|
Leon Marcus Uris (August 3, 1924 – June 21, 2003) was an United States Marine and author, known for his historical fiction and the deep research that went into his novels. His two bestselling books were ''Exodus'' (published in 1958) and ''Trinity'' (published in 1976).〔"Author Leon Uris Dies at 78", ''The Elyria (Ohio) Chronicle Telegram'', June 25, 2003, p. A8.〕 ==Life and career== Uris was born in Baltimore, Maryland, the son of Jewish American parents Wolf William and Anna (Blumberg) Uris. His father, a Polish-born immigrant, was a paperhanger, then a storekeeper. His mother was first-generation Russian American.〔Congressional Record, p. 16911〕 William spent a year in Palestine after World War I before entering the United States. He derived his surname from Yerushalmi, meaning "man of Jerusalem". (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 a Jew in Czarist Russia. I think failure formed his character, made him bitter." At age six, Uris reportedly wrote an operetta inspired by the death of his dog. He attended schools in Norfolk, 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 attacked Pearl Harbor and he enlisted in the United States Marine Corps. He served in the South Pacific, where he was stationed in New Zealand, and fought as a radioman in combat on Guadalcanal and Tarawa〔(Leon Uris Biography at nytimes.com )〕 from 1942 through 1945. While recuperating from malaria in San Francisco, he met Betty Beck, a Marine sergeant; they married in 1945. Coming out of the service, he worked for a newspaper, writing in his spare time. ''Esquire'' magazine, in 1950, bought an article, and he began to devote himself to writing more seriously. Drawing on his experiences in Guadalcanal and Tarawa, he produced the best-selling ''Battle Cry'', a novel depicting the toughness and courage of U.S. Marines in the Pacific. He then went to Warner Brothers in Hollywood helping to write the movie, which was extremely popular with the public, if not the critics.〔 He went on to write ''The Angry Hills'', a novel set in war-time Greece. His best-known work may be ''Exodus'', which was published in 1958. Most sources indicate Uris, motivated by an intense interest in Israel, financed his research for the novel by selling the film rights in advance to MGM and by writing newspaper articles about the Sinai campaign.〔(''Leon Uris, 78, Who Wrote Sweeping Novels Like ''"Exodus,"'' Dies ) New York Times – June 25, 2003〕〔 ()〕〔 ()〕 It is said that the book involved two years of research, and involved thousands of interviews. ''Exodus'' illustrated the history of Palestine from the late 19th century through the founding of the state of Israel in 1948 from azionist point of view.〔http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/the-exodus-effect-the-monumentally-fictional-israel-that-remade-american-jewry-1.476411〕〔http://www.theguardian.com/news/2003/jun/25/guardianobituaries.books〕〔http://martinkramer.org/sandbox/2011/10/exodus-myth-and-malpractice/〕 It was a worldwide best-seller, translated into a dozen languages, and was made into a feature film in 1960, starring Paul Newman, directed by Otto Preminger, as well as into a short-lived Broadway musical (12 previews, 19 performances) in 1971.〔(Ari )〕 Uris' 1967 novel ''Topaz'' was adapted for the screen and directed by Alfred Hitchcock in 1969. Uris's subsequent works included: ''Mila 18'', about the Warsaw ghetto uprising; ''Armageddon: A Novel of Berlin'', a chronicle which ends with the lifting of the Berlin Blockade in 1949; ''Trinity'', about Irish nationalism and the sequel, ''Redemption'', covering the early 20th century and World War I; ''QB VII'', about the role of a Polish doctor in a German concentration camp; and ''The Haj'', set in the history of the Middle East. He wrote the screenplays for ''Battle Cry'' and ''Gunfight at the O.K. Corral''. His work having to do with the subject of Israel has been criticized for being biased against Arabs.〔http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alan-elsner/exodus-book_b_3139291.html〕〔http://www.nytimes.com/1984/04/27/books/books-of-the-times-151205.html〕〔https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/leon-uris/the-haj/〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Leon Uris」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|