Joseph lelyveld biography

Joseph Salem Lelyveld (April 5, 1937 – January 5, 2024) was an American journalist.
Joseph Salem Lelyveld was an American journalist.
Joseph Lelyveld, former executive editor of the New York Times (1994-2001), is the author of the widely-acclaimed biography and international bestseller, Great.

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Behind the furor over "Great Soul," Joseph Lelyveld's biography of Mahatma Gandhi

Joseph Lelyveld, a former executive editor of the world's most influential newspaper, is certainly no stranger to controversy. But he didn't expect his new book about Mahatma Gandhi to draw the reaction it did.

"Great Soul," he thought, might raise eyebrows because of the way it explores the conflict between Gandhi's ideals and the country that venerates him. But when it was published in March, much of the world's attention focused on just a few paragraphs in which he discusses Gandhi's possible physical relationship with a male architect.

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The fuss over the book, which was actually banned in part of India, has since died down. This week, I asked Lelyveld, the former executive editor of the New York Times, about what the reaction taught him.

Q: What surprised you about the reaction to the book?

I was struck by the fact that hardly anybody reacted to what I considered to be the main themes of the book, what I said I was setting

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Arthur Joseph Lelyveld

LELYVELD, ARTHUR JOSEPH (1913–1996), U.S. Reform rabbi. Lelyveld was born in New York City and received his B.A. from Columbia University in 1933 and his M.H.L. and ordination from *Hebrew Union College in 1939. He was awarded an honorary D.D. by HUC-JIR in 1955, and a Litt.D. by the Cleveland College of Jewish Studies, where he was on the faculty, in 1986. Lelyveld's first pulpit was with Bene Israel in Hamilton, Ohio, a congregation he served while also acting as director of youth activities for the *Union of American Hebrew Congregations. In this position, he was instrumental in initiating summer youth conclaves and in organizing the National Federation of Temple Youth. During this time, he was also founder and first president of the Jewish Peace Fellowship (1941–44).

A passionate Zionist, Lelyveld then served as executive director of the Committee on Unity for Palestine (1944–46). In this role, the eloquent Lelyveld played a little-known but instrumental role in obtaining critical American recognition of the newly formed State of Israel. He won t

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Joseph Lelyveld, former executive editor of the New York Times, recently published a biography of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, "His Final Battle: The Last Year of Franklin Roosevelt." The book has attracted rave reviews. An earlier biography by Lelyveld of Mahatma Gandhi, published in 2011, attracted controversy because some Indian critics averred that the author implied that Gandhi -- one of the founders of modern India -- had a homosexual relationship in the early 1900s when he was a lawyer in South Africa. I wrote a defense of Lelyveld on April 1, 2011, for India's national newspaper, The Hindu, which I'm reproducing here because I believe that what I said then is still relevant:

Joseph Lelyveld may be many things -- not all of them pleasant -- but a falsifier of facts and misinterpreter of men he's definitely not. That's why the over-the-top assaults by Indian politicians on his authorial integrity seem so clueless and churlish. Anyone who's known the fastidiously careful Mr. Lelyveld would be amused by the attacks, which, among other things, have him suggesting in