John Payne (poet)

For other people with the same name, see John Payne.

John Payne
A photograph of John Payne, 1904
A photograph of John Payne, 1904
Born23 August 1842
Bloomsbury, London, England
Died11 February 1916 (aged 73)
South Kensington, London, England
OccupationPoet, translator, solicitor

John Payne (23 August 1842 – 11 February 1916[1]) was an English poet and translator. Initially he pursued a legal career and had associated with Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Later he became involved with limited edition publishing and the Villon Society.

He is now best known for his translations of Boccaccio's Decameron,[2] The Arabian Nights and the Diwan Hafez.

After completing his translation of Omar Khayyam, Payne returned to the rendition of Hafez that was eventually published in 3 volumes. in 1901. Payne argues that Hafez takes the "whole sweep of human experience and irradiates all things with his sun-gold and his wisdom".[3]

Payne once said that Hafez, Dante and Shakespeare were the three greatest poets of the world.[1]

  1. ^ a b Wright, Thomas (1919), The Life of John Payne, T. Fisher Unwin, retrieved 30 July 2011
  2. ^ "Review of The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio translated by John Payne, illustrated by Louis Chalon, 1893 ..." The Quarterly Review. 188: 473–493. October 1898.
  3. ^ "The John Payne Society". johnpaynesociety.org. Retrieved 25 March 2016.