Lattimore, Richmond

Lattimore, Richmond (Alexander) (1906–84) classicist, poet; born in Paotingfu, China (to Protestant missionary parents). He was educated at Dartmouth (B.A. 1926), Christ Church, Oxford (where he was a Rhodes scholar), and the University of Illinois (Ph.D. 1935). He spent virtually his entire teaching career at Bryn Mawr (1935–84), although he held visiting appointments in the United States, England, and Greece. His many translations from Greek into English, notably Pindar (1947) and the Iliad (1951), made him the best-known and most highly regarded translator of his day. With David Greene, he edited the translation of The Complete Greek Tragedies (1967–68). In 1962 he won the Bollingen Translation Prize for his translation of Aristophanes's Frogs, and in 1984 he won the award of the American Academy of Poets.