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Karl E. Meyer (May 22, 1928 – December 22, 2019) was anAmerican-basedjournalist. The third generation of his family to be engaged in that occupation,[1] Meyer's grandfather, George Meyer, was the editor of the leadingGerman language newspaper inMilwaukee, theGermania; his father, Ernest L. Meyer, was a columnist forThe Capital Times inMadison, Wisconsin and then theNew York Post. In 1979, he joinedThe New York Times as the senior writer for foreign affairs, a position he held until his retirement in 1998.
Meyer was born inMadison, Wisconsin. His career in journalism began while as an undergraduate at theUniversity of Wisconsin-Madison. During his junior year, he became the editor ofThe Daily Cardinal, the student newspaper, while serving as the campus correspondent of theMilwaukee Journal. During his senior year, he edited the university literary magazine,The Athenaean.[citation needed] He received his MPA (Master of Public Affairs) from theWoodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs atPrinceton University. After being awarded a Proctor Fellowship, he earned a Ph.D. (in politics), also from Princeton University.[citation needed]
After graduation in 1956, his career in foreign affairs began forThe Washington Post.[1] He also wrote a weekly column from America for theNew Statesman. Meyer won an Overseas Press Club award for his coverage ofLatin America,[citation needed] and duringthe Cuban revolution he interviewedFidel Castro in theSierra Maestra. From 1965 to 1970, he was thePost's London bureau chief where he became a weekly regular onthe BBC and a character in the humor magazinePrivate Eye. In 1968, he covered theSoviet invasion and occupation of Czechoslovakia.[1] Returning home in 1970, he headed thePost's New York bureau.
Meyer was a television columnist and contributing editor ofThe Saturday Review from 1975 to 1979 and a contributing editor ofArchaeology from 1999 to 2005. He joinedThe New York Times editorial board in 1979, where he served until 1998 as the senior writer on foreign affairs and was a frequent contributor to the "Arts and Ideas" section. He was a member of thePeabody Awards Board of Jurors from 1977 to 1983.[2] After his retirement from theTimes, Meyer became editor of theWorld Policy Journal, published quarterly by the World Policy Institute, a position he held until 2008, when he became editoremeritus.
Meyer was a visiting professor atYale University,Tufts University'sFletcher School,Bard College, and the McGraw Professor of Writing at Princeton. He was a Senior Associate Member of St. Antony's College, Oxford and fellow ofGreen College, Oxford University, theWissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, andDavenport College, Yale. He served as judge for thePeabodys, thePulitzer Prize, and theArnold Toynbee History Prize.[3] He was also a member of theCouncil on Foreign Relations and theCentury Association.
Meyer marriedShareen Blair Brysac, with whom he co-authored four books. He had two sons and a daughter.
