Sir Richard Winn Livingstone

Sir Richard Winn Livingstone (born Jan. 23, 1880, Liverpool—died Dec. 26, 1960, Oxford) was a classical scholar and university administrator who championed the classical liberal arts curriculum.

Livingstone’s parents were an Anglican vicar and the daughter of an Irish baron, and he was educated at Winchester and then New College at Oxford, where he took honours in Latin verse and other subjects. He stayed at Oxford until 1924 as a fellow, tutor, and librarian of Corpus Christi College. During these years he also served (1920) on the prime minister’s committee on the classics and was co-editor (1920–22) of the Classical Review.

In 1924 Livingstone assumed the position of vice chancellor at Queen’s University in Belfast. Under his administration, which lasted until 1933, he greatly enhanced the university’s stature and its financial support. In 1931 he was knighted.

From 1933 to the end of his academic career, Livingstone was back at Oxford. As president of Corpus Christi College he instituted summer schools for colonial administrators and expanded educational opportunities for adults. He also played a major role in establishing a residential college for women. He was vice chancellor from 1944 to 1947.

Livingstone retired from academic life in 1950 and filled the final decade of his life with writing and lecturing. He vigorously defended the value of a liberal arts education, with particular emphasis on the classics.

His lifelong commitment to classical literature was apparent in the many books he wrote and edited: The Greek Genius and its Meaning to Us (1912), A Defence of Classical Education (1916), The Legacy of Greece (1921), The Pageant of Greece (1923), The Mission of Greece (1928), The Future in Education (1941), Portrait of Socrates (1938), and The Rainbow Bridge (1959).