GOPAL SUKHU

SUKHU--Gopal. Gopal Sukhu, a professor of classical Chinese poetry and Asian comparative literature and religions at Queens College, CUNY, died of sudden heart failure in Manhattan on August 21, 2024. Of Indo-Trinidadian and Black American heritage, he was born in Boston in 1949 to George Sukhu and Joan DaLuz, who divorced not long after his birth. He was raised by a surrogate grandmother and her partner, a merchant marine who introduced him to Chinese philosophy. He attended Boston Latin School, working odd jobs to pay for tutoring in Chinese, Sanskrit, guitar, and drawing classes. He received a B.A. from Yale in 1972, and continued his studies in Taipei and Wuhan before completing his PhD in classical Chinese literature at Columbia in 1992. A gifted classical guitarist and bon vivant, he cultivated deep and lasting friendships in Sinology and beyond. His publications include a pathbreaking interpretation of The Songs of Chu, the forthcoming The Book of Songs, both for Columbia University Press, and The Shaman and the Heresiarch, published by SUNY Press. He is survived by his wife, Hanna Kim, a professor of anthropology, and his daughter Uma, a student at Yale. He is also survived by his sisters, Radha Sukhu and Kushelia Sukhu, and six half-siblings.