10 July 2019 Lax 66, L.H.D. 93 on Pulteney Street Podcast

Episode 3: Author Lax 66, L.H.D. 93

On the newest episode ofthe Pulteney Street Podcast: Inside HWS with Joyce Jacobsen, author Eric Lax 66, L.H.D. 93 joins President Joyce P. Jacobsen to discuss his wide-ranging books, his service in the Peace Corps and the impact of HWS on his career.

After graduating with a degree in English, Lax joined the Peace Corps, serving in Truk and the Caroline Islands in the Western Pacific. After completing his two-year placement, he worked in Washington, D.C., first as a Peace Corps Fellow, then as Overseas Director of the Peace Corps School Partnership Program, which allowed him to travel to 43 countries.

He left the Peace Corps in 1970 to pursue writing fulltime. Laxs longtime passion for comedy resulted in his first book,On Being Funny(1975), in which he used the work and thoughts of Woody Allen as a means of writing about comedy in general. In 1984, Lax authoredLife and Death on 10 West, about the bone marrow transplantation ward at the UCLA Medical Center, which was headed at the time by classmate Dr. Robert Peter Gale 66, L.H.D.87. Laxs work was recognized by TheNew York TimesBook Review as one of the Notable Books of the Year and received an award from the American Leukemia Society.

In 1991, Lax published the bestseller andNew York TimesNotable Book of the Year,Woody Allen: A Biography, which was translated into 17 languages. Five years later, Lax wrotePaul Newman: A Celebration, followed by 1997s Bogart, co-authored with A.M. Sperber. His other books include The Mold in Dr. Floreys Coat, about the development of penicillin; Conversations with Woody Allen: His Films, the Movies and Moviemaking; Faith: Interrupted; and Start to Finish: Woody Allen and the Art of Moviemaking.

Lax has contributed to many magazines, includingThe Atlantic,Life,Washington Monthly, TheNew York Times Magazine,The New Yorker,Vanity FairandEsquire, where he was a contributing editor. He has been a board member and past president of PEN Center USA West, a member of the International PEN Board and chair of the trustees of the International PEN Foundation.

For more information on President Jacobsen, visit her webpage.

Subscribe to the Pulteney Street Podcast onApple Podcasts,Spotify,Stitcher or your podcast app of choice with theRSS feed.