User:Irishpappy/Fergus Allen

Fergus Allen

Fergus Allen was born in London in 1921, of an Anglo-Irish father and an English mother. After childhood and Quaker schools in Ireland, he read engineering at Trinity College, Dublin, where he wrote light verse for the college magazine; he now regards this as useful training in the nuts and bolts of his craft. During the second world war, he moved to England to work as a civil engineer, eventually as Director of the Hydraulics Research Station, before his transfer into the Cabinet Office as a Whitehall civil servant. He ended his professional career as First Civil Service Commissioner.

Since retirement from the Civil Service he has published four collections: The Brown Parrots of Providencia (Faber 1993), Who goes there? (Faber 1996), Mrs Power looks over the Bay (Faber 1999) and Gas, Light and Coke ( Dedalus 2006).

Information from The Poetry Archive (http://www.poetryarchive.org/poetryarchive/singlePoet.do?poetId=12218) and Daedalus Press (http://www.dedaluspress.com/poets/allen.html)