A former Greenhill scholar who went on to a distinguished academic career has died at the age of 89. He was Haydn Mason, whose final position was Professor of French at Bristol University.

Haydn was the elder son of the late Mr. and Mrs. Herbert Mason of New Hedges.

Born near Saundersfoot, he was educated at Pentlepoir primary school and Greenhill before going on to the then University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, where he graduated in 1949 with first-class honours in French.

Following this, on the nomination of the Tenby Rotary Club he was chosen as a Rotary Foundation Fellow and spent a year in the United States studying for a master’s degree and serving as an unofficial “ambassador” for Wales.

Reporting reactions to talks he gave about Wales to American Rotarians, the Tenby Observer quoted a letter from the secretary of one American club to his Tenby counterpart saying: “We want you to know that Haydn did an outstanding job…We feel that you made an excellent choice when you selected [him] to become a Rotary Fellow”. The TO said reports from the USA showed he was doing “fine work … in fostering Anglo-American relations”.

During his career as a university teacher Haydn held appointments at no fewer than eight institutions in three countries, including one of America’s leading universities, Princeton, and the Sorbonne in Paris.

Before his appointment at Bristol he had been Professor of French at the University of East Anglia. In the course of his career he also spent three years at Jesus College, Oxford, working for a doctorate, and delivered papers and lectures at scholarly gatherings in many parts of the world, ranging from the US and Canada to Japan and Pakistan

Haydn’s specialist area was 18th-century France and the French Enlightenment, with a particular interest in the author and philosopher Voltaire.

With numerous publications about this writer to his credit, including a biography, he was for nearly two decades editor of a leading international journal on 18th-century studies.

He was also, for three years, general editor of the Complete Works of Voltaire published by Oxford University.

Among other distinctions, in recognition of his contribution to French scholarship Haydn was made an Officier dans l’Ordre des Palmes Académiques in 1985 and was later awarded the Silver Medal of the City of Paris.

In 2012 he was elected a Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales, an honour of which he was especially proud.