Breaking Ground: How Jackie Robinson Changed Brooklyn

Alan Lelchuk was born and raised in Brooklyn, attended public schools and Brooklyn College for his B.A. (1960) in World Literature and Stanford University for his graduate degrees in English (M.A. 1963, Ph.D.. 1965). He taught at Brandeis between 1966 and 1981. He has been a Visiting Writer at Amherst College, CCNY, University of Naples, The Free University in Berlin, and Moscow State University. In 2001-2002 he was the Salgo Professor of American literature and writing at ELTE in Budapest. A recipient of both Guggenheim and Fulbright Awards for fiction, his novels include American Mischief, Miriam at Thirty-Four, Shrinking: The Beginning of My Own Ending, Miriam in Her Forties, On Home Ground (for young adults), Brooklyn Boy, Playing the Game, Ziff: A Life?, and most recently, Searching for Wallenberg. He co-edited (in English) 8 Great Hebrew Short Novels, was Associate Editor of Modern Occasions (with Philip Rahv) and co-founder of Steerforth Press. He has been on the Dartmouth College faculty since 1985, lives in Canaan, New Hampshire, is married, and has two grown sons.

Both a biography and history of Jackie Robinson that reinterprets Brooklyn's place in the Civil Rights Movement.