Scott, F. R. (Francis Reginald)

Person

Scott, F. R. (Francis Reginald)

1899-1985

F.R. Scott, poet, lawyer, university professor, was born in Quebec City, a son of the poet and minister F.G. Scott. In 1919 Scott graduated from Bishop's University, then taught for a year and left for Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar in 1920. He entered McGill's Law School in 1924. During his first year at McGill, Scott contributed several pieces to The McGill Daily Literary Supplement through which he met the poet and critic A.J.M. Smith. Smith invited Scott to help found The McGill Fortnightly Review, which they published for two years and through which grew Scott's interest in modern poetry.

In 1928 Scott married the Canadian painter Marian Dale and joined the McGill Law Faculty. He co-edited the short-lived Canadian Mercury with poet Leo Kennedy, 1928-1929. In 1932 Scott and historian Frank Underhill founded the League for Social Reconstruction, a socialist study group, and contributed to its publication, Social Planning for Canada (1935). Scott was the League's president 1935-1936 and was also active in the C.C.F., serving as its national chairman 1942-1950. Scott edited New Provinces, a poetry anthology published in 1936, and was a member of Preview and Northern Review, Montreal little magazines, in the 1940's. He published his first collection of poetry, Overture, in 1945. Later publications included Events & Signals (1954), Eye of the Needle (1957), and The Blasted Pine (1957), co-edited by A.J.M. Smith.

Scott was a founder of les Recherches Sociales, which concerned itself with French Canadian social problems. At the same time, he worked on translations of various French Canadian poets and in 1962 published St-Denys Garneau and Anne Hébert, which was followed in 1977 by Poems of French Canada, which won him the Governor-General's award for translation. In law, Scott specialized in constitutional law, as well as the defence of civil liberties. Among his best known cases were the Roncarelli and Lady Chatterley's Lover cases, and his opposition to the Quebec Padlock Act. He became dean of McGill's Law Faculty in 1961.

During the 1960's, Scott helped found the New Party, the successor to the C.C.F. and the predecessor of the New Democratic Party, before retiring from active party politics, and served on the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism. He continued to publish poetry, including Signature (1964), his Selected Poems (1966), Trouvailles (1967) and The Dance is One (1973). In 1977 Essays on the Constitution appeared, for which he won the Governor-General's Award. His Collected Poems was published in 1981.

Scott died 31 January 1985 at Montréal.

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