End of an era: Larry Collins, chronicler of world cultures

In 1959, he moved to Newsweek as Middle East editor in New York. He was Newsweek’s Paris bureau chief from 1961 to 1964, when he quit topical journalism to write full-time with Lapierre.

The two were authors of such works as Is Paris Burning? (1965)—a reconstruction of the liberation of Paris—and O Jerusalem! (1972) on the rebirth of Israel as a Jewish state. For their historical works, the writers revisited the sites of some of the 20th century’s most controversial events and interviewed many protagonists and witnesses.

The results usually won critical approval and brisk book sales. Is Paris Burning? was also made into a 1966 action film.

Collins and Lapierre also collaborated on other books, published in both English and French. They included Or I’ll Dress You in Mourning (1967), about Spain and the bullfighter El Cordobes; Freedom at Midnight (1975), about India’s liberation from Britain; The Fifth Horseman (1980), a best-selling novel about nuclear terrorism; and Mountbatten and the Partition of India (1982).

Collins’ first solo effort was a thriller, Fall From Grace (1985). He also wrote Maze: A Novel (1989), Black Eagles (1995) and, most recently, again with Lapierre, Is New York Burning? (2004). —NYT