Career E. L. Doctorow

jason epstein, doctorow s book editor

to support family, doctorow spent 9 years book editor, first @ nal working ian fleming , ayn rand among others; , 1964, editor-in-chief @ dial press, publishing work james baldwin, norman mailer, ernest j. gaines, , william kennedy, among others.

in 1969, doctorow left publishing pursue writing career. accepted position visiting writer @ university of california, irvine, completed book of daniel (1971), freely fictionalized consideration of trial , execution of julius , ethel rosenberg giving nuclear secrets soviet union during cold war. acclaimed, called masterpiece guardian, , said new york times launch author first rank of american writers according christopher lehmann-haupt.

doctorow s next book, written in home in new rochelle, new york, ragtime (1975), later named 1 of 100 best novels of 20th century modern library editorial board. subsequent work includes award-winning novels world s fair (1985), billy bathgate (1989), , march (2005), several volumes of essays , short fiction.

novelist jay parini impressed doctorow s skill @ writing fictionalized history in unique style, kind of detached arresting presentation of history mingled real characters fictional ones in ways became signature manner . in ragtime, example, arranges story include sigmund freud , carl jung sharing ride @ coney island, or setting henry ford , j. p. morgan.

despite immense research doctorow needed create stories based on real events , real characters, reviewer john brooks notes nevertheless alive enough never smell research in old newspaper files must have required . doctorow demonstrated in of novels past alive, s not accessed, writes parini. tell , retell stories, , these stories illuminate our daily lives. showed again , again our past our present, , not willing grapple happened condemned repeat worst errors.

doctorow taught @ sarah lawrence college, yale school of drama, university of utah, university of california, irvine, , princeton university. loretta , lewis glucksman professor of english , american letters @ new york university. in 2001 donated papers fales library of new york university. library s director, marvin taylor, said doctorow 1 of important american novelists of 20th century .