Cecil Grayson
Cecil Grayson, CBE, FBA (5 February 1920 – 29 April 1998) was an English Italian studies scholar. He was the Serena Professor of Italian Studies at the University of Oxford from 1958 to 1987. Life Career Born on 5 February 1920, Grayson came from a working-class family; his father, a boilermaker, died following an accident when Grayson was six years old, and his mother used her income as a seamstress to pay for his and his brother Denis's education. He attended Batley Grammar School and St Edmund Hall, Oxford; he served in the Army in the Second World War, rising to the rank of Major. Graduating in modern languages in 1947, he was appointed a university lecturer in Italian at the University of Oxford the following year, and also held lectureships at St Edmund Hall and New College, Oxford. From 1958 to 1987, he was the Serena Professor of Italian Studies at Oxford and a fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford. He also held visiting professorships or fellowships at foreign universities, including Yale University, the University of California at Berkeley, UCLA, New York University, the University of Cape Town and the University of Western Australia. He served as president of the