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Elmore John Leonard Jr. (October 11, 1925 – August 20, 2013) was an American novelist, short story writer, and screenwriter. His earliest novels, published in the 1950s, were Westerns, but he went on to specialize in crime fiction and suspense thrillers, many of which have been adapted into motion pictures.

Elmore Leonard
Leonard at the 70th Annual Peabody Awards Luncheon, 2011
Born	Elmore John Leonard Jr. (1925-10-11)October 11, 1925 New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S.
Died	August 20, 2013(2013-08-20) (aged 87) Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, U.S.
Occupation	Writer
Alma mater	University of Detroit
Genre	Pulp fiction Westerns Crime fiction
Spouse	Beverly Claire Cline ​ ​ (m. 1949; div. 1977)​ Joan Shepard ​ ​ (m. 1979; died 1993)​ Christine Kent ​ ​ (m. 1993; div. 2012)​
Children	5, including Peter
Relatives	Megan Freels Johnston
Military career
Allegiance	United States
Service/branch	United States Navy
Years of service	1943–1946
Rank	Petty officer third class
Unit	Seabees
Battles/wars	World War II

Among his best-known works are Get Shorty, Out of Sight, Swag, Hombre, Mr. Majestyk, and Rum Punch (adapted as the film Jackie Brown). Leonard's writings include short stories that became the films 3:10 to Yuma and The Tall T, as well as the FX television series Justified.

Early life and education

Leonard was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, the son of Flora Amelia (née Rive) and Elmore John Leonard, Sr.[1] Because his father worked as a site locator for General Motors, the family moved frequently for several years. In 1934, the family settled in Detroit.

He graduated from the University of Detroit Jesuit High School in 1943 and, after being rejected for the Marines for weak eyesight, immediately joined the Navy, where he served with the Seabees for three years in the South Pacific (gaining the nickname "Dutch", after pitcher Dutch Leonard).[2] Enrolling at the University of Detroit in 1946, he pursued writing more seriously, entering his work in short story contests and submitting it to magazines for publication. He graduated in 1950[3] with a bachelor's degree in English and philosophy. A year before he graduated, he got a job as a copy writer with Campbell-Ewald Advertising Agency, a position he kept for several years, writing on the side.[3]

Career

This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (October 2014)

Leonard had his first success in 1951 when Argosy published the short story "Trail of the Apaches."[4]^: 29 During the 1950s and early 1960s, he continued writing Westerns, publishing more than 30 short stories. He wrote his first novel, The Bounty Hunters, in 1953 and followed this with four other novels. His western novels had already begun to show his fondness for culturally diverse outsiders and underdogs. He often developed his characters through dialogue, each defined by means of their speech. For many of his stories he favored Arizona and New Mexico settings.[5] Five of his westerns were turned into major movies before 1972: The Tall T (Randolph Scott), 3:10 to Yuma (Glenn Ford), Hombre (Paul Newman), Valdez Is Coming (Burt Lancaster), and Joe Kidd (Clint Eastwood).

In 1969, his first crime story titled The Big Bounce was published by Gold Medal Books. Leonard was different from the well-known names writing in this genre, such as Raymond Chandler or any of the other famous noir writers – no melodrama and pessimism, but more interested in his characters and in realistic dialogue. The stories were often located in Detroit but apart from his favorite setting he also liked to use South Florida as a setting. LaBrava, a novel set there published in 1983, was also the occasion for a New York Times review, in which Leonard moved from mystery suspense short story writer to novelist.[6] His next book, an Atlantic City gambling story published in 1985 and titled Glitz, was his breakout in the crime genre. It spent 16 weeks on The New York Times Best Seller list. Other crime novels that followed were all bestsellers, as well.[7][8] In his review of Glitz, Stephen King placed him in the same company as John D. MacDonald, Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett, but Leonard himself felt more influenced by Ernest Hemingway and John Steinbeck.[9] Leonard believed that his books during the 1980s were becoming more humorous and that he was developing a style that was more free and easy. His own favorites were the Dixie Mafia story Tishomingo Blues from 2002 and Freaky Deaky from 1988 about ex-hippie criminals.[10] Some characters appear in several novels, including mobster Chili Palmer, bank robber Jack Foley and the U. S. Marshals Carl Webster and Raylan Givens.[11][12] His crime books were published amongst others by Fawcett Publications, Bantam Books and Dell Publishing. In the 1980s his publisher was Arbor House, later also William Morrow & Company as an imprint of HarperCollins. There are different reprints of his novels; in the 2000s these included editions from Weidenfeld & Nicolson. At the time of his death his novels had sold tens of millions of copies.[13]

Among film adaptations of his work are Jackie Brown (starring Pam Grier, directed by Quentin Tarantino) which is a "homage to the author's trademark rhythm and pace";[13] Get Shorty (1995, John Travolta and Gene Hackman); Out of Sight (1998, George Clooney and Jennifer Lopez, directed by Steven Soderbergh) and the television series Justified.[14] Nearly thirty movies were made from Leonard's novels, but for some critics his special style worked only in print.[15]

Personal life

He married Beverly Clare Cline in 1949, and they had five children together—two daughters and three sons[16]—before divorcing in 1977. His second marriage in 1979, to Joan Leanne Lancaster (aka Joan Shepard), ended with her death in 1993. Later that same year, he married Christine Kent and they divorced in 2012.[17][18] Leonard spent the last years of his life with his family in Oakland County, Michigan. He suffered a stroke on July 29, 2013. Initial reports stated that he was recovering,[19] but on August 20, 2013, Leonard died at his home in the Detroit suburb of Bloomfield Hills of stroke complications.[20] He was 87 years old.[17][18] One of Leonard's grandchildren is Alex Leonard, the drummer in the Detroit band Protomartyr.[21]

Writing style

Commended by critics for his gritty realism and strong dialogue, Leonard sometimes took liberties with grammar in the interest of speeding the story along.[22] In his essay "Elmore Leonard's Ten Rules of Writing" he said: "My most important rule is one that sums up the 10: If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it." He also hinted: "I try to leave out the parts that readers tend to skip."[22]

Elmore Leonard has been called "the Dickens of Detroit" because of his intimate portraits of people from that city, though he said, "If I lived in Buffalo, I'd write about Buffalo."[4]^: 90 His favorite epithet was one given by Britain's New Musical Express: "the poet laureate of wild assholes with revolvers".[23] His ear for dialogue has been praised by writers such as Saul Bellow, Martin Amis, and Stephen King. "Your prose makes Raymond Chandler look clumsy," Amis told Leonard at a Writers Guild event in Beverly Hills in 1998.[24] Stephen King has called him "the great American writer."[25] According to Charles Rzepka of Boston University, Leonard's mastery of free indirect discourse, a third-person narrative technique that gives the illusion of immediate access to a character's thoughts, "is unsurpassed in our time, and among the surest of all time, even if we include Jane Austen, Gustave Flaubert, and Hemingway in the mix."[26]

Leonard often cited Ernest Hemingway as perhaps his most important influence, but at the same time criticized Hemingway for his lack of humor and for taking himself too seriously.[27] Still, it was Leonard's affection for Hemingway, as well as George V. Higgins, that led him to will his personal papers to the University of South Carolina, where many of Hemingway's and Higgins' papers are archived. Leonard's papers reside at the university's Irvin Department of Rare Books and Special Collections.[28][29][30]

Leonard in turn had a very strong influence on a generation of crime writers that followed him. His obituary in USA Today named George Pelecanos, Michael Connelly, Dennis Lehane, and Laura Lippman.[31]

Awards and honors

• 1984 Edgar Award for Best Mystery Novel of 1983 for LaBrava.
• 1992 Grand Master Award for Lifetime Achievement from the Mystery Writers of America[32]
• 2008 F. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Award for outstanding achievement in American literature; received during the 13th Annual F. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Conference held at Montgomery College in Rockville, Maryland, United States.[33]
• 2010 Peabody Award, FX's Justified[34]
• 2012 National Book Award, Medal for Distinguished Contribution[35]

Works

Novels

Year	Novel	Film adaptation	ISBN
1953	The Bounty Hunters		ISBN 0-380-82225-3
1954	The Law at Randado	1990 – Border Shootout	ISBN 0-062-28950-0
1956	Escape from Five Shadows		ISBN 0-060-01348-6
1959	Last Stand at Saber River	1997 – Last Stand at Saber River	ISBN 0-062-28948-9
1961	Hombre	1967 – Hombre	ISBN 0-062-20611-7
1969	The Big Bounce	1969 – The Big Bounce 2004 – The Big Bounce	ISBN 0-062-18428-8
	The Moonshine War	1970 – The Moonshine War	ISBN 0-062-20898-5
1970	Valdez Is Coming	1971 – Valdez Is Coming	ISBN 0-062-22785-8
1972	Forty Lashes Less One		ISBN 0-062-28949-7
1974	Mr. Majestyk	1974 – Mr. Majestyk	ISBN 0-062-18840-2
	Fifty-Two Pickup	1984 – The Ambassador 1986 – 52 Pick-Up	ISBN 0-753-81962-7
1976	Swag		ISBN 0-062-22786-6
1977	Unknown Man No. 89		ISBN 0-062-18928-X
	The Hunted		ISBN 0-062-18841-0
1978	The Switch	2013 – Life of Crime	ISBN 0-062-20613-3
1979	Gunsights		ISBN 0-062-26726-4
1980	City Primeval		ISBN 0-062-19135-7
	Gold Coast	1997 – TV movie	ISBN 0-062-20609-5
1981	Split Images	1992 – TV movie	ISBN 0-688-16971-6
1982	Cat Chaser	1989 – Cat Chaser	ISBN 0-060-51222-9
1983	Stick	1985 – Stick	ISBN 0-062-18435-0
	LaBrava Edgar Award, Best Novel (1984)		ISBN 0-062-22788-2
1985	Glitz	1988 – TV movie	ISBN 0-062-12158-8
1987	Bandits		ISBN 0-062-12032-8
	Touch	1997 – Touch	ISBN 0-062-26598-9
1988	Freaky Deaky	2012 – Freaky Deaky	ISBN 0-062-12035-2
1989	Killshot	2008 – Killshot	ISBN 0-688-16638-5
1990	Get Shorty	1995 – Get Shorty 2017 – TV series Get Shorty	ISBN 0-062-12025-5
1991	Maximum Bob	1998 – TV series Maximum Bob	ISBN 0-062-00940-0
1992	Rum Punch	1997 – Jackie Brown	ISBN 0-062-11982-6
1993	Pronto	1997 – TV movie 2010 – TV series Justified	ISBN 0-062-12033-6
1995	Riding the Rap	2010 – TV series Justified	ISBN 0-062-02029-3
1996	Out of Sight	1998 – Out of Sight 2003 – TV series Karen Sisco	ISBN 0-061-74031-4
1998	Cuba Libre		ISBN 0-062-18429-6
1999	Be Cool	2005 – Be Cool	ISBN 0-060-77706-0
2000	Pagan Babies		ISBN 0-062-26601-2
2002	Tishomingo Blues		ISBN 0-062-00939-7
2004	Mr. Paradise		ISBN 0-060-59807-7
	A Coyote's in the House		ISBN 0-141-31688-8
2005	The Hot Kid		ISBN 0-060-72423-4
2006	Comfort to the Enemy Published serially in The New York Times		ISBN 0-061-73515-9
2007	Up in Honey's Room		ISBN 0-060-72426-9
2009	Road Dogs		ISBN 0-061-98570-8
2010	Djibouti		ISBN 0-062-00831-5
2012	Raylan	2010 – TV series Justified	ISBN 0-062-11947-8

Leonard also contributed one chapter (the twelfth of thirteen) to the 1996 Miami Herald parody serial novel Naked Came the Manatee (ISBN 0-449-00124-5).

Collections

This list is incomplete; you can help by adding missing items. (April 2018)

Year	Collection	ISBN
1998	The Tonto Woman and Other Western Stories	ISBN 0-385-32387-5
2002	When the Women Come Out to Dance Later reprint retitled Fire in the Hole	ISBN 0-060-58616-8
2004	The Complete Western Stories of Elmore Leonard	ISBN 0-060-72425-0
2006	Moment of Vengeance and Other Stories	ISBN 0-060-72428-5
2006	Blood Money and Other Stories	ISBN 0-06-125487-8
2006	Three Ten To Yuma and Other Stories	ISBN 0-06-133677-7
2007	Trail of the Apache and Other Stories	ISBN 0-06-112165-7
2009	Comfort to the Enemy and Other Carl Webster Stories	ISBN 0-297-85668-5
2014	Charlie Martz and Other Stories: The Unpublished Stories of Elmore Leonard	ISBN 0-297-60979-3

Short stories

This list is incomplete; you can help by adding missing items. (April 2018)

Year	Story	First appearance	Film adaptation
1951-12	"Trail of the Apache"	Argosy
1952-05	"Apache Medicine"	Dime Western Magazine
1952-09	"You Never See Apaches..."	Dime Western Magazine
1952-10	"Red Hell Hits Diablo Canyon"	10 Story Western Magazine
1952-11	"The Colonel's Lady"	Zane Grey's Western
1952-12	"Law of the Hunted Ones"	Western Story Magazine
1952-12	"Cavalry Boots"	Zane Grey's Western
1953-01	"Under the Friar's Ledge"	Dime Western Magazine
1953-02	"The Rustlers"	Zane Grey's Western
1953-03	"Three-Ten to Yuma"	Dime Western Magazine	1957 – 3:10 to Yuma 2007 – 3:10 to Yuma
1953-04	"The Big Hunt"	Western Story Magazine
1953-05	"Long Night"	Zane Grey's Western
1953-06	"The Boy Who Smiled"	Gunsmoke
1953-08	"The Hard Way"	Zane Grey's Western
1953-09	"The Last Shot"	Fifteen Western Tales
1953-10	"Blood Money"	Western Story Magazine
1953-10	"Trouble at Rindo's Station"	Argosy
1954-10	"Saint with a Six-Gun"	Argosy
1955-02	"The Captives"	Argosy	1957 – The Tall T
1955-08	"No Man's Guns"	Western Story Roundup
1955-09	"The Rancher's Lady"	Western Magazine
1955-12	"Jugged"	Western Magazine
1956-04-21	"Moment of Vengeance"	Saturday Evening Post
1956-09	"Man with the Iron Arm"	Complete Western Book
1956-10	"The Longest Day of His Life"	Western Novel and Short Stories
1956-11	"The Nagual"	2-Gun Western
1956-12	"The Kid"	Western Short Stories
1958-06	"The Treasure of Mungo's Landing"	True Adventures
1961	"Only Good Ones"	Western Roundup	Later expanded to the novel and adapted as Valdez is Coming
1982	"The Tonto Woman"	Roundup	2007 – Academy Awards nominated Live Action Short
1994	"Hurrah for Captain Early!"	New Trails
1996	"Karen Makes Out"	Murder For Love – Delacorte Press 1996	First episode in Karen Sisco TV series
2001	"Fire in the Hole"	ebook (ISBN 0-062-12034-4)	2010 – TV series Justified
2001	"Chickasaw Charlie Hoke"	Murderers' Row: Original Baseball Mysteries[36]
2005	"Louly and Pretty Boy"	Dangerous Women - Mysterious Press 1996

Screenplays

Year	Title	Director	Co-writers
1970	The Moonshine War	Richard Quine
1972	Joe Kidd	John Sturges
1974	Mr. Majestyk	Richard Fleischer
1980	High Noon, Part II (TV)	Jerry Jameson
1985	Stick	Burt Reynolds	Joseph Stinson
1986	52 Pick-Up	John Frankenheimer	John Steppling
1987	The Rosary Murders	Fred Walton	William X. Kienzle & Fred Walton
	Desperado (TV Movie)	Virgil W. Vogel
1989	Cat Chaser	Abel Ferrara	James Borelli

Audiobooks

All but three of Leonard's novels have been performed as audiobooks (the exceptions being Escape From Five Shadows {Escape from Five Shadows audiobook published by Harper Audio 2017}, Hombre, and La Brava).^{[citation needed]} Many Leonard works (including The Big Bounce, Be Cool and The Tonto Woman) have been recorded more than once resulting in more than 70 English-language audiobook versions of Leonard novels.^{[citation needed]} Many of these were abridgements, the last of which was Pagan Babies (2000) read by Steve Buscemi. Certain narrators have dominated the Elmore Leonard oeuvre, notably Frank Muller (11 audiobooks), Grover Gardner aka Alexander Adams (7), George Guidall (5), Mark Hammer (5), and Joe Mantegna (5). Other notable Leonard narrators include Liev Schreiber, Neil Patrick Harris, Tom Wopat, Arliss Howard, Joe Morton, Taye Diggs, Brian Dennehy, Bruce Boxleitner, Tom Skerritt, Robert Forster, Dylan Baker, Paul Rudd, Keith Carradine, Ed Asner, Henry Rollins, and Barbara Rosenblatt, the only female narrator of an Leonard work (the story, When the Women Come Out to Dance).[37]

Nonfiction

• 10 Rules of Writing (2007)
• Foreword to Walter Mirisch's book I Thought We Were Making Movies, Not History

Adaptations

Twenty-six of Leonard's novels and short stories have been adapted for the screen (19 as motion pictures and another seven as television programs).

Film

Aside from the short stories already noted, a number of Leonard's novels have been adapted as films, including Get Shorty (1990 novel, 1995 film), Out of Sight (1996 novel, 1998 film) and Rum Punch (1992 novel, 1997 film Jackie Brown). The novel 52 Pick-Up was first adapted very loosely into the 1984 film The Ambassador (1984), starring Robert Mitchum and, two years later, under its original title starring Roy Scheider. Leonard has also written several screenplays based on his novels, plus original screenplays such as Joe Kidd (1972). The film Hombre (1967), starring Paul Newman, was an adaptation of Leonard's 1961 eponymous novel. His short story "Three-Ten to Yuma" (March 1953) and novels The Big Bounce (1969) and 52 Pick-Up have each been filmed twice.

Other novels filmed include:

• 3:10 to Yuma (1957 film) (with Glenn Ford and Van Heflin)
• Hombre (with Paul Newman)
• Mr. Majestyk (with Charles Bronson)
• Jackie Brown (Pam Grier, Samuel L. Jackson, Robert De Niro) from Rum Punch
• The Big Bounce (1969 film) (with Ryan O'Neal)
• Valdez Is Coming (with Burt Lancaster)
• 52 Pick-Up (with Roy Scheider, Ann Margaret)
• Stick (with Burt Reynolds)
• The Moonshine War (with Alan Alda and Patrick McGoohan)
• Last Stand at Saber River (with Tom Selleck)
• Gold Coast (with David Caruso)
• Glitz (with Jimmy Smits)
• The Ambassador (1984 American film) (Robert Mitchum, Rock Hudson, Ellen Burstyn)
• Cat Chaser (with Peter Weller)
• Out of Sight (George Clooney, Jennifer Lopez, Don Cheadle)
• Touch (with Christopher Walken)
• Pronto (with Peter Falk)
• Be Cool (with John Travolta, Harvey Keitel, Uma Thurman)
• The Big Bounce (2004 film) (with Morgan Freeman, Owen Wilson, Gary Sinese)
• Killshot (Diane Lane, Mickey Rourke).
• Get Shorty (with John Travolta, Gene Hackman, Danny Devito)
• Freaky Deaky (with Christian Slater)
• Life of Crime (Jennifer Aniston) (from The Switch)
• 3:10 to Yuma (2007 film) (with Christian Bale, Russell Crowe, Peter Fonda)

Quentin Tarantino has optioned the right to adapt Leonard's novel Forty Lashes Less One (1972).[38]

Television

• In 1992, Leonard played himself in a script he wrote and, with actor Paul Lazar dramatizing a scene from the novel Swag, appeared in a humorous television short about his writing process which aired on the Byline Showtime series on Showtime Networks.
• The 2010–15 FX series Justified was based around the popular Leonard character U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens, from the novels Pronto, Riding the Rap, the eponymous Raylan, and the short story "Fire in the Hole".
• The short-lived 1998 TV series Maximum Bob was based on Leonard's 1991 novel of the same name. It aired on ABC for seven episodes and starred Beau Bridges.
• The TV series Karen Sisco (2003–04) starring Carla Gugino was based on the U.S. Marshall character from the film Out of Sight (1998) played by Jennifer Lopez.
• The 2017 Epix series Get Shorty is based on the novel of the same.[39]

References

External links

• Official website
• Elmore Leonard at IMDb
• Elmore Leonard at Find a Grave
• Elmore Leonard at Curlie
• The Economist: 31 August 2013 Obituary Elmore Leonard, crime-fiction writer, died on August 20, aged 87
• Elmore Leonard's career
• Elmore Leonard on fantasticfiction.com
• Elmore Leonard Archive at the University of South Carolina Irvin Department of Rare Books and Special Collections.

На других языках

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[de] Elmore Leonard

Elmore John Leonard junior (* 11. Oktober 1925 in New Orleans, Louisiana; † 20. August 2013 in Bloomfield Hills bei Detroit, Michigan[1][2]) war ein US-amerikanischer Schriftsteller, der zunächst durch seine Western und später vor allem auch durch seine Kriminalromane sowie durch die Verfilmungen seiner Bücher bekannt wurde.

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- [en] Elmore Leonard

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[ru] Леонард, Элмор

Э́лмор Джон Леона́рд-мла́дший (англ. Elmore John Leonard; 11 октября 1925, Новый Орлеан — 20 августа 2013, Детройт) — американский писатель и сценарист, мастер криминальной литературы и вестернов, произведения которого отличались энергичными диалогами, персонажами-неудачниками и лаконичным юмором[1]. В прессе часто именовался «одним из величайших» и «наиболее узнаваемых» американских криминальных писателей в истории[2][3]. Жители Детройта считали его своим Диккенсом, Стивен Кинг — великим писателем, а Квентин Тарантино — своим творческим гуру и альтер эго[4]. По его книгам и сценариям было снято 43 фильма.

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