Zangwill, Israel, 1864–1926, English author, b. London. He became a journalist and founded Ariel, a humorous paper. Zangwill wrote Children of the Ghetto (1892), later dramatized and performed in England and America, and Dreamers of the Ghetto (1898), a series of biographical studies. His other well-known works are Merely Mary Ann (1893) and The Melting Pot (1914), both dramatized. A prominent Zionist (see Zionism Zionism, modern political movement for reconstituting a Jewish national state in Palestine.

Early Years

The rise of the Zionist movement in the late 19th cent.
..... Click the link for more information. ), he wrote The Principle of Nationalities (1917) and Chosen Peoples (1918). Uneven in value, Zangwill's novels attempt to portray modern Jewish life.

Bibliography

See biography by J. Leftwich (1957).

Zangwill, Israel

(born Feb. 14, 1864, London, Eng.—died Aug. 1, 1926, Midhurst, West Sussex) English novelist, playwright, and Zionist leader. The son of eastern European immigrants, Zangwill drew on his own experience in Children of the Ghetto (1892), which aroused great interest. His The King of Schnorrers (1894) is a picaresque novel about an 18th-century rogue, and Dreamers of the Ghetto (1898) contains essays on famous Jews. The metaphor of America as a crucible wherein various nationalities are transformed into a new race comes from his play The Melting Pot (1908). He is remembered as one of the earliest English interpreters of Jewish immigrant life.