Lattimore, Richmond (Alexander) (1906-1984)

US classicist and poet. 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. Lattimore was born in Paotingfu, China, to Protestant missionary parents. He was educated at Dartmouth College in the USA and at Christ Church College, Oxford University, England, where he was a Rhodes scholar. He then studied for his PhD at the University of Illinois, graduating in 1935. He spent virtually his entire teaching career at Bryn Mawr College (1935-84), although he also held visiting appointments elsewhere in the USA, England, and Greece.