Israel Zangwill (1864 - 1926) was a British author at the forefront of cultural Zionism during the 19th century and was a close associate of Theodor Herzl. He later rejected the search for a Jewish homeland and became the prime thinker behind the territorial movement. He had already written a tale entitled The Premier and the Painter in collaboration with Louis Cowen, when he resigned his position as a teacher owing to differences with the school managers and ventured into journalism. He initiated and edited Ariel, The London Puck and did miscellaneous work for the London press. Zangwill's work earned him the nickname "the Dickens of the Ghetto." He wrote a very influential novel Children of the Ghetto: A Study of a Peculiar People (1892). The use of the metaphorical phrase "melting pot" to describe American absorption of immigrants was popularized by Zangwill's play The Melting Pot, a success in the United States in 1909-10. When The Melting Pot opened in Washington D.C. on October 5, 1909, former President Theodore Roosevelt leaned over the edge of his box and shouted, "That's a great play, Mr. Zangwill, that's a great play." In 1912 Zangwill received a letter from Roosevelt in which Roosevelt wrote of the Melting Pot "That particular play I shall always count among the very strong and real influences upon my thought and my life."
