Yang Xianyi, translator of Chinese classics, dies at 95

• Source: Global Times
• [16:06 November 24 2009]
• Comments

Yang Xianyi and his wife Gladys Taylor in a photo from 1940s (Photo: The Beijing News)

Yang Xianyi, a distinguished translator known for rendering numerous ancient Chinese classics into English, including Dream of the Red Chamber, died in Beijing Monday at the age of 95.

He had been fighting lymphoma cancer and was hospitalized on October 10. His condition deteriorated and he passed away 5 am Monday.

Yang was born into a wealthy family in 1915 in Tianjin, a northern coastal city in China. He studied classics at Oxford, where he met Gladys Taylor who later became his wife. Yang and his wife returned to China in 1940 and they devoted their lives to introducing Chinese classics to the English-speaking world. The couple's cooperation yielded a remarkable number of quality translation works that made them household names, including classic novels like Dream of the Red Chamber and The Scholars and selected Lu Xun stories.

Yang also translated many foreign classics into Chinese including Homer's The Odyssey and Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion.

He received a lifetime Achievement Award in Translation from the Translators Association of China on September 17 this year.

His wife died in 1999.