Erich Segal

Erich Wolf Segal (June 16, 1937 – January 17, 2010) was an American author, screenwriter, educator, and classicist who wrote the bestselling novel Love Story (1970) and its film adaptation.

His coach advised him to jog as a part of his rehabilitation, which ended up becoming his passion and caused him to participate in the Boston Marathon more than 12 times.

In 1967, through connections on Broadway, Segal was given the opportunity to collaborate on the screenplay for the Beatles' 1968 motion picture Yellow Submarine, based on a story by Lee Minoff.

He occasionally worked as an actor, having a supporting role in the French crime thriller Without Apparent Motive and a cameo appearance as a gondolier in Jennifer on My Mind, which he also wrote.

His first academic book, Roman Laughter: The Comedy of Plautus (1968), published by the Harvard University Press, gave him considerable recognition and chronicled the great Roman comic playwright who inspired the Broadway hit A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1962).

Literary agent Lois Wallace at the William Morris Agency then suggested he turn the script into a novel, and the result was Love Story (1970).

1 bestseller, the book became the top selling work of fiction for 1970 in the United States, and was translated into 33 languages worldwide.

Moreover, Love Story "was ignominiously bounced from the nomination slate of the National Book Awards after the fiction jury threatened to resign."

"[13] In 2000, The Washington Post included the incident among the 10 most memorable American sports calls (albeit misquoting the latter line as being "it's a fraud, Frank!").

Segal, who suffered from Parkinson's disease,[16] died of a heart attack on January 17, 2010,[17] and was buried in London.