Pulitzer winner Berg '71 to speak

A. Scott Berg '71, a Pulitzer Prizewinning biographer of figures including Charles Lindbergh and Katharine Hepburn, will participate in a discussion tonight with fellow alumnus Roger Berlind '52, a 12-time Tony winning Broadway producer.

The book that launched Berg's career, "Max Perkins, Editor of Genius," emerged from Berg's Princeton experience. During his freshman year, he visited the University's rare books section to pore over F. Scott Fitzgerald's documents, and discovered that Fitzgerald's editor, Max Perkins, had also edited Ernest Hemingway, Virginia Woolf, and other significant writers. Yet there was very little information on Perkins himself.

"Here's a man who literally changed the course of American literature, and there's nothing written about him," he said. "So, I decided to write about him."

The idea turned into a thesis, which Berg worked on throughout his undergraduate career with the help of English professor and Hemingway biographer Carlos Baker.

The resulting 250-page paper won the English department's thesis prize, and the department encouraged him to turn it into a book.

"What the English department didn't tell me is it would take another seven years of work, full-time," Berg said. Baker continued to offer advice, and Berg said that encouragement kept him going.

"That man changed my life," Berg said.

When it was published, "Max Perkins, Editor of Genius," won the National Book Award.

"That book put me on the map — I had not only a book, but a career if I wanted it," Berg said.

He gives Princeton credit for his early success.

"That story could only happen at Princeton," he said, citing the access he had to the rare books collection and the accessibility of world-class faculty like Baker.

Since then, Berg has written biographies of Samuel Goldwyn, Charles Lindbergh (which won the 1999 Pulitzer Prize), and most recently Katharine Hepburn.

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That book was born out of an intensely close 21-year friendship between Berg and Hepburn.

"Immediately after we met she wanted me to write her biography," Berg said. But he knew that with such a close relationship, he could not write an objective story. Instead, he wrote a "biographical memoir" in his own voice, chronicling their relationship and recounting conversations in which Hepburn herself talked about her life.

It was published after her death, as she had wished, and was a spectacular success.

"It became a phenomenon ... It was outselling Harry Potter. Because this woman was such an icon, and deservedly so," Berg said.

Berg's current project is a biography of Woodrow Wilson, who "was one of the three portraits on my wall when I was 15," Berg said.

"I've long wanted to write about him, but I didn't feel ready. He's a daunting figure."

Berg's involvement with the University continues not only through his participation on the English department's Advisory Committee, but also through his own scholarship fund — the A. Scott Berg '71 Scholarship — established in 2001. The scholarship provides students in the English department $3,500 for summer work on a junior paper or a thesis.

Berg judges submissions along with two faculty members.

"Most of them are great ideas for theses or dissertations, and half of them I think are publishable," Berg said.

Berg has high hopes for tomorrow's event, "From Medea to Madonna: Producing for Broadway."

Berg described Berlind, a close friend who also sits on the English department's Advisory Committee, as "the most successful producer on Broadway," but also as "extremely modest." He said he wanted to participate in the event partly because "if [Berlind] is up on stage he'll have to talk about himself."

He hopes to lead the conversation to "the state of the theater today."

"I will throw mostly softballs, but a few hardballs," he said. "It will be an interesting event for anyone with an interest in the theater."