Biography
He was born on 30 November 1915 in Istanbul to Austrian parents. He attended an English High School in Istanbul. His parents set up an import and export business in London which he headed. After World War II he took a course in international relations at the London School of Economics. During a bridge game, he met A. S. Frere, who inspired him to change his import and export business into a publishing house. Reinhardt then bought HFL Publishers, a company that published accounting textbooks.
Max Reinhardt's first author was George Bernard Shaw, who reissued his romantic correspondence with the actress Ellen Terry. In 1957 Reinhardt and a banker partner bought The Bodley Head publishing house, where Reinhardt built a strong editing team, naming Graham Greene as director. Greene published his own novels there. They also published Alistair Cooke, Maurice Sendak, William Trevor and Eric Ambler.
Bodley Head was purchased by Random House, and both Reinhardt and Greene resigned. Reinhardt kept ownership of HFL, renaming it Reinhardt Books which was later bough by Viking Press.
He died on 19 November 2002.
Read more about this topic: Max Reinhardt (publisher)
Famous quotes containing the word biography:
“Just how difficult it is to write biography can be reckoned by anybody who sits down and considers just how many people know the real truth about his or her love affairs.”
—Rebecca West (1892–1983)
“The death of Irving, which at any other time would have attracted universal attention, having occurred while these things were transpiring, went almost unobserved. I shall have to read of it in the biography of authors.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Had Dr. Johnson written his own life, in conformity with the opinion which he has given, that every man’s life may be best written by himself; had he employed in the preservation of his own history, that clearness of narration and elegance of language in which he has embalmed so many eminent persons, the world would probably have had the most perfect example of biography that was ever exhibited.”
—James Boswell (1740–95)