[1] Friedman was born in The Bronx on April 8, 1929, and was raised in Brooklyn and Woodmere, Long Island.
[1] He attended Townsend Harris Hall High School and graduated from Columbia College in 1949.
At Columbia, Friedman studied under Lionel Trilling, Mark Van Doren, Jacques Barzun, and F. W. Dupee, and was a member of the Philolexian Society.
Friedman obtained his PhD from Harvard University in just three years after completing military service.
His scholarship focused on Renaissance poetry and drama in English,[2][3] and he served as chair of Berkeley's department of dramatic art and as dean of humanities.