Erich Segal

Erich Segal (June 16, 1937 – January 17, 2010) was an American author, screenwriter, educator, and classics scholar best known for his 1970 novel and screenplay Love Story, a cultural phenomenon that sold over 21 million copies worldwide and inspired a blockbuster film.

Born Erich Wolf Segal in Brooklyn, New York, to Rabbi Samuel Michael Segal and Cynthia Shapiro Segal, he grew up in a Jewish family and developed an early passion for literature and classics. He attended Harvard University, where he earned bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees in comparative literature, serving as class poet and Latin orator during his time there. Segal began his academic career as a professor of classics at Yale University in the 1960s, later holding visiting positions at Princeton, Oxford, and the University of Munich, where he specialized in ancient Greek and Latin literature.

Erich Segal was born on June 16, 1937, in Brooklyn, New York, into a Jewish family as the eldest of three brothers. His father, Samuel Michael Segal, was a prominent rabbi who served at Congregation B'nai Jeshurun and later as spiritual director of Mount Neboh Temple in Manhattan, instilling in the household a deep engagement with Jewish scholarship and religious texts from an early age. His mother, Cynthia Shapiro Segal, supported a home environment rich in intellectual discourse, where young Erich was surrounded by discussions of ethics, history, and literature influenced by his father's rabbinical work.

Segal attended Midwood High School in Brooklyn, where he distinguished himself as a precocious student, excelling in academics and immersing himself in the study of Greek, Latin, and Hebrew. His parents permitted enrollment at the secular school on the condition that he continue Jewish studies at the Jewish Theological Seminary in the afternoons, blending classical languages with religious education and igniting a lasting passion for ancient history and literature. At Midwood, Segal's academic prowess set the stage for his transition to higher education, where he would deepen his expertise in classics.