27 Facts About Laurence Binyon

Robert Laurence Binyon, CH was an English poet, dramatist and art scholar.

Laurence Binyon studied at St Paul's School, London and at Trinity College, Oxford, where he won the Newdigate Prize for poetry in 1891.

Laurence Binyon worked for the British Museum from 1893 until his retirement in 1933.

Laurence Binyon wrote about these experiences in For Dauntless France.

Laurence Binyon was appointed Norton Professor of Poetry at Harvard University in 1933.

Laurence Binyon's parents were Frederick Binyon, a clergyman of the Church of England, and Mary Dockray.

Immediately after graduating in 1893, Laurence Binyon started working for the Department of Printed Books of the British Museum, writing catalogues for the museum and art monographs for himself.

In that same year, Laurence Binyon moved into the Museum's Department of Prints and Drawings, under Campbell Dodgson.

In 1909, Laurence Binyon became its Assistant Keeper, and in 1913, he was made the Keeper of the new Sub-Department of Oriental Prints and Drawings.

Many of Laurence Binyon's books produced at the museum were influenced by his own sensibilities as a poet although some were works of plain scholarship, such as his four-volume catalogue of all of the museum's English drawings and his seminal catalogue of Chinese and Japanese prints.

In 1915, despite being too old to enlist in the armed forces, Laurence Binyon volunteered at a British hospital for French soldiers, Hopital Temporaire d'Arc-en-Barrois, Haute-Marne, France, working briefly as a hospital orderly.

Laurence Binyon returned in the summer of 1916 and took care of soldiers taken in from the Verdun battlefield.

Laurence Binyon wrote about his experiences in For Dauntless France and his poems, "Fetching the Wounded" and "The Distant Guns", were inspired by his hospital service in Arc-en-Barrois.

In 1932, Laurence Binyon rose to be the Keeper of the Prints and Drawings Department, but in 1933, he retired from the British Museum.

Laurence Binyon went to live in the country at Westridge Green, near Streatley, Berkshire, where his daughters came to live during the Second World War, and he continued to write poetry.

Laurence Binyon delivered a series of lectures on The Spirit of Man in Asian Art, which were published in 1935.

Laurence Binyon worked there until he was forced to leave, narrowly escaping the German invasion of Greece in April 1941.

Laurence Binyon had been friends with Pound since around 1909, and in the 1930s, the two became especially close; Pound affectionately called him "BinBin" and assisted Laurence Binyon with his translation of Dante.

Between 1933 and 1943, Laurence Binyon published his acclaimed translation of Dante's Divine Comedy in an English version of terza rima, made with some editorial assistance from Ezra Pound.

Laurence Binyon dedicated twenty years to his translation and finished it shortly before his death.

Laurence Binyon significantly revised his translation of all three parts for the project, and the volume went through three major editions and eight printings before it was replaced by the Mark Musa translation in 1981.

At his death, Laurence Binyon was working on a major three-part Arthurian trilogy, the first part of which was published after his death as The Madness of Merlin.

Laurence Binyon died in Dunedin Nursing Home, Bath Road, Reading, on 10 March 1943, aged 73, after an operation.

On 11 November 1985, Laurence Binyon was among 16 Great War poets commemorated on a slate stone unveiled in Westminster Abbey's Poets' Corner.

Helen Laurence Binyon studied with Paul Nash and Eric Ravilious, illustrating many books for the Oxford University Press, and was a marionettist.

Laurence Binyon later taught puppetry and published Puppetry Today and Professional Puppetry in England.

Margaret Laurence Binyon wrote children's books, which were illustrated by Helen.