Gavriel Shapiro is Professor of Comparative and Russian Literature at Cornell University. His major publications include Nikolai Gogol and the Baroque Cultural Heritage (1993), Delicate Markers: Subtexts in Vladimir Nabokov’s “Invitation to a Beheading” (1998), (ed.) Nabokov at Cornell (2003), The Sublime Artist’s Studio: Nabokov and Painting (2009), and The Tender Friendship and the Charm of Perfect Accord: Nabokov and His Father (2014).

• Note on Transliteration List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Foreword 1. Ancestry 2. Immediate Family 3. Growing Up in Postwar Soviet Russia 4. Emergence of National Awareness and the Struggle for Immigration to Israel 5. Arrest, Imprisonment, Trial, and Aftermath 6. Life in Israel 7. Graduate Studies in the United States 8. Living, Teaching, and Writing in America Afterword Index

“The story of the struggle of Soviet Jews for self-determination and freedom of emigration is an account of global forces in collision. However, it is also the story of individuals with hopes and dreams and a willingness to risk all they have for the chance for self-fulfillment. Therefore, together with learned analyses of politics and policies, it is important to keep focus on the individual—and there is nothing like an autobiography to do this. Gavriel Shapiro’s Thanksgiving All Year Round is precisely such an account. It is full of fascinating detail, well based self-analysis, and also a fair degree of drama. It is a great read and a valuable introduction to a world that is thankfully gone. The fall of the Soviet Union was far from predictable in the seventies—and this book reminds us of the power of humanity to overcome obstacles that appeared to be insurmountable."

Gavriel Shapiro is Professor of Comparative and Russian Literature at Cornell University. His major publications include Nikolai Gogol and the Baroque Cultural Heritage (1993), Delicate Markers: Subtexts in Vladimir Nabokov’s “Invitation to a Beheading” (1998), (ed.) Nabokov at Cornell (2003), The Sublime Artist’s Studio: Nabokov and Painting (2009), and The Tender Friendship and the Charm of Perfect Accord: Nabokov and His Father (2014).

• Note on Transliteration List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Foreword 1. Ancestry 2. Immediate Family 3. Growing Up in Postwar Soviet Russia 4. Emergence of National Awareness and the Struggle for Immigration to Israel 5. Arrest, Imprisonment, Trial, and Aftermath 6. Life in Israel 7. Graduate Studies in the United States 8. Living, Teaching, and Writing in America Afterword Index

“The story of the struggle of Soviet Jews for self-determination and freedom of emigration is an account of global forces in collision. However, it is also the story of individuals with hopes and dreams and a willingness to risk all they have for the chance for self-fulfillment. Therefore, together with learned analyses of politics and policies, it is important to keep focus on the individual—and there is nothing like an autobiography to do this. Gavriel Shapiro’s Thanksgiving All Year Round is precisely such an account. It is full of fascinating detail, well based self-analysis, and also a fair degree of drama. It is a great read and a valuable introduction to a world that is thankfully gone. The fall of the Soviet Union was far from predictable in the seventies—and this book reminds us of the power of humanity to overcome obstacles that appeared to be insurmountable."

Gavriel Shapiro is Professor of Comparative and Russian Literature at Cornell University. His major publications include Nikolai Gogol and the Baroque Cultural Heritage (1993), Delicate Markers: Subtexts in Vladimir Nabokov’s “Invitation to a Beheading” (1998), (ed.) Nabokov at Cornell (2003), The Sublime Artist’s Studio: Nabokov and Painting (2009), and The Tender Friendship and the Charm of Perfect Accord: Nabokov and His Father (2014).

• Note on Transliteration List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Foreword 1. Ancestry 2. Immediate Family 3. Growing Up in Postwar Soviet Russia 4. Emergence of National Awareness and the Struggle for Immigration to Israel 5. Arrest, Imprisonment, Trial, and Aftermath 6. Life in Israel 7. Graduate Studies in the United States 8. Living, Teaching, and Writing in America Afterword Index

“The story of the struggle of Soviet Jews for self-determination and freedom of emigration is an account of global forces in collision. However, it is also the story of individuals with hopes and dreams and a willingness to risk all they have for the chance for self-fulfillment. Therefore, together with learned analyses of politics and policies, it is important to keep focus on the individual—and there is nothing like an autobiography to do this. Gavriel Shapiro’s Thanksgiving All Year Round is precisely such an account. It is full of fascinating detail, well based self-analysis, and also a fair degree of drama. It is a great read and a valuable introduction to a world that is thankfully gone. The fall of the Soviet Union was far from predictable in the seventies—and this book reminds us of the power of humanity to overcome obstacles that appeared to be insurmountable."