John Henry Wright

John Henry Wright
John Henry Wright
Born(1852-02-04)February 4, 1852
DiedNovember 25, 1908(1908-11-25) (aged 56)
NationalityAmerican
Alma materDartmouth College
Leipzig University
Case Western Reserve University
Occupation(s)Educator, classical scholar, author
Years active1873—1908
Employer(s)Dartmouth College
Ohio State University
Harvard University
Organization(s)American Philological Association
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Notable work"Masterpieces of Greek literature" (1902)
"A History of All Nations from the Earliest Times" (24 volumes, 1905)
"The Origin of Plato's Cave" (1906)
SpouseMary Tappan Wright
ChildrenElizabeth Tappan Wright, Austin Tappan Wright, John Kirtland Wright
Parent(s)Austin Hazen Wright, Catherine Myers Wright
Signature

John Henry Wright (February 4, 1852 – November 25, 1908)[1] was an American classical scholar born at Urumiah (Rezaieh), Persia.[2] He earned his Bachelors (1873) and Masters (1876) at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire. After junior appointments (first in Ohio and then at Dartmouth) in 1886 he joined Johns Hopkins as a professor of classical philology. In 1887, he became a professor of Greek at Harvard, where, from 1895 to 1908, he was also Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.

Some of Wright's most notable works are A History of All Nations from the Earliest Times (1905), a 24–volume history of the world; the translations Masterpieces of Greek literature (1902); and The Origin of Plato's Cave (1906). He was active in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Philological Association, and similar organizations. From 1889 to 1906 he co-edited the Classical Review (later Classical Quarterly) and from 1897 to 1906 he was chief editor of the American Journal of Archaeology.

In 1893 Wright met the Indian Hindu monk Swami Vivekananda, who greatly influenced him;[3] Wright described Vivekananda as "more learned than all our learned professors put together."[4]

Wright received LL.D.s from Dartmouth and Case Western Reserve University in 1901. He died on 25 November 1908 in Cambridge, Massachusetts.[2]

  1. ^ Briggs 1994, p. 729
  2. ^ a b Gulick, Charles Burton (1916). "John Henry Wright (1852-1908)". Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. 51 (14): 930–932. JSTOR 20025660.
  3. ^ "Chronology of Swami Vivekananda in the West" (PDF). Vedanta Society. Archived from the original (PDF) on November 4, 2013. Retrieved September 15, 2013.
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference Bhuyan 2003 p16 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).