author
William Young
1809–1888
Best known for bringing the songs of Pierre-Jean de Béranger into English verse, this 19th-century writer also turned his eye to the New York art world in an illustrated book on the city’s picture galleries. His surviving work suggests a literary career built around translation, description, and cultural commentary.
1 Audiobook
Mathieu Ropars: et cetera
by William Young
About the author
William Young was a 19th-century writer and translator whose dates are commonly given as 1809–1888. The clearest records found for him connect him with Béranger: two hundred of his lyrical poems, done into English verse, which shows him working as an English-language interpreter of the celebrated French songwriter Pierre-Jean de Béranger.
Young also appeared as the credited selector and describer for Lights and Shadows of New York Picture Galleries (1864), a work illustrated with photographs by A. A. Turner. That points to a broader interest in the arts beyond poetry alone: he was not just translating literature, but also writing for readers curious about painting, exhibition culture, and the visual life of New York.
Detailed biographical information about his personal life was not readily confirmed in the sources consulted, so the picture that emerges is necessarily limited. Even so, his known books present him as a cultivated Victorian-era man of letters whose work helped English-speaking readers approach both French popular poetry and American art collections.