The Magic Barrel

Bernard Malamud (1914–1986) was an American novelist and short story writer renowned for his parables of Jewish immigrant life, with notable works including The Natural (1952), The Assistant (1957), The Magic Barrel (1958), and The Fixer (1966). He won the National Book Award for The Magic Barrel (1959) and both the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize for The Fixer (1967). Born in Brooklyn to Russian Jewish immigrants, he taught at Oregon State University and Bennington College while building his literary career.