
Leo Calvin Rosten (
Yiddish
Yiddish, historically Judeo-German, is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated in 9th-century Central Europe, and provided the nascent Ashkenazi community with a vernacular based on High German fused with ...
: ; April 11, 1908 – February 19, 1997) was an American writer and
humorist
A humorist is an intellectual who uses humor, or wit, in writing or public speaking. A raconteur is one who tells anecdotes in a skillful and amusing way.
Henri Bergson writes that a humorist's work grows from viewing the morals of society ...
in the fields of
scriptwriting, storywriting, journalism, and
Yiddish
Yiddish, historically Judeo-German, is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated in 9th-century Central Europe, and provided the nascent Ashkenazi community with a vernacular based on High German fused with ...
lexicography.
Early life
Rosten was born into a
Yiddish
Yiddish, historically Judeo-German, is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated in 9th-century Central Europe, and provided the nascent Ashkenazi community with a vernacular based on High German fused with ...
-speaking family in
Łódź
Łódź is a city in central Poland and a former industrial centre. It is the capital of Łódź Voivodeship, and is located south-west of Warsaw. Łódź has a population of 655,279, making it the country's List of cities and towns in Polan ...
, Russian Empire (now in
Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...
), and immigrated to the United States with his family in 1911 when he was three. His parents were Samuel Rosten and Ida Freundlich Rosten, both trade unionists. They opened a knitting shop in the Greater Lawndale area of Chicago, where Rosten and his younger sister grew up among other working-class Jewish families.
Like their neighbors, the children spoke both English and Yiddish. Rosten showed an interest in books and language very early and began writing stories when he was only nine. During the
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...
, when he was unable to find other work, he taught
English for recent immigrants at night. These experiences eventually became the source of his most popular works, ''The Education of H*Y*M*A*N K*A*P*L*A*N'' and ''The Return of H*Y*M*A*N K*A*P*L*A*N''.
Rosten studied political science, economics, and psychology at both the
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...
, where he obtained his doctorate in political science, and the
London School of Economics
The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), established in 1895, is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the University of London. The school specialises in the social sciences. Founded ...
.
From this time date his life-long friendships with
Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman (; July 31, 1912 – November 16, 2006) was an American economist and statistician who received the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his research on consumption analysis, monetary history and theory and ...
,
W. Allen Wallis and other economists who would become influential in forming American
neoliberalism
Neoliberalism is a political and economic ideology that advocates for free-market capitalism, which became dominant in policy-making from the late 20th century onward. The term has multiple, competing definitions, and is most often used pe ...
. Unlike them, Rosten did not become a member of the
Mont Pèlerin Society.
Like other University of Chicago graduates, during the war he worked in
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), also known as FDR, was the 32nd president of the United States, serving from 1933 until his death in 1945. He is the longest-serving U.S. president, and the only one to have served ...
's administration, both as deputy director at the
Office of War Information and as assistant to
Lowell Mellett, one of Roosevelt's aides. After the war, his connection with Allen Wallis led to his involvement with forming the Social Sciences division at the
RAND Corporation
The RAND Corporation, doing business as RAND, is an American nonprofit global policy think tank, research institute, and public sector consulting firm. RAND engages in research and development (R&D) in several fields and industries. Since the ...
. Although Rosten, who was already involved in Hollywood at this point, did not work full-time at RAND, he was an influential consultant on human psychology and put RAND in contact with several influential academics such as
Hans Speier and
Bernard Brodie. He also suggested that RAND contact the
Ford Foundation
The Ford Foundation is an American private foundation with the stated goal of advancing human welfare. Created in 1936 by Edsel Ford and his father Henry Ford, it was originally funded by a $25,000 (about $550,000 in 2023) gift from Edsel Ford. ...
for funding.
Scriptwriter
Rosten was a successful
screenwriter
A screenwriter (also called scriptwriter, scribe, or scenarist) is a person who practices the craft of writing for visual mass media, known as screenwriting. These can include short films, feature-length films, television programs, television ...
. He wrote the story for ''
The Dark Corner'' (1946), a
film noir
Film noir (; ) is a style of Cinema of the United States, Hollywood Crime film, crime dramas that emphasizes cynicism (contemporary), cynical attitudes and motivations. The 1940s and 1950s are generally regarded as the "classic period" of Ameri ...
starring
Mark Stevens, and ''
Lured'', the
Douglas Sirk-directed period drama starring Charles Coburn; both films featured
Lucille Ball. He is listed as one of the writers for ''
Captain Newman, M.D.'' (1963) adapted from his novel of the same title. Other films: ''Mechanized Patrolling'' (1943; as Leonard Q. Ross), ''
They Got Me Covered'' (1943) (story; as Leonard Q. Ross), ''
All Through the Night'' (1942) (story; as Leonard Q. Ross), ''
The Conspirators'' (1944) (screenplay), ''
The Velvet Touch'' (1948), ''
Sleep, My Love'' (1948) (novel) (screenplay), ''
Double Dynamite'' (1954)
(story), ''Walk East on Beacon'' (1952), and ''
Mister Cory'' (1957) (story).
Stories and books
But funny is funny. Look at Leo Rosten. He's the Jewish James Thurber. The kind of writer who makes you laugh out loud. I made a friend of mine read ''The Education of H*Y*M*A*N K*A*P*L*A*N'' – she's Boston Italian – and she agreed. But the world of that generation is disappearing. The same with Thurber. That small-town Ohio life: That world is gone. But you can still discover it in a book. That's why people should read.
:— Fran Lebowitz
Rosten is best remembered for his stories about the night-school "prodigy"
Hyman Kaplan, written under the
pseudonym
A pseudonym (; ) or alias () is a fictitious name that a person assumes for a particular purpose, which differs from their original or true meaning ( orthonym). This also differs from a new name that entirely or legally replaces an individual's o ...
Leonard Q. Ross. They were published in ''
The New Yorker
''The New Yorker'' is an American magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. It was founded on February 21, 1925, by Harold Ross and his wife Jane Grant, a reporter for ''The New York T ...
'' from 1935
and collected in two volumes published in 1937 and 1959, ''The Education of H*Y*M*A*N K*A*P*L*A*N'' and ''The Return of H*Y*M*A*N K*A*P*L*A*N''.
[ ''The Education'' was a "close second" for one U.S. ]National Book Award
The National Book Awards (NBA) are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. ...
in 1938.[
Probably that award was the Most Original Book of 1937. See Hyman Kaplan for more information.] The second collection was one of eighteen National Book Award for Fiction finalists in 1960.[ (See The Education of H*Y*M*A*N K*A*P*L*A*N for the musical rendition.)
He is also well known for his encyclopedic '' The Joys of Yiddish'' (1968), a guide to ]Yiddish
Yiddish, historically Judeo-German, is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated in 9th-century Central Europe, and provided the nascent Ashkenazi community with a vernacular based on High German fused with ...
and to Jewish culture including anecdotes and Jewish humor. It was followed by ''O K*A*P*L*A*N! My K*A*P*L*A*N!'' (1976), a reworking of the two 1930s collections, and ''Hooray for Yiddish!'' (1982), a humorous lexicon of the American language as influenced by Jewish culture. Another Rosten work is ''Leo Rosten's Treasury of Jewish Quotations''.
Quotations
Among his own many quotations are "A conservative is one who admires radicals centuries after they're dead," "Truth is stranger than fiction; fiction has to make sense," "We see things as we are, not as they are," and "The purpose of life is not to be happy at all. It is to be useful, to be honorable. It is to be compassionate. It is to ''matter,'' to have it make some difference that you lived." (A version of this quotation is sometimes attributed, falsely, to Ralph Waldo Emerson.)
At a tribute dinner to fellow humorist W. C. Fields, Rosten came up with the remark about Fields that "any man who hates dogs and babies can't be all bad." This statement is often misattributed to Fields himself.
In his book ''The Joys of Yiddish'', he defines the word chutzpah as "that quality enshrined in a man who, having killed his mother and father, throws himself on the mercy of the court because he is an orphan." In his novel ''Silky'', he defines "nebbish" as "The kind of person, when he leaves a room, you have the feeling someone fascinating just walked in."
Personal life
On March 30, 1935, Rosten married Priscilla Ann "Pam" Mead (1911–1959), a fellow graduate student at the University of Chicago and sister of anthropologist Margaret Mead. Rosten's marriage to Mead also made him a brother-in-law of William Steig and the uncle of Jeremy Steig and Mary Catherine Bateson.[ They had two daughters: Madeline Rosten and Margaret Ramsey Rosten; and a son, Philip Rosten (1938–1996), and six grandchildren: Josh and Ben Lee (Madeline), Seth Muir (Margaret), and Alexander, Carrie and Pamela Rosten (Phillip). Carrie followed in her grandfather's literary footsteps and has written three books, including a young adult novel, ''Chloe Leiberman (Sometimes Wong)''. Leo's and Pam's marriage ended in divorce in 1959; she took her own life on December 1 the same year.][ Jane Howard, ''Margaret Mead: A Life''. New York: ]Simon & Schuster
Simon & Schuster LLC (, ) is an American publishing house owned by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts since 2023. It was founded in New York City in 1924, by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. Along with Penguin Random House, Hachette Book Group US ...
, 1984, p. 359. Rosten's second wife, whom he married January 5, 1960, was Gertrude Zimmerman (1915–1995).
Rosten died in New York City in 1997 at age 88. His obituary in ''The Independent'' on February 21, 1997, written by Chaim Bermant, describes his personality as follows:
Rosten was an inveterate Anglophile. He had enjoyed his years at LSE, was amazed by the enthusiastic reception ''Kaplan'' had received in the English press, and returned to London whenever opportunity dictated and even when it didn't. He lived in considerable luxury in a penthouse flat in Sutton Place, one of the most exclusive areas of New York, and rented a mews flat in Mayfair. England represented the tranquillity he could not find in America. He loved to rummage in English bookshops and wear English clothes — he contrived to display a subdued elegance — to go to the London theatres and entertain and be entertained in London clubs. He himself was a member of the Savile, the Reform and the Garrick.
Books
Maxim Lieber served as his literary editor, 1935–1938.
Hyman Kaplan
* Short stories by Leonard Q. Ross (''The New Yorker'', 1930s)
* PZ3.R7386 Ed[
:—"close second" for a U.S. National Book Award][
"Booksellers Give Prize to 'Citadel': Cronin's Work About Doctors Their Favorite--'Mme. Curie' Gets Non-Fiction Award ...", ''The New York Times'', March 2, 1938, p. 14]
* ''The Return of H*Y*M*A*N K*A*P*L*A*N'' (Harper, 1959) OCLC 391898; PZ3.R7386 Re[
:— National Book Award for Fiction finalist]["National Book Awards – 1960"]
NBF. Retrieved 2012-04-05.
* ''O K*A*P*L*A*N! My K*A*P*L*A*N!'' (Harper & Row, 1976) ; PZ3.R7386 Oad
:—"New, completely rewritten H*y*m*a*n K*a*p*l*a*n, combining ''The education'' and ''The return'' with a new introduction." (Library of Congress Online Catalog)["Rosten, Leo, 1908–1997"]
Library of Congress Authorities. Library of Congress
The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...
. Retrieved 2012-04-05. (Linked to Library of Congress Online Catalog listings for Rosten.)
Other
* ''Hollywood: The Movie Colony, the Movie Makers'' (Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1941)
* '' All Through the Night'' (1941) (story; as Leonard Q. Ross)
* '' They Got Me Covered'' (1943) (story; as Leonard Q. Ross)
* ''Mechanized Patrolling'' (1943; as Leonard Q. Ross)
* '' The Conspirators'' (1944) (screenplay)
* '' The Dark Corner'' (1946) (story)
* '' Lured'' (1947)
* '' Sleep, My Love'' (1948) (novel) (screenplay)
* '' The Velvet Touch'' (1948)
* '' Double Dynamite'' (1951) (story)
* ''Walk East on Beacon!'' (1952)
* '' Mister Cory'' (1957) (story)
* ''Captain Newman, M.D.'' (1961) (novel)
* ''Leo Rosten Bedside Book'' (1962)
* ''A Most Private Intrigue'' (1967)
* '' The Joys of Yiddish'' (1968)
* ''People I Have Loved, Known or Admired'' (1970)
* ''A Trumpet for Reason'' (1970)
* ''Rome Wasn't Burned In a Day: The Mischief of Language'' (1972) — illustrated by Robert Day
* ''Home is Where to Learn How to Hate'' (1973)
* ''The Washington Correspondents (Politics and People)'' (1974)
* ''Dear'' (1975)
* ''The Cook Book'' (1975)
*
* ''Dear Herm'' (1975)
* ''The 3:10 to anywhere'' (1976)
* ''Look Book'' (1976)
* ''Leo Rosten's Treasury of Jewish Quotations'' (1977)
* ''The Power of Positive Nonsense''
* ''Passions & Prejudices: Or, Some of My Best Friends Are People'' (1978)
* ''Silky. A Detective Story'' (1979)
* ''Infinite Riches'' (1979)
* ''King Silky'' (1981)
* ''Hooray for Yiddish: A Book About English''
* ''Giant Book of Laughter'' (1985)
* ''Leo Rosten's Book of Laughter'' (1986)
* ''Hebrew-English Lexicon of the Bible'' (1987)
* ''The Joys of Yinglish'' (1988)
* ''Leo Rosten's Giant Book of Laugh'' (1989)
* ''Leo Rosten's Carnival of Wit: From Aristotle to Woody Allen'' (1996)
* Leo Rosten Five Stories from Five Faiths, a portfolio (10.5"×13") of five stories with five photos by Art Kane. First published in ''McCall's'' magazine in June 1960.
Notes
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Rosten, Leo
1908 births
1997 deaths
20th-century American novelists
American humorists
Jewish humorists
American male novelists
20th-century Polish Jews
Emigrants from Congress Poland to the United States
Jewish American novelists
Yiddish-speaking people
20th-century American male writers
20th-century American non-fiction writers
American male non-fiction writers
People of the United States Office of War Information
People from Łódź
20th-century American lexicographers
20th-century American Jews