2] and by 1970, he was Vicar of Westwell, Oxfordshire.[10]

Fisher wrote books of prayers and other Christian matters, poems, and later three histories of parishes in West Oxfordshire. Longman published his An Anthology of Prayers Compiled for use in School and Home in 1934 and republished it a number of times from 1943 to 1959. Under the pseudonym of Michael Scarrott, Fisher wrote a gay novel set in a fictitious Dorset public school, which Reginald Caton's Fortune Press published in 1955.[5] The novel was illustrated by Fisher's son-in-law, B.H. (Barry) Surie.

Works

As A. S. T. Fisher

As Michael Scarrott

Notes and References

  1. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/n50005286.html Library of Congress
  2. Gray . Sir John Milner . Acholi History, 1860–1901—III . The Uganda Journal . The Uganda Society . 16 . 2 . September 1952 . 144 . 28 June 2013.
  3. Web site: Papers of Rev. A. B. Fisher . Mundus . 28 June 2013.
  4. Web site: Front Free Endpaper: More on Ambassador of Loss, Michael Scarrott, A S T Fisher and B. H. Surie. 2016-03-04. https://web.archive.org/web/20160304114412/http://callumjames.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/more-on-ambassador-of-loss-michael.html. 2016-03-04. 2018-03-19.
  5. Web site: Ambassador of Loss by Michael Scarrott . https://web.archive.org/web/20140109145120/http://callumjames.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/ambassador-of-loss-by-michael-scarrott.html . dead . 9 January 2014 . James . Callum . Front Free Endpaper . . 10 September 2012 . 28 June 2013 .
  6. Web site: Consolidated index . https://web.archive.org/web/20001211165300/http://www.gnelson.demon.co.uk/oxpoetry/index/if.html . dead . 11 December 2000 . Oxford Poetry . Graham Nelson . 28 June 2013 .
  7. Web site: W. H. Auden . Helensburgh Heroes . 28 June 2013.
  8. Recommended by the Bishop of London for reading during Lent, 1934 . . XXXV . endpaper . 28 June 2013.
  9. Web site: The New Deal in Education . Jones . Brian . . . 16 February 1935 . 28 June 2013.
  10. News: The Changing Face of Kingham . Chipperfield . John . . Newsquest Oxfordshire . 7 June 2010 . 28 June 2013.

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