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Leon Uris

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Leon Uris
Uris in 1989
Uris in 1989
Born(1924-08-03)August 3, 1924
Baltimore, Maryland,U.S.
DiedJune 21, 2003(2003-06-21)(aged 78)
Shelter Island, New York,U.S.
Resting placeQuantico National Cemetery
OccupationAuthor
GenreHistorical fiction
Notable worksExodus(1958)
Mila 18(1961)
QB VII(1970)
Spouse
Betty Beck
​
​
(m.1945;div.1968)​
Marjorie Edwards
​
​
(m.1968; died 1969)​
Jill Peabody
​
​
(m.1970;div.1988)​
Children5

Leon Marcus Uris(August 3, 1924 – June 21, 2003) was an American author of historical fiction who wrote many bestselling books, includingExodus(published in 1958) andTrinity(published in 1976).[1]

Life and career[edit]

Uris was born inBaltimore, Maryland,the son ofJewish Americanparents Wolf William and Anna (née Blumberg) Uris. His father, aPolish-born immigrant, was apaperhanger,then a storekeeper. His mother was first-generationRussian American.[2]William spent a year inPalestineafterWorld War Ibefore entering the United States. He derived his last name from Yerushalmi, meaning "man ofJerusalem".(His brother Aron, Leon's uncle, took the name Yerushalmi.)" He was basically a failure ", Uris later said of his father." I think his personality was formed by the harsh realities of being aJew inCzarist Russia.I think failure formed his character, made him bitter. "[3]

Uris in Israel in the 1950s
Leon Uris during a 1967 visit to Israel
Leon Uris during a 1967 visit to Israel

At age six, Uris reportedly wrote an operetta inspired by the death of his dog. He attended schools inNorfolk,Virginia,and Baltimore, but never graduated from high school, and failed English three times. When he was 17 and in his senior year of high school, the Japanese attackedPearl Harborand he enlisted in theUnited States Marine Corps.He served in theSouth Pacificwith the2nd Battalion, 6th Marines Regiment,where he was stationed in New Zealand, and fought as a radioman in combat onGuadalcanalandTarawa[4]from 1942 through 1944. He was sent to the US after suffering fromdengue fever,malariaand a recurrence ofasthmathat made him miss the devastation of his battalion at theBattle of Saipan,which was featured inBattle Cry.[5]While recuperating frommalariain San Francisco, he met Betty Beck, aMarinesergeant; they married in 1945.

Released from service he worked for a newspaper, and wrote in his spare time.Esquiremagazine bought an article in 1950, and he began to devote himself to writing more seriously. Drawing on his experiences in Guadalcanal and Tarawa, he produced the best-sellingBattle Cry,a novel depicting the toughness and courage of U.S. Marines in the Pacific. He then went toWarner Brothersin Hollywood helping to write theeponymous moviewhich was extremely popular with the public, but not the critics.[4]He went on to writeThe Angry Hills,a novel set in war-time Greece.

His best-known work may beExodus,which was published in 1958. Most sources indicate that Uris, motivated by an intense interest in Israel, financed his research for the novel by selling the film rights in advance toMGMand by writing newspaper articles about theSinai campaign,[6][7][8]which is said to have involved two years of research, and thousands of interviews.[a][10]It was a worldwide best-seller, translated into a dozen languages, and was made into afeature filmin 1960, starringPaul Newman,directed byOtto Preminger,as well as into a short-lived Broadway musical,Ari,in 1971, for which Uris wrote the book and lyrics.[11]

Exodusillustrated the history of Palestine from the late 19th century through the founding of the state ofIsraelin 1948.[12][13][14]Exoduswas also extraordinarily influential among RussianRefuseniks.Two typewritten Russian translations were circulated assamizdat– illegal, hand-copied works that were passed secretly from hand to hand – and the story was retold orally in the prison camps, with the oral version eventually being written in a notebook which was passed from one generation of prisoners to the next.[15]

Uris's 1967 novelTopazwasadapted for the screenand directed byAlfred Hitchcockin 1969.[16]His subsequent works includedMila 18,about theWarsaw ghettouprising;Armageddon: A Novel of Berlin,a chronicle which ends with the lifting of the Berlin Blockade in 1949;Trinity,aboutIrish nationalism,and the sequel,Redemption,covering the early 20th century andWorld War I.

QB VII,about the role of a Polish doctor in a Germanconcentration camp,is a dramatic four-part courtroom novel published in 1970, highlighting the events leading to a libel trial in the United Kingdom. It is loosely based on a court case for defamation (Dering v Uris) that arose from Uris's earlier best-selling novelExodus,and was Uris's second consecutive #1New York TimesBest Seller.The Hajwas set in the history of the Middle East. He also wrote the screenplays forBattle CryandGunfight at the O.K. Corral.

Personal life[edit]

Uris was married three times. His first wife was Betty Beck, whom he married in 1945. They had three children before divorcing in 1968. He then married Marjorie Edwards in 1968, who committed suicide by gunshot the following year.[17][18]

His third and last wife was photographer Jill Peabody, daughter of Frances Gleason and Alfred Peabody of Boston.[19]They had two children. They married in 1970, when Jill was 22 years old and he was 45.[20][21]He and wife Jill worked together on his bookIreland: A Terrible Beauty,for which she provided illustrations and onJerusalem: A Song of Songs.[18][22]They divorced in 1988, and soon after Uris settled in New York City.[23]

Death[edit]

Leon Uris died ofkidney failureat hisLong Islandhome onShelter Islandin 2003, aged 78.[4]His papers can be found at theHarry Ransom Center,University of Texasin Austin, where theUniversity of Texas Presspublished a literary biography about him.[24]The collection includes all of Uris's novels, with the exception ofThe HajandMitla Pass,as well as manuscripts for the screenplay,Gunfight at the O.K. Corral.[16]He was survived by his five children and two grandchildren.[23]

Selected titles[edit]

See also[edit]

Explanatory notes[edit]

  1. ^Thirty years after the publication ofExodus,public relations man Edward Gottlieb claimed to have commissioned the novel to make the American public sympathetic toward Israel, however research byMartin Kramer,a Middle East scholar, found no evidence that Gottlieb's claim was true.[9]

References[edit]

  1. ^"Author Leon Uris Dies at 78",The Elyria (Ohio) Chronicle Telegram,June 25, 2003, p. A8.
  2. ^Congressional Record, p. 16911
  3. ^Hillel Italie AP national (June 2003)."Leon Uris, author of 'Exodus', novel of founding of Israel, and other"(news).Deseret News.RetrievedAugust 11,2010.
  4. ^abc"Movies".The New York Times.RetrievedFebruary 10,2018– via NYTimes.com.
  5. ^Nadel, Ira B.Leon Uris: Life of a Best SellerUniversity of Texas Press, September 24, 2010
  6. ^Leon Uris, 78, Who Wrote Sweeping Novels Like "Exodus,"DiesArchivedJanuary 1, 2010, at theWayback MachineNew York Times– June 25, 2003
  7. ^Chris Fujiwara (2009).The World and Its Double: The Life and Work of Otto Preminger.Faber & Faber. p. 255.ISBN978-0-86547-995-1.[1]
  8. ^Patricia Erens (March 3, 2009).The Jew in American Cinema.Indiana University Press, 1988. p. 217.ISBN978-0-86547-995-1.[2]
  9. ^Kramer, Martin (2016).The War on Error: Israel, Islam, and the Middle East; The Exodus Conspiracy(PDF).New Brunswick, NJ: Routledge. pp. 245–252.ISBN978-1412864992.
  10. ^Joel Shatzky; Michael Taub (1994).Contemporary Jewish-American Novelists: A Bio-Critical Sourcebook.Greenwood Press. p.440.ISBN0-313-29462-3.
  11. ^"Ari".Internet Broadway Database.RetrievedDecember 1,2018.
  12. ^Burston, Bradley (November 9, 2012)."The 'Exodus' Effect: The Monumentally Fictional Israel That Remade American Jewry".Haaretz.RetrievedFebruary 10,2018.
  13. ^Homberger, Eric (June 25, 2003)."Obituary: Leon Uris".The Guardian.RetrievedFebruary 10,2018.
  14. ^"Exodus, myth and malpractice – Martin Kramer on the Middle East".martinkramer.org.October 11, 2011.RetrievedFebruary 10,2018.
  15. ^Beckerman, Gal, When They Come for Us We'll Be Gone, pp. 27-29
  16. ^abWillmann, Travis."Leon Uris's Exodus".Obituary.Fall 2003 Newsletter.Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin. Archived fromthe originalon May 1, 2009.RetrievedJanuary 16,2010.
  17. ^"Milestones: Feb. 28, 1969".Time magazine.February 28, 1969. Archived fromthe originalon December 14, 2008.RetrievedJanuary 3,2011.Marjorie Uris, 26, former New York fashion model who married Author Leon Uris (Exodus, Topaz) six months ago; apparently by her own hand (.38-cal. revolver); in Aspen, Colo.
  18. ^abBlagden, Nellie (January 12, 1976)."To Jill and Leon Uris, 'Our Marriage Is Like the Melding of Two Generations'".People.RetrievedDecember 1,2018.
  19. ^"Jill Peabody Married Here To Leon Uris".The New York Times.February 16, 1970. p. 41.RetrievedDecember 1,2018.
  20. ^Bernstein, Adam (June 25, 2003)."Writer Leon Uris Dies".The Washington Post.RetrievedDecember 1,2018.
  21. ^"Leon Uris (1924–2003)".Jewish Virtual Library.RetrievedDecember 1,2018.
  22. ^Gascoigne, Bamber; Liukkonen, Petri."Leon (Marcus) Uris )1924–2003)".Authors Calendar: Books and Writers.RetrievedDecember 1,2018.
  23. ^abHarrell, Eben (June 24, 2003)."Author Leon Uris dies".Aspen Times.RetrievedDecember 1,2018.
  24. ^Nadel, Ira B. (October 2010).Leon Uris: Life of a Best Seller(First ed.). Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.ISBN978-0-292-70935-5.Archived fromthe originalon June 12, 2020.RetrievedJune 12,2020.

Further reading[edit]

  • Ira Nadel.Leon Uris: Life of a Best Seller(University of Texas Press; 2010) 376 pages; scholarly biography

External links[edit]

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Leon_Uris&oldid=1229293788"