Hebrew College professor Nehemia Polen and longtime Prozdor instructor and distinguished alumnus Norman Finkelstein each received a 2002 National Jewish Book Award in a ceremony at the Center for Jewish History in New York City on October 30.

Their books were among the 15 works honored this year by the Jewish Book Council, which reviewed over 400 entries. Founded in 1943, the Council presents the awards—considered the most prestigious in the field of Jewish literature—to North American and Israeli authors to honor excellence, either for one book or for a lifetime of achievement.

Dr. Nehemia Polen, Professor of Jewish Thought, received the award in the autobiography and memoir category for The Rebbe's Daughter: Memoir of a Hasidic Childhood (Jewish Publication Society, 2002), his edited and annotated translation of Malkah Shapiro's memoir. The book offers a rare glimpse into the life of an 11-year-old girl—the daughter of the Rebbe of Kozienice—who grew up in early-20th-century Poland. (See book excerpt.) A sought-after lecturer and teacher, Polen directs Hebrew College's new Hasidic Text Institute. In 1998–99, he was a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellow, working on the writings of Malkah Shapiro, which led to his translation and now publication of her story.

Winner in the children's literature category, Norman Finkelstein's Forged in Freedom: Shaping the Jewish-American Experience (Jewish Publication Society, 2002) chronicles in words and photographs the growth of the Jewish community in the United States and its contributions to American culture, politics and economics in the 20th century. Finkelstein (P'57, BJEd'61, MA'86), is a teacher, librarian and prolific author who has served on the Prozdor faculty for 22 years. The 1989 recipient of Hebrew College's Louis Hillson Memorial Award for outstanding service as an educator in a Jewish school, he also won the 1999 National Jewish Book Award for Heeding the Call: Jewish Voices in America's Civil Rights Struggle.

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