born April 23, 1929, Paris, France
French-born U.S.-Swiss critic.
Steiner became a U.S. citizen in 1944 but spent much of his time in Europe, teaching principally at Cambridge University and the University of Geneva. He studied the relationship between literature and society, particularly in light of modern history, and his writings on language and the Holocaust reached a wide nonacademic audience. Among his works are The Death of Tragedy (1960), Language and Silence (1967), essays on the dehumanizing effects of World War II on literature, After Babel (1975), on the intersection of culture and linguistics, In Bluebeard's Castle (1971), and several works of fiction.