Herman Wouk was an American author best known for historical fiction such as The Caine Mutiny for which he won the Pulitzer Prize in fiction.
19 Facts About Herman Wouk
2.
Herman Wouk was born in the Bronx, the second of three children born to Esther and Abraham Isaac Herman Wouk, Russian Jewish immigrants from what is today Belarus.
3.
Herman Wouk's father toiled for many years to raise the family out of poverty before opening a successful laundry service.
4.
When Herman Wouk was 13, his maternal grandfather, Mendel Leib Levine, came from Minsk to live with them and took charge of his grandson's Jewish education.
5.
Herman Wouk earned a Bachelor of Arts degree at the age of 19 from Columbia University in 1934, where he was a member of the Pi Lambda Phi fraternity.
6.
Herman Wouk served as editor of the university's humor magazine, Jester, and wrote two of its annual Varsity Shows.
7.
Herman Wouk participated in around six invasions and won a number of battle stars.
8.
Herman Wouk was in the New Georgia Campaign, the Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign, the Mariana and Palau Islands campaign, and the Battle of Okinawa.
9.
Herman Wouk sent a copy of the opening chapters to philosophy professor Irwin Edman, under whom he studied at Columbia, who quoted a few pages verbatim to a New York editor.
10.
Herman Wouk devoted "thirteen years of extraordinary research and long, arduous composition" to these two novels, noted Arnold Beichman.
11.
In 1995, Herman Wouk was honored on his 80th birthday by the Library of Congress with a symposium on his career.
12.
Herman Wouk's memoir, titled Sailor and Fiddler: Reflections of a 100-Year-Old Author, was published in January 2016 to mark his 100th birthday.
13.
On September 10,2008, Herman Wouk presented the Library of Congress with his journals, which number more than 100 volumes as of 2012, at a ceremony that honored him with the first Library of Congress Lifetime Achievement Award for the Writing of Fiction.
14.
Herman Wouk often referred to his journals to check dates and facts in his writing, and he was hesitant to let the originals out of his personal possession.
15.
In late 1944 Herman Wouk met Betty Sarah Brown, a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Southern California, who was working as a personnel specialist in the navy while the Zane was undergoing repairs in San Pedro, California.
16.
Herman Wouk's first-born son, Abraham Isaac Wouk, was named after Wouk's late father.
17.
Herman Wouk drowned in a swimming pool accident in Cuernavaca, Mexico shortly before his fifth birthday.
18.
Herman Wouk's nephew, Alan I Green, was a psychiatrist at Dartmouth College.
19.
Herman Wouk died in his sleep in his home in Palm Springs, California, on May 17,2019, at the age of 103, ten days before his 104th birthday.