Acting
Born
1933-06-14 · 57 yrs
Died
1991-05-03
From
Lódz, Poland, Russian Empire [now Lódz, Lódzkie, Poland]
Known for
Acting
Jerzy Nikodem Kosiński , born Józef Lewinkopf, was a Polish-American novelist and two-time President of the American Chapter of P.E.N., who wrote primarily in English. For several decades, Kosinski was famous as a wit, a great raconteur, and a media celebrity. His first three novels were big hits. However, in June 22, 1982, "Jerzy Kosinski's Tainted Words," an article by Geoffrey Stokes and Eliot Fremont-Smith in The Village Voice, accused Jerzy Kosinski of plagiarism and dishonesty. 'The Painted Bird' was widely considered to be autobiographical; the Voice showed that this shocking tale about a brutalized childhood during the Jewish Holocaust was not after all about Jerzy, who actually lived rather comfortably during the war years. 'Being There', which was adapted as a successful film, was shown to have been plagiarized from an earlier Polish novel.…
