James Legge (1815–1897) is primarily remembered today
as the heroic translator of the Chinese Classics
(1861–1872, 1893–1895). Allowing for changes in
stylistic taste, these massive translations are
still considered the “standard” versions of works
that “classically” and “scripturally” defined a
so-called Confucian “great tradition” in China.
Unfortunately a fixation on this singular scholarly
accomplishment has tended to brand Legge as merely a
great, though plodding, translator – someone
primarily remarkable for his indefatigable habits of
working. Certainly it was often felt that his
contributions to the emergent Sinological
Orientalism of the nineteenth century in no way
matched the achievements of the great Parisian
academicians (Abel Rémusat and Stanislas Julien);
nor was he seen as a particularly significant figure
in any other aspect of British tradition in the
nineteenth century. Even worse, and seeming to make
him a fit candidate for Lytton Strachey's debunking
criticism of all insufferably righteous Victorian
paragons of virtue, was that his identity as a
sinologist and scholar was forever tainted by his
original vocation as a Congregationalist missionary
agent for the London Missionary Society.