Thomas Okey

Thomas Okey (1852-1935) came from a poor East End family of hereditary basket makers and was apprenticed to the trade at thirteen, following it for more than thirty years. Largely self-taught, he studied French, German, and Italian over breakfast before a 6 a.m. start and at evening classes, and met Italian properly through the extension lectures at Toynbee Hall. He went on to translate Dante's Purgatorio and the Little Flowers of St Francis, and to write on the art and topography of Italian and French towns. In 1919 he was appointed the first Serena Professor of Italian at Cambridge, and became a Fellow of Gonville and Caius College the year after.