Arthur Waley

English orientalist, sinologist, poet and renowned translator of classic Chinese and Japanese poetry (19 August 1889, Tunbridge Wells, Kent — 27 June 1966, London). Arthur D. Waley published numerous critically-acclaimed translations, praised by academic scholars and broader audiences and often regarded as "canonical," even though he was primarily self-taught in Classical Chinese and Classical Japanese. Waley never acquired his university degree, didn't speak Mandarin Chinese or contemporary Japanese, and never even traveled to Japan, China or anywhere in East Asia. Arthur Waley earned several prestigious accolades, including CBE (Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) in 1952 and CH (Companion of Honour) in 1956. Among various musical works and compositions based on Waley's poetry and translations, perhaps the best known is Benjamin Britten's 1957 cycle for high voice and guitar, Songs from the Chinese, Op. 58. Arthur was born to an Ashkenazi Jewish family; his original surname was Schloss. (Like many Jewish peers, Arthur changed it in 1914 to avoid the growing British prejudice against German-sounding names during the First World War.) He studied at Rugby School and enrolled in King's College, Cambridge, in 1907 on a "Classics" scholarship; however, Arthur dropped out in 1910 before completing his degree due to health issues. (Subsequently, King's College awarded him with Honorary Fellowship in 1945). In 1913, when he was twenty-four, Waley became an Assistant Keeper of Oriental Prints and Manuscripts at The British Museum. Supervised and briefly tutored by his boss, renowned art historian and poet Laurence Binyon (1869—1943), Arthur Waley taught himself to read Classical Chinese and Japanese to be more helpful in cataloging the Museum's collection. In the preface to one of his books, The Secret History of the Mongols (1963), Waley wrote he wasn't a master of many languages, modestly claiming to know Chinese and Japanese "fairly well" and mentioning "some knowledge" of Ainu, Mongolian, Hebrew, and Syriac. In 1918, Arthur Waley met ballet dancer, orientalist and scholar Beryl De Zoete (1879—1962), with whom they had a lifelong romantic relationship (even though they never married).