Richard Martin Elman

Background

Richard Martin Elman was born April 23, 1934, in Brooklyn, New York, United States.

Education

Elman graduated from Syracuse University in 1955 and received a master's degree at Stanford University two years later.

Career

Early in his career, Elman worked as public affairs director at WBAI-FM in New York City. After a year at Columbia University’s School of Social Work Research Center as a research associate, he joined the faculty at Hunter College for another year. He served at Bennington College as a visiting writer from 1966 to 1967, then he returned to Columbia University as an adjunct professor of writing until 1976. He became the director of the Bennington College Summer Writing Workshop that same year.

He also taught at schools such as the University of Pennsylvania, the State University of New York at Stony Brook, the University of Arizona, the University of Michigan, and Notre Dame University.

Achievements

• During his career, Elman published more than 20 books, some of them reflecting his Jewish upbringing, and three volumes of poetry. His works include novels such as A Coat for the Tsar, Taxi Driver (based on the screenplay by Paul Schrader), Smokey and the Bandit (under the pseudonym of Delmar Hawks), Gangster Chronicles: TV Tie-In (under the pseudonym Michael Lasker, with Richard A. Simmons), Disco Frito, and Tar Beach. Elman also wrote a trilogy about a Hungarian family of Jewish descent. These books consisted of The Twenty-Eighth Day of Elul, Lilo’s Diary, and The Reckoning. His volumes of poetry included The Man Who Ate New York and Homage to Fats Navarro, while his nonfiction work included The Poorhouse State: The American Way of Life on Public Assistance and Uptight with the Rolling Stones. He used the pseudonym Michael Parnell to write Eric Linklater: A Critical Biography and Laughter from the Dark: A Life of Gwyn Thomas. He also wrote under the pseudonyms Fred McShane, Eric Pearl, and John Howland Spyker.

Works

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  • The Menu Cypher: A Novel

    (Professor Robert Harmon, reluctant CIA operative, underta...)

    1982
  • Namedropping: Mostly Literary Memoirs

    (Candid snapshots in prose of literary and other figures--...)

    1999
  • Cocktails at Somoza's: A Reporter's Sketchbook of Events in Revolutionary Nicaragua

    (A journalist describes his experiences in Nicaragua durin...)

    1981
  • Tar Beach (New American Fiction Series)

    (Tar Beach is New York slang for the roof where one sunbat...)

    1991
  • Fredi & Shirl & the Kids: The autobiography in fables of Richard M. Elman 1972
  • The Breadfruit Lotteries 1980
  • Disco Frito 1988
  • An education in blood;: A novel, 1971

Connections

Elman is survived by his wife Alice Elman; their daughter, Lila Elman, his elder daughter by an earlier marriage, Margaret Elman, and a brother, Leonard. His marriage to his first wife Emily Schorr ended in divorce.

Wife:

Alice Elman

Daughter:

Lila Elman

Daughter:

Margaret Elman

Brother:

Leonard Elman

ex-wife:

Emily Schorr