Wayne C Paton AB MA
We are very sorry to let members know that Mr Wayne Paton, retired Lecturer in the School of English, died on 1 January 2014.
Wayne Paton was born in 1936. He graduated in Latin cum laude from Harvard in 1956 and went on to complete an MA in English at the University of Columbia. Having moved to London to pursue research on Henry James, he was appointed Assistant Lecturer in the then Department of English Literature at Leeds in 1963. He was promoted to Lecturer in 1965. During the course of his lengthy career in the University, Wayne Paton taught with enthusiasm across a number of areas of literature, drawing on his background in classical literature and his wide comparative knowledge of English, American and French literature. Fluent in French, he also read Italian, German and Russian. During his final decade of teaching, he concentrated on American Literature and worked on Henry James and his Russian contemporaries. Wayne particularly enjoyed his MA teaching in this field and, over the years, befriended many graduate students, especially ones from overseas, and they often remained in contact with him after completing their studies at Leeds.
Wayne Paton served for several years on the Standing Committee on the Library and associated sub-committees. In 1996, he was appointed to the office of Assistant Sub-Dean of the Faculties of Arts, Economic and Social Studies and Law. He retired in 1998, retaining an association with the School of English as a Senior Fellow for the following two years.
Posted in: Obituaries