Story Highlights
- Historical event:
- 12. March 2001
- It is interesting that Robert Ludlum allegedly attempted to publish his first novel only at the age of 44. Until the end of his life he wrote over 20 novels, of which around 500,000,000 have been sold to date.
American writer Robert Ludlum died on this day in 2001. It is estimated that over 500 million of his books have been sold to date, making him one of the best-selling writers in the world. Ludlum was born in New York in 1927, to English American parents.
It is interesting to note that Robert Ludlum served in the U.S. Marine Corps in his youth, and completed his studies at the respected Wesleyan University.
Let us also mention that Robert Ludlum allegedly attempted to publish his first novel only at the age of 44. His first novel was a thriller titled The Scarlatti Inheritance. The plot revolved around international conspiracies in the time of Nazi Germany, which was generally one of the more recognizable themes in Ludlum’s earlier novels.
Ludlum wrote over 20 novels in total. Today, he is probably best-known among the broader public for his novels from the Jason Bourne series. The first of them was The Bourne Identity (1980), followed by The Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Ultimatum.
Movies about Jason Bourne, starring Matt Damon, which arrived in cinemas only after Ludlum’s death, have thus far made around one billion dollars. However, there also exist earlier film adaptations of some of Ludlum’s novels, including for example The Osterman Weekend (with Rutger Hauer) and The Holcroft Covenant (with Michael Caine).
It is very interesting that Ludlum named almost all his novels according to the formula “The – first name – noun” (e.g. The Bourne Identity, The Matlock Paper, The Rhinemann Exchange). After achieving a very fertile writing career, Robert Ludlum died in Florida on this day in 2001, aged 73.
