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Chaim Potok, Author
He read "B.B.", a short story from his newest book Zebra
and Other Stories. Listening to him gently craft each sentence
you fully "experienced" this story. Zebra is Dr. Potok’s first book for young adults.
He remarked that he found it interesting that young adults were reading
his adult books and thought perhaps it was time to write a young adult
book that adults might read. He did not want to write "fluff"…."there
is enough "fluff" out there. He wanted to write about "real" …life
situations in everyday life. Situations that we are all aware of
whether consciously or unconsciously. Each of the six short stories is titled with
the name of the main character and encompass a wide range of feelings including
helplessness, powerlessness, hope, divorce, trust, death, loss, fear
of abandonment, secrets, boundaries and communication. These
are ordinary and very real people. Dr. Potok skillfully and gently tells these stories with
a quiet respect for the audience and characters, forming no judgements;
allowing the reader to draw their own conclusions. This is
exceptional reading. Chaim Potok was born and raised in New York City.
He began to write fiction at the age of sixteen, graduated summa cum laude
with a B.A. in English literature from Yeshiva University, and earned a
Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Pennsylvania. An ordained rabbi, he served as an army chaplan in Korea
for sixteen months, with, successively, a front-line medical battalion
and an engineer combat battalion. He lives with his wife in a suburb of Philadelphia. Chaim Potok's Bibliography
The
Chosen (1967) received the Edward Lewis Wallant Award.
October 29, 1998
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Chaim Potok spoke for nearly two hours to a extraordinarily
mixed group ranging from elementary school children to senior citizens.