Benjamin Nathans

American historian

Benjamin Nathans

Born| 1962 (age 62–63)
Relatives| Daniel Nathans (father)
Awards| 2025 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction
2003 Koret Jewish Book Award
Academic background
Education| BA, Yale University
MA, PhD, 1995, University of California, Berkeley
Thesis| Beyond the pale: the Jewish encounter with Russia, 1840-1900 (1995)
Academic work
Institutions| University of Pennsylvania
Indiana University Bloomington

Benjamin Nathans (born 1962) is an American historian. He is the Alan Charles Kors Endowed Term Professor of History at the University of Pennsylvania. His book, To the Success of Our Hopeless Cause: The Many Lives of the Soviet Dissident Movement received the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction.

## Early life and education

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Nathans was born in 1962[1] to parents Joanne and Daniel Nathans. His father was a microbiologist who won the 1978 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.[2] After completing his schooling at the Park School of Baltimore in 1979,[3] Nathans earned his Bachelor of Arts degree at Yale University and his PhD at the University of California, Berkeley.[4] Immediately following his graduation in 1984, Nathans spent time studying at the University of Tübingen in West Germany.[5]

As a graduate student, Nathans spent the spring of 1987 attending Leningrad State University as part of the Council on International Educational Exchange program.[6] He also spent the summer of 1989 at Hebrew University of Jerusalem.[7] Nathans finished his PhD dissertation under the supervision of Reggie Zelnik.[8]

## Career

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Upon completing his PhD in 1995, Nathans became an assistant professor of History and Jewish Studies at Indiana University Bloomington.[7] He remained there until 1998, when he became a faculty member in the Department of History at the University of Pennsylvania.[4] As the M. Mark and Esther K. Watkins Assistant Professor in the Humanities, Nathans published Beyond the Pale: The Jewish Encounter with Late Imperial Russia in 2002. The book, which won the 2003 Koret Jewish Book Award, focused on Jews who lived, literally or figuratively, outside the pale of settlement in Russia.[9][10]

Nathans book, To the Success of Our Hopeless Cause: The Many Lives of the Soviet Dissident Movement received the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction.[11]

## References

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1. ^ "Benjamin Nathans, 1962-". Yale University. Retrieved May 19, 2025.
2. ^ "Daniel Nathans, Hopkins sage and Nobel-winner, dies". The Baltimore Sun. November 17, 1999. Retrieved May 19, 2025 – via newspapers.com.
3. ^ "Benjamin Nathans '79 Wins Pulitzer". Park School of Baltimore. May 8, 2025. Archived from the original on May 19, 2025. Retrieved May 19, 2025.
4. ^ a b Nkodo, Julie-Irene (August 7, 2013). "AHA Member Spotlight: Benjamin Nathans". American Historical Association. Retrieved May 19, 2025.
5. ^ "Benjamin Nathans". Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 2024. Archived from the original on January 17, 2025. Retrieved May 19, 2025.
6. ^ "Soviet study improves U.S. image". The Grand Rapids Press. September 9, 1987. Retrieved May 19, 2025 – via newspapers.com.
7. ^ a b "Prof. Dr. Benjamin Nathans". Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies. Archived from the original on May 19, 2025. Retrieved May 19, 2025.
8. ^ ""Refuseniks & Rights Defenders: Jews & the Soviet Dissident Movement"". University of California, Berkeley. Retrieved May 19, 2025.
9. ^ "Benjamin Nathans Wins Koret Jewish Book Award". Penn Today. March 11, 2003. Retrieved May 19, 2025.
10. ^ Guesnet, François (2005). "Book review: Beyond the Pale: The Jewish Encounter with Late Imperial Russia". Jewish History. 19: 235–243. Retrieved May 19, 2025.
11. ^ Hopkins, Earl (May 5, 2025). "Penn Professor Benjamin Nathans wins Pulitzer Prize for general nonfiction". The Philadelphia Inquirer. Retrieved May 19, 2025.

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Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction

1962–1975|

* The Making of the President 1960 by Theodore White (1962)
* The Guns of August by Barbara W. Tuchman (1963)
* Anti-intellectualism in American Life by Richard Hofstadter (1964)
* O Strange New World by Howard Mumford Jones (1965)
* Wandering Through Winter by Edwin Way Teale (1966)
* The Problem of Slavery in Western Culture by David Brion Davis (1967)
* Rousseau and Revolution, vol. 10 of The Story of Civilization, by Will and Ariel Durant (1968)
* So Human an Animal by René Dubos / The Armies of the Night by Norman Mailer (1969)
* Gandhi's Truth by Erik Erikson (1970)
* The Rising Sun by John Toland (1971)
* Stilwell and the American Experience in China, 1911–45 by Barbara W. Tuchman (1972)
* Fire in the Lake by Frances FitzGerald / Children of Crisis vols. 2 and 3 by Robert Coles (1973)
* The Denial of Death by Ernest Becker (1974)
* Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard (1975)

1976–2000|

* Why Survive? by Robert N. Butler (1976)
* Beautiful Swimmers by William W. Warner (1977)
* The Dragons of Eden by Carl Sagan (1978)
* On Human Nature by E. O. Wilson (1979)
* Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter (1980)
* Fin-de-siècle Vienna by Carl Emil Schorske (1981)
* The Soul of a New Machine by Tracy Kidder (1982)
* Is There No Place on Earth for Me? by Susan Sheehan (1983)
* The Social Transformation of American Medicine by Paul Starr (1984)
* The Good War by Studs Terkel (1985)
* Common Ground by J. Anthony Lukas / Move Your Shadow by Joseph Lelyveld (1986)
* Arab and Jew by David K. Shipler (1987)
* The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes (1988)
* A Bright Shining Lie by Neil Sheehan (1989)
* And Their Children After Them by Dale Maharidge and Michael Williamson (1990)
* The Ants by Bert Hölldobler and E. O. Wilson (1991)
* The Prize by Daniel Yergin (1992)
* Lincoln at Gettysburg by Garry Wills (1993)
* Lenin's Tomb by David Remnick (1994)
* The Beak of the Finch by Jonathan Weiner (1995)
* The Haunted Land by Tina Rosenberg (1996)
* Ashes to Ashes by Richard Kluger (1997)
* Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond (1998)
* Annals of the Former World by John McPhee (1999)
* Embracing Defeat by John W. Dower (2000)

2001–2025|

* Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan by Herbert P. Bix (2001)
* Carry Me Home by Diane McWhorter (2002)
* "A Problem from Hell" by Samantha Power (2003)
* Gulag: A History by Anne Applebaum (2004)
* Ghost Wars by Steve Coll (2005)
* Imperial Reckoning by Caroline Elkins (2006)
* The Looming Tower by Lawrence Wright (2007)
* The Years of Extermination by Saul Friedländer (2008)
* Slavery by Another Name by Douglas A. Blackmon (2009)
* The Dead Hand by David E. Hoffman (2010)
* The Emperor of All Maladies by Siddhartha Mukherjee (2011)
* The Swerve by Stephen Greenblatt (2012)
* Devil in the Grove by Gilbert King (2013)
* Toms River by Dan Fagin (2014)
* The Sixth Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert (2015)
* Black Flags by Joby Warrick (2016)
* Evicted by Matthew Desmond (2017)
* Locking Up Our Own by James Forman Jr. (2018)
* Amity and Prosperity by Eliza Griswold (2019)
* The End of the Myth by Greg Grandin / The Undying by Anne Boyer (2020)
* Wilmington's Lie by David Zucchino (2021)
* Invisible Child by Andrea Elliott (2022)
* His Name Is George Floyd by Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa (2023)
* A Day in the Life of Abed Salama by Nathan Thrall (2024)
* To the Success of Our Hopeless Cause: The Many Lives of the Soviet Dissident Movement by Benjamin Nathans (2025)

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