[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 97 (Friday, June 27, 2003)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1393-E1394]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        TRIBUTE TO LEON M. URIS

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. TOM LANTOS

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, June 26, 2003

  Mr. LANTOS. Mr. Speaker, I rise to pay tribute to the life and memory 
of Leon Marcus Uris, the novelist and screenwriter who touched the 
lives of millions around the world. His unfortunate passing this week 
is a devastating loss to the world of literature and cinema and to 
thinking people and humanitarians everywhere.
  The author of more than a dozen books and several screenplays, Leon 
Uris was best known for his Gunfight at O.K. Corral, which was 
universally heralded as an archetypal Hollywood Western, and his moving 
and humane account of the birth of the State of Israel, Exodus.
  Mr. Speaker, Exodus became an international sensation immediately 
upon its publication in 1958, and was made into an enormously popular 
and critically acclaimed film two years later. Mr. Uris's Exodus is the 
story of the struggles and spirit of the Jewish people, a people who, 
persecuted and murdered in Europe, emerged from the Holocaust and fled 
and were expelled from hostile Islamic and Arab societies in the late 
1940s and early 1950s to establish a state in their historic homeland, 
Israel, on land granted to them by the United Nations. I encourage all 
Members who have not yet read Exodus to read this eloquent and 
emotional account of a people's struggle for survival and freedom.
  As a Jew who personally fought the Nazi occupation of Hungary and 
survived the Holocaust, I was deeply moved by Mr. Uris's books, many of 
which highlighted historical events of Jewish concern and the poignant 
and ongoing struggle for the survival of the State of Israel. Yet it 
would be unfair to pigeonhole him as a man concerned exclusively with 
Jewish issues. Mr. Uris was an unabashed champion of freedom and 
democracy, not just for Jews but for the Irish and oppressed groups 
worldwide whom he wrote and cared about.
  Mr. Speaker, Exodus was Leon Uris's magnum opus and it was translated 
into dozens of languages and distributed clandestinely throughout the 
Soviet Union, where it became known in dissident circles simply as 
``The Book'' and helped generate resistance against the Communist 
regime. The film version, directed by Otto Preminger and starring Eva 
Marie Saint and Paul Newman, drew attention to the plight of the State 
of Israel, a vibrant democracy and ally of the United States under 
assault from all sides. After enjoying success beyond all expectations 
both as a book and as a film, Exodus was reincarnated as a Broadway 
musical in 1971.
  Many of Mr. Uris's books were sympathetic war novels, imbued with 
tales of courage and daring, as well as intrigue and romance. In 
addition to Exodus, I was especially moved by Mila 18, a heroic story 
he wrote in 1961 about the Warsaw ghetto uprising during World War II.
  Leon Uris was an unusually creative and thorough practitioner of his 
craft. The New York Times noted in its obituary yesterday that in 
``preparing to write Exodus . . . [Mr. Uris] read nearly 300 books, 
underwent a physical-

[[Page E1394]]

training program in preparation for about 12,000 miles of travel within 
Israel and interviewed more than 1,200 people.'' The child of a first-
generation Russian-American mother and a Polish immigrant father, Mr. 
Uris's pool of talent was seemingly bottomless, and his spirit 
indomitable, renewed daily by his commitment to the twin causes of 
freedom and justice, and propelled by a quintessentially American-
immigrant zeal. A successful genius who rose from ``hardscrabble 
beginnings,'' the Washington Post wrote in its epitaph yesterday, Mr. 
Uris was a man of uncommon and extraordinary character.
  Mr. Speaker, Leon Uris was one of the great novelists of the 
twentieth century, and has secured his place among the intellectual and 
literary giants of our time. It is with great sadness and deep 
admiration that I bid farewell to Mr. Uris, and I extend my heartfelt 
condolences to his family.

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