Ralph Russell

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Ralph Russell (born May 21, 1918 in Homerton near London , † September 14, 2008 ) was an English orientalist and linguist who devoted himself to the research and dissemination of the Urdu language and literature of India and Pakistan and was the leading during his lifetime Representative of his field was considered.

life and work

Russell grew up in Loughton , Essex , near London. A rebellious spirit, he soon ran into conflict with his school and joined the British Communist Party at the age of 16 . Their concerns - according to his words "atheistic humanism, pacifism, socialism and communism" - he represented during his student years in Cambridge (1937-1940) and as a soldier (since 1940) and officer in the Indian Army (1942-1945), where he politically influenced his sepoy soldiers in their national language. The Pashtun accent with which his Urdu was colored also came from his time as a soldier .

After the Second World War, Russell studied at the renowned School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London (since 1946) and received a scholarship for a stay in India and Pakistan from 1949 to 1950, especially at the Aligarh Muslim University .

Russel was a member of SOAS from 1949 to 1981 and from 1950 to his retirement at the same time Dean of the Department of Urdu. He published numerous books, articles and essays - both in Urdu and English -, developed teaching materials and a popular language teaching method of everyday Urdu for children and adults that is still used today. His translations, especially by the Indian Urdu poet Mirza Ghalib , opened the Urdu poetry and literary tradition to a wide readership.

Even after his retirement, Russell continued to work as a prolific translator, editor and author. In Pakistan he was therefore considered the "Baba-i-Urdu of England" ("English father of Urdu") and received the Pakistani order Sitara-i-Imtiaz ("Star of Excellence"), the third highest order in the country, in recognition of his Services to language and literature.

His relationship with SOAS, his academic home base, was "although always friendly in tone, yet characterized by sharp criticism in the matter" and basically since 1968 "a constant battle with the establishment" of the institution.

The marriage (1948–1989; divorce after 41 years of marriage) with Molly Musgrove had a daughter Sarah and a son Ian, who now also teaches Urdu.

Fonts

Urdu

  • Three Mughal Poets , together with Kurshidul Islam, 1968 (new edition 1993)
  • Urdu in Britain (as editor), 1982
  • The pursuit of Urdu literature: a select history , 1992
  • An Anthology of Urdu Literature , 1999
  • How not to write the history of Urdu literature and other essays on Urdu and Islam , 1999

Mirza Ghalib

  • Ghalib, life and letters , 1969 (new edition 1994)
  • Ghalib: The Poet and his Age (Ed) , 1997
  • Selections from the Persian Ghazals of Ghalib with Translations , 1997
  • The Famous Ghalib , 2000
  • The Seeing Eye: Selection from the Urdu and Persian Ghazals of Ghalib , 2003
  • The Oxford India Ghalib: Life, Letters and Ghazals , 2003

Urdu language course

  • New course in Urdu and spoken Hindi for learners in Britain , 1997

Autobiography

  • Findings, keepings: Life, Communism and everything , 2001
  • Losses, Gains , posthumously 2010

Web links

  • www.ralphrussel.co.uk

Remarks

  1. ↑ http://www.ralphrussell.co.uk
  2. ↑ http://www.ralphrussell.co.uk/autobiography.html ; http://www.ralphrussell.co.uk/about.html
  3. ↑ The German Indologist Wilhelm Rau (1922–1999) also owed part of his language skills to his time as a soldier, albeit on the other hand, as an interpreter for the Indian Legion .
  4. ↑ So the Pakistani columnist and BBC Urdu employee Asif Jillani in https://www.dawn.com/news/321417/baba-i-urdu-of-england-mourned.html
  5. ↑ https://www.dawn.com/news/321417/baba-i-urdu-of-england-mourned.html
  6. ↑ http://www.ralphrussell.co.uk/soas.html ; See also his critical work Oriental Despotism: A Report on the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (1973), which was reprinted by SOAS itself in 2007.
  7. ↑ Russell, Losses Gains, chap. 7, p. 69 ff., Chap. 13, p. 125 ff., Conclusion p. 350.
personal data
SURNAME Russell, Ralph
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English orientalist and linguist
DATE OF BIRTH May 21, 1918
PLACE OF BIRTH Homerton near London
DATE OF DEATH September 14, 2008