Author, translator, and lecturer. Born in Romania, he came to the U.S. in 1914. He wrote books on Israel including What Happened in Palestine and Harvest in the Desert. In The Great Hatred (1940) he reached the conclusion that Jews are hated because they taught the world a system of morality which humans have not been able to live up to.

In addition to a number of novels, Samuel produced many excellent translations from Yiddish, Hebrew, and German. These include most of the poetry of Chaim Nahman Bialik and several novels by Sholem Asch. His most popular books are The World of Sholom Aleichem and Prince of the Ghetto, which recreates the stories of the great Yiddish writer Y.L. Peretz.