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Meyer Levin

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For the World War II hero, see Meyer Levin (military).

Meyer Levin (October 7, 1905 – July 9, 1981) was an American novelist. Perhaps best known for his work on the Leopold and Loeb case, Levin worked as a journalist (for the Chicago Daily News and from 1933 to 1939, he worked as an editor for Esquire).

Career

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Levin was born in Chicago. He published six novels before World War II. Even though the critical response to them was good, none of them were financially successful. Reporter (1929) was a novel of the modern newspapers, Frankie and Johnny (1930) an urban romance, Yehuda (1931) takes place on a kibbutz, and The New Bridge (1933) dealt with unemployed construction workers at the beginning of the Depression. In 1937, Levin published The Old Bunch, a story of immigrant Chicago Jewry that James T. Farrell called "one of the most serious and ambitious novels yet produced by the current generation of American novelists."[1] Citizens (1940) was a fictional account of the 1937 strike at the Republic Steel Company plant outside Chicago.

He also wrote and directed a documentary titled "The Illegals", for the Office Of War. The film dealt with the smuggling of Jews out of Poland.[2]

Levin was a war correspondent in Europe during World War II, representing the Overseas News Agency and the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.[3]

After the war, Levin wrote, with the approval of the Frank family, a play which was based on The Diary of Anne Frank, but his play was not produced. Instead, another version of the same story which was dramatized by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett reached Broadway. Levin sued for plagiarism.[4]

Meyer wrote the 1956 novel Compulsion, inspired by the Leopold and Loeb case. The novel, for which Levin was given a Special Edgar Award by the Mystery Writers of America in 1957, was the basis for Levin's own 1957 play adaptation and the 1959 film which was based on it, starring Orson Welles.[5] Compulsion was "the first 'documentary' or 'non-fiction novel' ("a style later used in Truman Capote's In Cold Blood and Norman Mailer's The Executioner's Song").[6]

Levin died in Jerusalem.

Bibliography

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Novels

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Autobiographical works

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Judaica

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  • Beginnings in Jewish Philosophy
  • The Story of Israel
  • An Israel Haggadah for Passover
  • The Story of the Synagogue
  • The Story of the Jewish Way of Life
  • Hassidic Stories"[8]

Awards

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See also

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References

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  1. ^ Saturday Review of Literature, 13 March 1937
  2. ^ Mitgang, Herbert (July 11, 1981). "MEYER LEVIN, WRITER, 75, DIES; BOOKS INCLUDED 'COMPULSION'". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved April 6, 2021.
  3. ^ Fuchs, Daniel (January 3, 1982). "The Life of Meyer Levin". The New York Times.
  4. ^ An Obsession with Anne Frank Meyer Levin and the Diary Lawrence Graver UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS Berkeley · Los Angeles · Oxford 1997 The Regents of the University of California
  5. ^ Jake Hinkson (October 19, 2012). "Leopold and Loeb Still Fascinate 90 Years Later". criminalelement.com. Retrieved October 23, 2012.
  6. ^ "Meyer Levin's Compulsion": article by Steve Powell in "The Venetian Vase of September 21, 2012
  7. ^ Jason Aronson Inc. Northvale, NJ 1996
  8. ^ Greenfield Ltd. Publishers,1932, Box 3084 Tel Aviv Israel
  9. ^ "Past Winners". Jewish Book Council. Retrieved January 19, 2020.
  10. ^ "Past Winners". Jewish Book Council. Retrieved January 19, 2020.
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