George Weidenfeld
|
The Lord Weidenfeld GBE |
|
|---|---|
| Born |
Arthur George Weidenfeld 13 September 1919 Vienna, Austria |
| Died | 20 January 2016 (aged 96) London, England |
| Nationality | Austrian, British |
| Occupation | Publisher |
| Spouse(s) |
Jane Sieff (m. 1952; div. 1955) Barbara Skelton (m. 1956; div. 1961) Sandra Payson Meyer (m. 1966; div. 1976) Annabelle Whitestone (m. 1992; his death 2016) |
| Children | Laura Weidenfeld |
| Parent(s) | Max and Rosa Weidenfeld |
George Weidenfeld, Baron Weidenfeld, GBE (13 September 1919 – 20 January 2016) was a British publisher, philanthropist, and newspaper columnist. He was also a lifelong Zionist and renowned as a master networker. He was on good terms with popes, prime ministers and presidents and put his connections to good use for diplomatic and philanthropic ends.
George Weidenfeld was born in Vienna, Austria in 1919, He was the only son of Max and Rosa Weidenfeld. Weidenfeld attended the University of Vienna and the city's Diplomatic College. Following the Anschluss (Germany's annexation of Austria) in 1938, he emigrated to London and began work with the monitoring service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC).
By 1942 he was a political commentator for the BBC and also wrote a weekly newspaper column, coming into contact with General de Gaulle and Tito as a result. Not long afterwards, from 1949, he was away for a year as the political adviser and Chief of Cabinet to Chaim Weizmann, the first President of Israel.
In 1948, Weidenfeld co-founded the publishing firm Weidenfeld & Nicolson with Nigel Nicolson. Intending to start an upmarket political magazine, a mix of the New Statesman, Fortune and The New Yorker, they found that the post-war paper shortage made a book publishing concern more feasible, and the new firm was partly intended as a cover for the impractical magazine. Over the years, the firm published many outstanding titles, including the British edition of Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita in 1959 and Nicolson's biography of his parents, Portrait of a Marriage (1973).
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