Career
During the course of his research for the fanzine, Levitz became well known at the offices of DC Comics, where in December 1972, editor Joe Orlando gave him his first freelance work, initially writing text pages and letter pages, and later working as a per diem assistant editor before writing stories. Levitz later studied business at New York University but had took no formal education in writing, other than a journalism course. He dropped out after three years in order to concentrate on his writing career.
After serving as Joe Orlando's assistant editor, in 1976 Levitz "fulfilled a lifelong dream" by becoming the editor of Adventure Comics on the eve of his 20th birthday. He also notably served as editor for the Batman line of comics.
As a writer, Levitz is best known for his work on the title The Legion of Super-Heroes, which he wrote from 1977–1979 and 1981–1989. Levitz wrote All-New Collectors' Edition #C-55 (1978), a treasury-sized special drawn by Mike Grell, in which longtime Legion members Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad were married. Levitz and artists James Sherman and Joe Staton crafted "Earthwar" an five-issue storyline in Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes #241-245 (July-Nov. 1978). He and Keith Giffen produced "The Great Darkness Saga", one of the best known Legion stories, in Legion of Super-Heroes vol. 2, #290-294. In August 1984, a new Legion of Super-Heroes series was launched by Levitz and Giffen.
With artist Steve Ditko, Levitz co-created the characters Stalker and the Prince Gavyn version of Starman. He also wrote the Justice Society series in All Star Comics during the late 1970s and co-created the Earth-2 Huntress with artist Joe Staton. He and Staton provided the JSA with an origin story in DC Special #29. Lucien the Librarian, a character later used in Neil Gaiman's The Sandman series, was created by Levitz and artist Nestor Redondo.
Levitz eventually became an editor, and served as vice president and executive vice president, before assuming the role of President in 2002.
In 2006, Levitz returned to writing the Justice Society with issue #82 of JSA, completing that volume before writer Geoff Johns' relaunch.
On September 9, 2009, it was announced that Levitz would step down as President and Publisher of DC Comics to serve as the Contributing Editor and Overall Consultant for the newly formed DC Entertainment, and become the writer of both Adventure Comics vol. 2 and Legion of Super-Heroes vol. 6.
Levitz mentioned in an August 2010 interview that he was also working on "my first genuine book." His 75 Years of DC Comics: The Art of Modern Mythmaking (ISBN 9783836519816) was published by Taschen America, LLC in November 2010.
In addition to Legion of Super-Heroes, Levitz is writing the Worlds' Finest series, which is drawn by George Pérez and Kevin Maguire.
Read more about this topic: Paul Levitz
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