Edwin Arnold

Indian Poetry (Dodo Press) Edwin Arnold

Sir Edwin Arnold, CSI, CIE (1832-1904), was an English poet and journalist, who is best known for his work, The Light of Asia (1879). In 1856, he went to India as principal of the Government Sanskrit College at Poona, a post which he held for seven years, which includes a period during the mutiny of 1857, when he was able to render services for which he was publicly thanked by Lord Elphinstone in the Bombay council. Here he received the bias towards, and gathered material for, his future works. Returning to England in 1861 he worked as a journalist on the staff of The Daily Telegraph, a newspaper with which he continued to be associated as editor for more than forty years, and later became its editor-in-chief. His other works include: Indian Song of Songs (1875), Pearls of the Faith (1883), The Song Celestial (1885), With Sadi in the Garden (1888), Tiphar's Wife (1892) and Adzuma; or, The Japanese Wife (1893). In his later years Arnold resided for some time in Japan, and his third wife was Japanese. In Seas and Lands (1891) and Japonica (1892) he gives an interesting study of Japanese life.