William Sotheby

William Sotheby FRS (9 November 1757 – 30 December 1833) was an English poet and translator. He was born into a wealthy London family, the son of Col. William and Elizabeth (née Sloan) Sotheby, and was educated at Harrow School and the Military Academy, Angers, France before joining the army at 17, where he served for six years until 1780.

He then published a few dramas and books of poems that had limited success; his reputation rests upon his translations of the Oberon of Christoph Martin Wieland, the Georgics of Virgil, and the Iliad and Odyssey by Homer. The last two were begun when he was over 70, but he lived to complete them. His Georgics in particular advanced his reputation and was praised in the Edinburgh Review as, if not "the most perfect translation of a classic poet now extant in our language, it is assuredly capable of being advanced to that high distinction."

He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in November 1794.

Sotheby died in London in 1833 and was buried in Hackney churchyard. Joanna Baillie, a close friend of Sotheby's for "nearly thirty years" mourned his passing: "A more generous, high-minded, amiable man never lived, and this, taken together with his great talents & acquirements, makes a Character which cannot be replaced."

In 1780 he married Mary née Isted and they had seven children, among them:

• Lt-Col. William Sotheby (c. 1785–1815)
• Rear-Adm. Charles Sotheby (c. 1785–1854)
• George Sotheby EICo (1787–1817) died at Nagpur in the Maharatta war
• Hans Sotheby EICo (c. 1780–1827)
• Col. Frederick Sotheby CB (c. 1780–1870)