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Author | Mitch Albom |
---|---|
Language | English |
Genre | Biographical, Philosophical novel, Memoir |
Publisher | Doubleday |
Publication date | 1997 |
Publication place | United States |
Pages | 192[ not verified in body ] |
ISBN | 0385484518 |
OCLC | 36130729 |
378.1/2/092 B 21[ not verified in body ] | |
LC Class | LD571.B418 S383 1997[ not verified in body ] |
Tuesdays with Morrie: An Old Man, A Young Man and Life's Greatest Lesson is a 1997 memoir by American author Mitch Albom. The book is about a series of visits Albom made to his former Brandeis University sociology professor, Morrie Schwartz, as Schwartz was dying from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). [1] [2] Albom's subsequent memoir has been widely reviewed and has received critical attention after features by The Boston Globe and Nightline about Schwartz's dying. [1] [3] [4] [5] [6] [ not verified in body ][ clarification needed ]
The book spent 206 weeks on the New York Times Non-Fiction Bestsellers List and remained on the New York Times Best Seller list for several years, [7] and was, as of 2006, the best-selling memoir of all time. [2] [ better source needed ][ needs update ]
Author Mitch Albom is a successful sports columnist. In 1995, Albom contacts his former sociology professor, Morrie Schwartz, after seeing him on Nightline afflicted with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Albom is prompted to visit Schwartz in Massachusetts, where a coincidental newspaper strike allows him to visit every Tuesday. The book is divided into 14 days, each containing one of Albom's visits to Schwartz. Each visit includes lectures from Morrie on life experiences with flashbacks and references to contemporary events. Schwartz's final days, ultimately, are spent giving Albom his final lesson of life.
Mitch Albom was born in May 1958 in New Jersey.[ citation needed ] Originally, he was a pianist and wanted to pursue a life as a musician.[ citation needed ] Instead, Albom became a journalist and later an author, screenwriter, and television/radio broadcaster[ citation needed ] In college, he met sociology professor Dr. Morrie Schwartz, who would later be the focal point of the memoir Tuesdays with Morrie.[ citation needed ]
Morrie Schwartz was a sociology professor at Brandeis University who was diagnosed with ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig's disease, at the age of 77 in August 1994. [8] The son of Russian immigrants, Schwartz had a difficult childhood, indelibly marked by the death of his mother and his brother's infection with the polio virus.[ citation needed ] He later went on to work as a researcher in a mental hospital, where he learned about mental illness and how to have empathy and compassion for other people; later in life, he decided to become a sociology professor in hopes of putting his accumulated wisdom to use.[ citation needed ] This is where Schwartz met his student Mitch Albom, who would later become a lifelong friend.[ citation needed ] Schwartz was married to Charlotte Schwartz, with whom he had two children.[ citation needed ] After a long battle with ALS, Schwartz died on November 4, 1995.[ citation needed ] His tombstone reads, "A teacher until the end."[ citation needed ]
In March 1995, Jack Thomas of The Boston Globe wrote a piece on Schwartz, titled "A Professor's Final Course: His Own Death." [3] [4] Ted Koppel became aware of the article, and a decision was made to conduct a series of interviews with Schwartz, which began later in March and which were then edited and presented on Nightline . [5] [6] [9] [ better source needed ] It was through this program's airing that Schwartz's former student, Albom, was reminded of his old professor, leading Albom to reach out and reconnect. [9] [ better source needed ]
This section needs expansionwith: a broad and representative array of source-derived perspectives on both the popular and critical receptions of the book. You can help by adding to it. (May 2023) |
Tuesdays with Morrie spent 206 weeks on the New York Times Non-Fiction Bestsellers List and remained on the New York Times Best Seller list for several years. [7] In July 2006, Tuesdays with Morrie was the best selling memoir of all time. [2] [ better source needed ]
This section needs expansionwith: a broad and representative array of source-derived perspectives on the book's critical reception. You can help by adding to it. (May 2023) |
Albom's book has been widely reviewed since its appearance in 1997. [1]
This section needs expansionwith: further full bibliographic and web information on the publication of the paperback, anniversary, and other editions of the book. You can help by adding to it. (May 2023) |
An unabridged audiobook was also published and narrated by Albom. The appendix of the audiobook contains several minutes of excerpts from audio recordings that Albom made during his conversations with Schwartz before writing the book. A new edition with an afterword by Albom was released on the book's tenth anniversary in 2007. [10]
The book was adapted into a 1999 television film directed by Mick Jackson, starring Jack Lemmon. [11] as Schwartz and Hank Azaria as Albom.
The book's author, Mitch Albom, and esteemed playwright Jeffrey Hatcher joined forces for a stage play adaptation that premiered Off-Broadway in November 2002 at the Minetta Lane Theatre. Directed by David Esbjornson, it starred Alvin Epstein as Schwartz and Jon Tenney as Albom. A revival of the play, featuring Len Cariou as Schwartz and Chris Domig as Albom, was presented by the Sea Dog Theater company at St. George's Episcopal Church in the spring of 2024. [12]
Articles on other Albom books
Brandeis University is a private research university in Waltham, Massachusetts. It is located within the Greater Boston area. Founded in 1948 as a non-sectarian, coeducational University, Brandeis was established on the site of the former Middlesex University. The university is named after Louis Brandeis, a former Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
Edward James Martin Koppel is a British-born American broadcast journalist, best known as the anchor for Nightline, from the program's inception in 1980 until 2005.
Nightline is ABC News' late-night television news program broadcast on ABC in the United States with a franchised formula to other networks and stations elsewhere in the world. Created by Roone Arledge, the program featured Ted Koppel as its main anchor from March 1980 until his retirement in November 2005. Its ongoing rotating anchors are Byron Pitts and Juju Chang. Nightline airs weeknights from 12:37 to 1:07 a.m., Eastern Time, after Jimmy Kimmel Live!, which had served as the program's lead-out from 2003 to 2012.
Mitchell David Albom is an American author, journalist, and musician. As of 2021, he has sold 40 million books worldwide. Having achieved national recognition for sports writing in his early career, he turned to writing inspirational stories and themes—a preeminent early one being Tuesdays with Morrie—themes that now weave their way through his books, plays, and films and stage plays.
The Five People You Meet In Heaven is a 2003 novel by Mitch Albom. It follows the life and death of a ride mechanic named Eddie, who is killed in an amusement park accident and sent to heaven, where he encounters five people who had a significant impact on him while he was alive. It was published by Hyperion and remained on the New York Times Best Seller list for 95 weeks.
Morris S. Schwartz was an American professor of sociology at Brandeis University and an author. He was the subject of the best-selling book Tuesdays with Morrie, written by Mitch Albom, a former student of Schwartz. He was portrayed by Jack Lemmon in the 1999 television film adaptation of the book.
A Jewish Buddhist is a person with a Jewish background who believes in the tenets of a form of Buddhism.
A living funeral, also called a pre-funeral, is a funeral held for a living person. It may be important to the person's psychological state and also that of the dying person's family to attend the living funeral. It is also sometimes used as a time to read the will and explain the reasons behind some of the decisions contained within it.
Philip Elliot Slater was an American sociologist and writer. He was the author of the bestselling 1970 book on American culture, The Pursuit of Loneliness (1970) and of numerous other books and articles.
For One More Day is a 2006 philosophical novel by Mitch Albom. Like his previous works, it features mortality as a central theme. The book tells the story of a troubled man and his mother, and explores how people might use the opportunity to spend a day with a lost relative.
Stephen Scott Bell was an American journalist and educator. He was news anchor of the ABC News programs Good Morning America and World News This Morning, and a professor emeritus of telecommunications at Ball State University.
Broadway Books, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a Division of Random House, Inc., released its first list in Fall, 1996. Broadway was founded in 1995 as a unit of Bantam Doubleday Dell a unit of Bertelsmann. Bertelsmann acquired Random House in 1998 and merged Broadway into a combined group with Doubleday the next year. Random House reorganized again in 2008, with Doubleday moving to Knopf and Broadway moving to its current home at Crown. Broadway's general-interest publishing was combined with Crown in 2010. Broadway became the paperback publisher for the Crown imprint in 2010.
Tuesdays with Morrie is a 1999 American biographical drama television film directed by Mick Jackson and written by Thomas Rickman, based on journalist Mitch Albom's 1997 memoir of the same title. In the film, Albom bonds with his former professor, Morrie Schwartz, who is dying of ALS, over a series of visits.
"Thursdays with Abie" is the ninth episode of the twenty-first season of the American animated television series The Simpsons. In this episode, Grampa meets a human interest journalist who writes and publishes Grampa's life stories, which makes Homer jealous. While giving his story of Mr. Burns to the newspaper, he finds out that the journalist plots to kill Grampa. Meanwhile, Bart is forced to care for a stuffed lamb as part of a class project and gives the lamb to Lisa.
Rabbi Albert L. Lewis was a leading American Conservative rabbi, scholar, and author; President of the Rabbinical Assembly (RA), the international organization of Conservative rabbis; and Vice-President of The World Council of Synagogues. In 2009, the award-winning author, Mitch Albom, wrote about Lewis, his childhood rabbi, as the main character in the non-fiction book, Have a Little Faith. The book, hailed as a story of faith that inspires faith in others, concludes with the eulogy that Albom delivered at Lewis's funeral, on February 12, 2008.
Have a Little Faith is a 2009 non-fiction book by Mitch Albom, author of previous works that include Tuesdays with Morrie and The Five People You Meet in Heaven. It is based on two separate sets of conversations that took place between the author and members of the clergy: a rabbi in a relatively affluent section of New Jersey, and a Protestant minister in a very poor section of Detroit, Michigan.
Samuel Barry is an American author, columnist, publishing professional, and musician.
Paul Solman is an American journalist focused on economics, business, and politics since the early 1970s. He has been the business and economics correspondent for the PBS NewsHour since 1985, with occasional forays into art reporting.
Jose Mari Hontiveros Avellana was a Filipino actor, screenwriter, director, and production designer.
Who was Morris Schwartz, who died in 1995, and what did he have to say that Albom found so helpful? Schwartz came from a family of destitute Lower East Side Russian Jews and became a leading member of the Brandeis sociology faculty. He was a genial fellow, whom Albom describes as looking, in his commencement robes, like a cross between a biblical prophet and a Christmas elf. He loved to laugh and dance, he was irreverent toward those in authority and kind to the underprivileged. He was an inspiration to his students and a loving husband and family man. / Albom's book is divided into chapters that give us Schwartz's attitudes toward death, fear, aging, greed, marriage, family, society, forgiveness and a meaningful life. The professor was not afraid of big statements: Love always wins,Money is not a substitute for tenderness,Once you learn how to die, you learn how to live. One gets whiffs of Jesus, the Buddha, Epicurus, Montaigne and Erik Erikson. Schwartz's advice to Albom boils down to recommendations that he should work less, think more about his wife, give himself to others and remember he has to die. / Unfortunately, such true and sometimes touching pieces of advice don't add up to a very wise book. Though Albom insists that Schwartz's words have transformed him, it's hard to see why, to judge from the evidence in Tuesdays With Morrie. To be told that we should think more of love and less of money is no doubt correct, but it's hard to put such advice into practice unless it is accompanied by some understanding of why we ever did otherwise. Because Albom fails to achieve any real insight into his own previously less-than-exemplary life, it's difficult for the reader to trust in his spiritual transformation. Albom describes Schwartz's effect on others, including him, but never quite captures the effect itself. Despite the obvious charm and good nature of both author and subject, in the end, the exhortations fall flat. Just as a well-meaning statement like We should all live in peace doesn't help avert wars, Tuesdays with Morrie finally fails to enlighten.
https://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/video/july-14-1998-morrie-man-teaches-live-die-48868897 https://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/video/july-14-1998-morrie-man-teaches-live-die-48868897