Jopson , Norman Brooke , 1890-1969 , philologist

Norman Brooke Jopson: born Leeds, 1890; educated at Cambridge University, where he obtained a first-class degree in French and German and Vienna University, where he studied Slavic languages. He then spent some time in Prague learning Czech and was in St Petersburg learning Russian when the First World War began. On returning to Britain, Jopson was recruited by the Government for work in Postal Censorship. He spent the war in this and other Government departments. This experience allowed him to widen his knowledge of languages. After the war he joined the Foreign Office. In 1922 he left Government service to become Reader in Comparative Philology at SSEES. He left SSEES in 1937 to take up an appointment as the first holder of the Professorship in Comparative Philology at Cambridge. In 1939 Jopson was recalled by the Government to work in Postal Censorship again. He became head of the Uncommon Languages Division. In 1945 he returned to Cambridge where he remained for the rest of his life. After his retirement in 1955 he gave a number of overseas lectures. Jopson published little, concentrating instead on learning languages and teaching.