Those years at Georgetown were probably the best years of my life, Blatty said in 2015. He attended Brooklyn Preparatory, a Jesuit school, on a scholarship and graduated as class valedictorian in 1946. He later attended Georgetown University on a scholarship, where he earned his bachelor's degree in English in 1950. 'Eviction was the order of the day.' Blatty's mother died in 1967. Roosevelt when the President was cutting the ribbon for the Queens–Midtown Tunnel, telling him, 'For when you have company.' He lived at 28 different addresses during his childhood because of nonpayment of rent. 'We never lived at the same address in New York for longer than two or three months at a time,' Blatty told The Washington Post in 1972. After service in the air force, he worked for the United States Information Agency in Beirut.īlatty was born on January 7, 1928, in New York City. He was the fifth and youngest child of Lebanese immigrants, Mary (née Mouakad), a devout Catholic and the niece of a bishop, and Peter Blatty, a cloth cutter. His parents separated when he was a toddler. He was raised in what he described as 'comfortable destitution' by his deeply religious mother, whose sole support came from peddling homemade quince jelly in the streets of Manhattan she once offered a jar of it to Franklin D. Following completion of his master's degree in 1954, he joined the United States Air Force, where he worked in the Psychological Warfare Division. Two years later, Blatty adapted the novel into a film of the same title and won Best Screenplay at the 38th Golden Globe Awards.īorn and raised in New York City, Blatty received his bachelor's degree in English from Georgetown University in 1950, and his master's degree in English literature from the George Washington University.

After the success of The Exorcist, Blatty reworked Twinkle, Twinkle, 'Killer' Kane! (1960) into a new novel titled The Ninth Configuration, published in 1978. He was the original writer of the novels, Exorcist and Legion. He also wrote and directed the Exorcist III. William Peter Blatty was the famed writer and producer of The Exorcist and its film adaptation. “ We mourn the blossoms of May because they are to whither but we know that May is one day to have its revenge upon November, by the revolution of that solemn circle which never stops-which teaches us in our height of hope, ever to be sober, and in our depth of desolation, never to despair.”

William Peter Blatty on 'The Exorcist': From Novel to Film

Legion blatty novel