Editing Errol Morris (section)

==Early life and education==
Morris was born on February 5, 1948,<ref>{{cite book|editor-last=Aitken|editor-first=Ian|title=The Concise Routledge Encyclopedia of the Documentary Film|location=New York|publisher=Routledge|date=2013|isbn=9780415596428|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4r8cRrzOavEC|page=660}}</ref> into a Jewish family in [[Hewlett, New York|Hewlett]], [[New York (state)|New York]].<ref name=":0">{{cite web |last=Shapiro |first=Laurie Gwen |date=September 21, 2012 |title=Into Wilderness of Errol |url=https://forward.com/schmooze/163179/into-wilderness-of-errol/ |access-date=2022-12-20 |work=[[The Jewish Daily Forward]]}}</ref> His father died when he was two and he was raised by his mother, a piano teacher.<ref name=":0" /> He had one older brother, Noel, who was a computer programmer.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Berman |first1=Benjamin |last2=Errol |first2=Morris |date=June 17, 2011 |title=Errol Morris: Did My Brother Invent E-Mail With Tom Van Vleck? |url=https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/06/20/opinion/20110620-who-invented-email.html |access-date=2022-12-20 |work=The New York Times}}</ref> After being treated for [[strabismus]] in childhood, Morris refused to wear an eye patch. As a consequence, he has limited sight in one eye and lacks normal stereoscopic vision.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Schulz |first1=Kathryn |date=September 4, 2011 |title=Errol Morris Looks for the Truth in Photography |work=[[The New York Times]] |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/04/books/review/believing-is-seeing-by-errol-morris-book-review.html |url-access=subscription |access-date=2022-12-20}}</ref>

In the 10th grade, Morris attended [[The Putney School]], a boarding school in Vermont. He began playing the [[cello]], spending a summer in France studying music under the acclaimed [[Nadia Boulanger]], who also taught Morris's future collaborator [[Philip Glass]]. Describing Morris as a teenager, [[Mark Singer (journalist)|Mark Singer]] wrote that he "read with a passion the 14-odd [[List of Oz books|''Oz'' books]], watched a lot of television, and on a regular basis went with a doting but not quite right maiden aunt ('I guess you'd have to say that Aunt Roz was somewhat demented') to Saturday matinées, where he saw such films as ''[[This Island Earth]]'' and ''[[Creature from the Black Lagoon]]''—horror movies that, viewed again 30 years later, still seem scary to him."<ref name="singer1">{{cite magazine|title=Predilections|last=Singer|first=Mark|magazine=[[The New Yorker]]| author-link=Mark Singer (journalist)|date=February 2, 1989|url=http://www.errolmorris.com/content/profile/singer_predilections.html |publisher=Errol Moriss |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240112224404/http://www.errolmorris.com/content/profile/singer_predilections.html |archive-date=Jan 12, 2024 }}</ref>

=== College ===
Morris attended the [[University of Wisconsin–Madison]], graduating in 1969 with a Bachelor of Arts in history. For a brief time, Morris held small jobs, first as a cable-television salesman, and then as a term-paper writer. His unorthodox approach to applying for graduate school included "trying to get accepted at different graduate schools just by showing up on their doorstep."<ref name="singer1"/> Having unsuccessfully approached both the [[University of Oxford]] and [[Harvard University]], Morris was able to talk his way into [[Princeton University]], where he began studying the history of science, a topic in which he had "absolutely no background." His concentration was in the history of physics, and he was bored and unsuccessful in the prerequisite physics classes he had to take. This, together with his antagonistic relationship with his advisor [[Thomas Kuhn]] ('You won't even look through my telescope.' And his response was 'Errol, it's not a telescope, it's a kaleidoscope.')<ref name="singer1"/> ensured that his stay at Princeton would be short.

Morris left Princeton in 1972, enrolling at [[University of California, Berkeley|Berkeley]] as a doctoral student in philosophy. At Berkeley, he once again found that he was not well-suited to his subject. "Berkeley was just a world of pedants. It was truly shocking. I spent two or three years in the philosophy program. I have very bad feelings about it", he later said.<ref name="singer1"/>