Erich Wolf Segal was a renowned American author, screenwriter, educator, and classicist, best recognized for penning the bestselling novel Love Story (1970) and its successful film adaptation.
Born on June 16, 1937, in Brooklyn, New York, to a Jewish household, Segal was the eldest of three brothers. His father was a rabbi, and his mother was a homemaker. As a child, he developed a passion for storytelling and writing.
Segal attended Midwood High School, where he suffered a serious accident while canoeing, which led to his coach advising him to jog as part of his rehabilitation. This ultimately turned into a lifelong passion, and he went on to participate in the Boston Marathon over 12 times.
He graduated from Harvard College in 1958, earning the distinction of being both the class poet and Latin salutatorian. He then obtained his master's degree in 1959 and a doctorate in 1965 in comparative literature from Harvard University. Subsequently, he began teaching at Yale.
In 1967, Segal collaborated on the screenplay for the Beatles' 1968 motion picture Yellow Submarine, based on a story by Lee Minoff.
His first academic book, Roman Laughter: The Comedy of Plautus (1968),published by Harvard University Press, received significant recognition and chronicled the life of the great Roman comic playwright who inspired the Broadway hit A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1962).
In the late 1960s, Segal worked on other screenplays, including a romantic story about a Harvard student and a Radcliffe student, which he initially failed to sell. However, literary agent Lois Wallace suggested he turn the script into a novel, resulting in the publication of Love Story (1970).
The novel became a huge success, topping the New York Times bestseller list and being translated into 33 languages worldwide. The motion picture adaptation also became the number one box office attraction of 1970.
Despite the novel's success, it had a profound impact on Segal's life. He acknowledged that it unleashed "egotism bordering on megalomania" and he was denied tenure at Yale. Moreover, Love Story was removed from the nomination slate of the National Book Awards after the fiction jury threatened to resign. Segal later stated that the book "totally ruined me."
He went on to write more novels and screenplays, including the 1977 sequel to Love Story, titled Oliver's Story.
Throughout his career, Segal published scholarly works on Greek and Latin literature and taught Greek and Latin literature at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton universities. He was a Supernumerary Fellow and an Honorary Fellow of Wolfson College at Oxford University. He also served as a visiting professor at Princeton, the University of Munich, and Dartmouth College.
Some of his notable works include The Class (1985),a bestseller that won literary honors in France and Italy, and Doctors (1988),another New York Times bestseller. In 2001, he published a book on the history of theatre called The Death of Comedy.
