Lee Israel
Leonore (variously spelled Lenore) Carol Israel (December 3, 1939 - December 24, 2014) was a noted author, literary forger and thief. She went by the name Lee Israel.
Biography
Israel was born in New York City and graduated in 1961 from Brooklyn College. She began a career as a freelance writer in the 1960s that continued into the 1970s. In the 1970s and 1980s she wrote biographies of actress Tallulah Bankhead, journalist and game show panelist Dorothy Kilgallen and cosmetics tycoon Estée Lauder. The biography of Kilgallen was well received and made it onto the New York Times Best Sellers List. However her biography of Lauder was panned and proved a commercial failure. Following this her career went into a decline compounded by alcoholism and a personality that some found difficult.[1][2]
She is, however, best remembered for her serial forgery of letters from celebrities, estimated at over 400, and her theft of actual letters and autographed papers of famous persons from archives and libraries which began in the early 1990s. When stealing original papers she would replace them with forged copies. She sold both forged and stolen original works. This went on for a little over a year before Israel was arrested. In June 1993 Israel plead guilty to conspiracy to transport stolen property, for which she served six months under house arrest and five years probation. Israel later expressed pride in her criminal accomplishments, especially the forgeries.[1][2][3]
Lee Israel died on December 24, 2014 from myeloma in New York City. According to the New York Times she had lived alone and had no children.[1]
References
- ^ a b c "Lee Israel, a Writer Proudest of Her Literary Forgeries, Dies at 75". New York Times. 7 January 2015. Retrieved 8 January 2015. Cite error: The named reference "New York Times" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
- ^ a b Jennifer Champagne (8 January 2015). "Lee Israel 1939-2014". Paste. Retrieved 8 January 2015.
- ^ "Instances of literary forgery". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 8 January 2015.