Background
Samuels was born 14 September 1920 in London, the son of Harry Samuels Karlin, and Céline Aronowitz: his sister was actress Miriam Karlin (1925–2011).
Samuels was born 14 September 1920 in London, the son of Harry Samuels Karlin, and Céline Aronowitz: his sister was actress Miriam Karlin (1925–2011).
He studied at Street Paul"s school, and Balliol College, Oxford, initially to study classics, but graduating with first-class honours in English in 1947, after wartime service with the Air Ministry.
His academic career began with a research fellowship at the University of Birmingham followed by a lectureship at Edinburgh University. He became Professor of English Language at Glasgow University in 1959, staying until his retirement in 1990. After this academic retirement he continued to work, especially on the Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, a project he had begun in 1965, and which was eventually published in October 2009.