1919 – 1991
Angus Charles Graham (1919–1991) was a British sinologist and philosopher at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, widely regarded as one of the foremost Western interpreters of classical Chinese philosophy. He brought rigorous philological and philosophical analysis to texts spanning Daoism, Mohism, and Confucianism, significantly reshaping how these traditions are understood in the West.
Authored Disputers of the Tao (1989), a landmark synthetic study of classical Chinese philosophical debate
Produced groundbreaking translations and analyses of the Zhuangzi and Liezi texts
Reconstructed and translated Later Mohist logic, ethics, and science (1978), recovering a largely neglected tradition
Developed influential interpretive frameworks for understanding Mencius and the nature/xing debate in early Confucianism
Advanced the field of comparative philosophy by applying Western analytic methods to classical Chinese texts without distortion