Saul Bellow — writer (nobel) with roots in the Russian Empire
Saul Bellow was a Canadian-American novelist who won the Nobel Prize in Literature (1976), the Pulitzer Prize, and three National Book Awards — the most decorated American fiction writer of the 20th century. His novels Herzog, Henderson the Rain King, Humboldt's Gift, and The Adventures of Augie March defined the post-war American literary landscape.
Tracing the roots — St. Petersburg
Born in Lachine, Quebec in 1915 to Abraham Bellows and Liza Gordon, both Jewish immigrants from St. Petersburg (Russian Empire), Bellow grew up in the Jewish immigrant community of Montreal and Chicago. His Nobel Prize citation spoke of 'the human understanding and subtle analysis of contemporary culture' — qualities forged in the intellectual Jewish immigrant world that his parents carried from St. Petersburg.
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St. Petersburg. At the time, this region lay within the Russian Empire, which spanned from Poland to the Pacific.
A career defined by ambition
"I am an American, Chicago-born, and go at things as I have taught myself, free-style."