Leon Uris

Author profile

born

August 03, 1924 in Baltimore, Maryland, The United States

died

June 21, 2003

gender

male

genre

Literature & Fiction, Historical Fiction

About this author

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Leon Marcus Uris (August 3, 1924 - June 21, 2003) was an American novelist, 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, in 1976.

Leon 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. 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 Uris' uncle, took the name Yerushalmi) "He was basically a failure," Uris later said of his father. "He went from failure to failure."

Uris a...more Leon Marcus Uris (August 3, 1924 - June 21, 2003) was an American novelist, 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, in 1976.

Leon 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. 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 Uris' uncle, took the name Yerushalmi) "He was basically a failure," Uris later said of his father. "He went from failure to failure."

Uris attended schools in Norfolk, Virginia and Baltimore, but never graduated from high school, after having failed English three times. At age seventeen, while in his senior year of high school, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and Uris enlisted in the United States Marine Corps. He served in the South Pacific as a radioman (in combat) at Guadalcanal, Tarawa, and New Zealand 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. In 1950, Esquire magazine 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. Later he went on to write The Angry Hills, a novel set in war-time Greece.

According to one source, in the early 1950's he was hired by an American public relations firm to go to Israel and "soak up the atmosphere and create a novel about it". That novel would be Exodus, which came out in 1958 and became his best known work. Others say that Uris, motivated by an intense interest in Israel, financed his own research for the novel by selling the film rights in advance to MGM and writing articles about the Sinai campaign. 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. 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. Uris' novel Topaz was adapted for the screen and directed by Alfred Hitchcock.

Uris' subsequent works included: Mila 18, a story of the Warsaw ghetto uprising; Armageddon: A Novel of Berlin, which reveals the detailed work by British and American intelligence services in planning for the occupation and pacification of post WWII Germany; Trinity, an epic novel about Ireland's struggle for independence; QB VII, a novel about the role of a Polish doctor in a German concentration camp ; and The Haj, with insights into the history of the Middle East and the secret machinations of foreigners which have led to today's turmoil.

He also wrote the screenplays for Battle Cry and Gunfight at the O.K. Corral.

Uris was married three times: to Betty Beck, with whom he had three children, from 1945 through their divorce in 1968; Margery Edwards in 1969, who died a year later, and Jill Peabody in 1970, with whom he had two children, and divorced in 1989.

Leon Uris died of renal failure at his Long Island home on Shelter Island, aged 78.

Leon Uris's papers can be found at the Ransom Center, University of Texas in Austin. The collection includes all of Uris's novels, with the exception of The Haj and Mitla Pass, as well as manus(less)

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Books by Leon Uris

Average rating: 4.07 · 46,000 ratings · 1,992 reviews · 24 distinct works

	Exodus 4.23 avg rating — 18,931 ratings — published 1958 — 34 editions	My rating:
	Trinity 4.14 avg rating — 6,677 ratings — published 1976 — 18 editions	My rating:
	Mila 18 4.16 avg rating — 5,153 ratings — published 1961 — 20 editions	My rating:
	QB VII 3.97 avg rating — 4,893 ratings — published 1970 — 24 editions	My rating:
	The Haj 3.80 avg rating — 2,923 ratings — published 1984 — 19 editions	My rating:
	Battle Cry 3.97 avg rating — 1,801 ratings — published 1953 — 14 editions	My rating:
	Redemption 3.73 avg rating — 1,188 ratings — published 1995 — 15 editions	My rating:
	Topaz 3.48 avg rating — 1,162 ratings — published 1980 — 19 editions	My rating:
	Armageddon 3.94 avg rating — 925 ratings — published 1963 — 16 editions	My rating:
	Mitla Pass 3.59 avg rating — 911 ratings — published 2011 — 18 editions	My rating:

More books by Leon Uris…

Quotes by Leon Uris

“All you have the right to ask of life is to choose a battle in this war, make the best you can, and leave the field with honor.”
― Leon Uris

11 people liked it

“Huxley: "Tell me something Bryce, do you know the difference between a Jersey, a Guernsey, a Holstein, and an Ayershire?"
Bryce: "No."
Huxley: "Seabags Brown does."
Bryce: "I don't see what that has to do..."
Huxley: "What do you know about Gaelic history?"
Bryce: "Not much."
Huxley: "Then why don't you sit down one day with Gunner McQuade. He is an expert. Speaks the language, too."
Bryce: "I don't..."
Huxley: " What do you know about astronomy?"
Bryce: "A little."
Huxley: "Discuss it with Wellman, he held a fellowship."
Bryce: "This is most puzzling."
Huxley: "What about Homer, ever read Homer?"
Bryce: "Of course I've read Homer."
Huxley: "In the original Greek?"
Bryce: "No"
Huxley: "Then chat with Pfc. Hodgkiss. Loves to read the ancient Greek."
Bryce: "Would you kindly get to the point?"
Huxley: "The point is this, Bryce. What makes you think you are so goddam superior? Who gave you the bright idea that you had a corner on the world's knowledge? There are privates in this battalion who can piss more brains down a slit trench then you'll ever have. You're the most pretentious, egotistical individual I've ever encountered. Your superiority complex reeks. I've seen the way you treat men, like a big strutting peacock. Why, you've had them do everything but wipe your ass.”
― Leon Uris

tags: battle-cry , ego , humor , marine-corps , superior

9 people liked it

“Who here wants to be a writer?' I asked. Everyone in the room raised his hand. 'Why the hell aren't you home writing?' I said, and left the stage.”
― Leon Uris, QB VII

9 people liked it

See all Leon Uris's quotes »

Polls

What do we want to do for our Ireland Historical Read in March?

The Princes of Ireland by Edward Rutherfurd

9 votes 26.5%

1916 A Novel of the Irish Rebellion by Morgan Llywelyn

8 votes 23.5%

Cashelmara by Susan Howatch

8 votes 23.5%

Trinity by Leon Uris

4 votes 11.8%

Ireland A Novel by Frank Delaney

3 votes 8.8%

Death and Nightingales by Eugene Mccabe

2 votes 5.9%

34 total votes

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