Arthur George Weidenfeld, Baron Weidenfeld, GBE (born 13 September 1919) is a British publisher, philanthropist, and newspaper columnist. He was born in Vienna, Austria.
Weidenfeld attended the University of Vienna and the city's Diplomatic College. Following Germany's annexation of Austria in 1938, he emigrated to London and began work with the monitoring service of the British Broadcasting Corporation. By 1942 he was a political commentator for the BBC and also wrote a weekly newspaper column.
In 1948, Weidenfeld co-founded the publishing firm Weidenfeld & Nicolson with Nigel Nicolson. The firm published several landmark titles, including Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita and Nicolson's own controversial autobiography Portrait of a Marriage. In 1949 he served as political adviser and Chief of Cabinet to Chaim Weizmann.
In 1985, Weidenfeld's publishing interests expanded to the United States, when he acquired the Grove Press in partnership with Ann Getty (wife of Gordon Getty). Grove later merged with the New York division of Weidenfeld & Nicolson to form Grove Nicolson. In 1991, Weidenfeld & Nicolson's UK branch was sold to the Orion Publishing Group and became Orion's main non-fiction imprint. In 1993 the US company, Grove Nicolson, merged with the Atlantic Monthly Press to form Grove/Atlantic Inc.
Weidenfeld's responsibilities therefore no longer include day-to-day business operations, but he continues to work on attracting prestigious authors to his imprints. A notable coup for Weidenfeld & Nicolson came in 2005 when Weidenfeld arranged the publication of Memory & Identity by John Paul II. Weidenfeld also remains active as a columnist for the Hamburg newspaper Die Welt.
In January 2006, the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, originally founded as The Club of Three[1][2] in the 1990s, was established with Weidenfeld as its president. This network-based policy organisation works with global leaders in the private and public sectors to challenge the long-range threats to international and communal peace and to enhance Europe’s capacity to be a coherent and effective player.
Weidenfeld has served in many philanthropic capacities including Chairman of the Ben Gurion University of the Negev (1996–2004), Governor of Tel Aviv University, Governor of the Weizmann Institute, Vice-Chairman of the EU-Israel Forum, and Trustee of the National Portrait Gallery (1988–95).
Weidenfeld, who became a British citizen in 1946, was knighted in 1969 and created Life peer as Baron Weidenfeld of Chelsea in the County of Greater London in 1976. He was appointed Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire (GBE) in the 2011 New Year Honours for public service.[3] Further honors have included Honorary Fellow of St Peter's College, Oxford, Honorary Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford and Honorary D.Litt. from the University of Exeter. Weidenfeld has been married to Annabelle Whitestone since 1992.[4]