Charles Patrick Fitzgerald - Emeritus Professor, sinologist

Charles Patrick FitzGerald, foundation ANU Professor of Far Eastern History and Chairman of the Centre of Oriental Studies, standing by a Chinese bookcase in his study, August 1964. [Courtesy ANU Archives]Professor FitzGerald was born in 1902 in London and was educated at Clifton College, Bristol. Family problems prevented him from accepting an offer to Lincoln College, Oxford and after a couple of years of office work in London he travelled to China. He lived in China for a number of years from 1923 until the outbreak of the second world war, working and researching. During this period he published his first three books on China. He tells the story of his early life in the book Why China?. In 1946 he returned to China as a representative of the British Council. The Australian National University invited him in 1950 to give a lecture tour in Australia and then asked him to accept the position of Reader in Oriental Studies. He arrived to take up this post in January 1951. The Readership was attached to the Department of Pacific History. He was offered a Professorship in 1953 and created the Department of Far Eastern History. After retiring from the university in 1967, he was awarded a D.Litt. based on examination of his published works and the title of Emeritus Professor. * This transcript has been edited by the interviewee