Irving Wallace (March 19, 1916 – June 29, 1990) was an American best-selling author and screenwriter. Wallace was known for his heavily researched novels, many with a sexual theme. One critic described him "as the most successful of all the many exponents of junk fiction perhaps because he took it all so seriously, not to say lugubriously". Wallace was a blue-collar writer who wrote for a blue-collar audience. Most critics were scornful of his novels' flat prose and pedestrian characters.Wallace's name is not to be found in directories of writers but he possessed the skill to entertain millions and he was seldom pretentious about it.
To be one's self, and unafraid whether right or wrong, is more admirable than the easy cowardice of surrender to conformity.
2
Maybe all my endings are wish-fulfillment. Maybe it's an anti-death thing. If I let the characters be tragic, dead or without hope, then I'd die too.
3
I have ideas that interest people. I tell stories and readers are hungry for stories. What a lovely thing it is to sit down for three nights and be carried away by a book.
4
I am no philosopher. I like to think but I'm not deep. I'd like to write better, to do more sensory writing, better description. I try to write stylistically, but I'll sacrifice a good sentence for a good paragraph
5
Writing a bestseller instantly makes an author suspect in the eyes of critics.
#
Fact
1
Biography in: "The Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives". Volume Two, 1986-1990, pages 863-865. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1999.
2
His son David Wallechinsky was doing genealogical research on the family, and discovered that the family's original last name was "Wallechinsky". It had been Anglicized to "Wallace" by a US Immigration clerk. He was so angered at this that he had his name legally changed to "David Wallechinsky".
3
Writer of bestselling novels.
Writer
Title
Year
Status
Character
The Man
1972
novel
The Seven Minutes
1971
novel
The Prize
1963
novel
The Chapman Report
1962
novel
The Big Circus
1959
screenplay
Have Gun - Will Travel
1958-1959
TV Series written by - 3 episodes
The Texan
TV Series story - 1 episode, 1959 teleplay - 1 episode, 1959
Alcoa Theatre
1958
TV Series teleplay - 1 episode
Yancy Derringer
1958
TV Series written by - 1 episode
Behind Closed Doors
1958
TV Series writer - 1 episode
Climax!
1958
TV Series adaptation - 2 episodes
The Thin Man
1958
TV Series 1 episode
Bombers B-52
1957
screenplay
The Burning Hills
1956
screenplay
Celebrity Playhouse
TV Series based on an article by - 1 episode, 1955 writer - 1 episode, 1955
$12 Million
