Edwin Cranston
Edwin Augustus Cranston | |
|---|---|
| Born | Edwin Cranston October 10, 1932 Pittsfield, Massachusetts, U.S. |
| Died | December 8, 2021 |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | University of Arizona University of California, Berkeley alumni Stanford University |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | Japanese literature |
Edwin Augustus Cranston (1932–2021) was a Professor of Japanese literature in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at Harvard University. His primary research interest was the classical literature of Japan, especially traditional poetic forms. He received the Japan–U.S. Friendship Commission Prize for the Translation of Japanese Literature in 1992 for his translation A Waka Anthology: The Gem-Glistening Cup. Vol I.[1]
History
[edit | edit source]Born on October 18, 1932,[2] Cranston was raised on a farm in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, until the age of ten, when he moved to Arizona with his parents. He graduated from Tucson High School and received his B.A. in English from the University of Arizona in Tucson in 1954. He served four years in the United States Navy where he was a journalist and served on the USS Princeton (CV-37).[3][4][5] He then began graduate study in 1958 at the University of California at Berkeley. In 1962 he transferred to Stanford University and in 1966 earned a Ph.D. there in Japanese literature. He entered the Harvard University faculty in 1965.
Contributions to Japan Studies
[edit | edit source]Cranston's career has centered around the translation and writing of poetry.
His dissertation, a translation of and commentary on the Izumi Shikibu diary, was published in 1969 in the Harvard-Yenching Monograph series as The Izumi Shikibu Diary: A Romance of the Heian Court and remains the authoritative English version.[6]
In 1993, Stanford University Press released the first of his proposed six-volume anthology of classical Japanese poetry. Titled A Waka Anthology, Volume One: The Gem-Glistening Cup, it was awarded a prize by the Japan-United States Friendship Commission[7] and followed in 2006 by A Waka Anthology, Volume Two: Grasses of Remembrance.[8] In 2009, he was awarded the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Neck Ribbon, by the government of Japan.[9]
Cranston has also translated the work of poet Mizuno Ruriko.
References
[edit | edit source]- ^ Lua error in Module:Citation/CS1/Configuration at line 2172: attempt to index field '?' (a nil value).
- ^ Edwin A. CRANSTON. Curriculum Vitae. online, accessed 15 May 2009. Archived 2009-04-06 at the Wayback Machine.
- ^ "Tucsonan Wed In Shinto Shrine", The Arizona Daily Star, volume 119, number 250, September 6, 1960, sec. C, p. 1.
- ^ "Cranston", Tucson Daily Citizen, volume 84, number 97, April 23, 1956, p. 28.
- ^ "Arizona Navy Men, Marines Take Part In SEATO Action", The Arizona Republic, Phoenix, Arizona, 66th year, number 205, p. 14.
- ^ Lua error in Module:Citation/CS1/Configuration at line 2172: attempt to index field '?' (a nil value).
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- ^ Lua error in Module:Citation/CS1/Configuration at line 2172: attempt to index field '?' (a nil value).
- ^ Harvard Gazette: Japanese government honors Professor Edwin A. Cranston. 14 May 2009.
External links
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- 1932 births
- 2021 deaths
- Writers from Pittsfield, Massachusetts
- University of Arizona alumni
- United States Navy sailors
- University of California, Berkeley alumni
- Stanford University alumni
- Tucson High School alumni
- Scholars of Japanese literature
- Japanese–English translators
- Harvard University faculty
- Writers from Arizona
- Recipients of the Order of the Rising Sun, 3rd class