Sir Edwin Arnold

Sir Edwin Arnold (1832-1904) was an English poet, journalist, and scholar of Eastern languages. He spent several years in India as principal of Deccan College in Poona before returning to London, where he became a lead editor of the Daily Telegraph. He is best remembered for The Light of Asia (1879), a narrative poem on the life of the Buddha that became a Victorian bestseller, and much of his writing drew on the religion and literature of Asia, which he translated and adapted for English readers.