Gu Yanwu
Wilhelm pursued graduate study in Chinese at the University of Berlin. He wrote a dissertation on Ming dynasty scholar Gu Yanwu, receiving a doctorate in 1932. Wilhelm then returned to China, where he lived and worked in Beijing until 1948. He taught German language and literature at Peking University and produced the "Deutsch-Chinesische Wörterbuch", a well-known German-Chinese dictionary. During the early 1940s, Wilhelm would frequently give lectures on Chinese history and thought to the German-speaking community in Beijing. In 1944, Wilhelm published a set of lectures on the ancient Chinese classic "Yi Jing" entitled "Die Wandlung: Acht Vorträge zum I-Ging" – subsequently translated into English as "Change: Eight Lectures on the" I Ching – which have become the most widely read introduction to the "Yi Jing" in a Western language.