Shechner to Head UB English Department

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Mark Shechner, Ph.D., a member of the University at Buffalo faculty for 28 years, has been named chair of the UB Department of English by Kerry Grant, dean of the UB College of Arts and Sciences.

He is a professor of English, a literary scholar who specializes in contemporary American literature, the work of James Joyce and contemporary Jewish-American authors, particularly Isaac Rosenfeld, a writer and critic of the 1950s and '60s. These topics have been the subjects of his many published essays and journal articles.

Shechner's books include "Joyce in Nighttown: A Psychoanalytic Inquiry into Ulysses," "After the Revolution: Studies in Contemporary Jewish-American Imagination" (1987) and "The Conversion of the Jews and Other Essays" (1990).

He also is known locally for more than 200 book reviews and travel articles published by The Buffalo News since he became a contributing writer in 1983. His literary commentary also appears in The Chicago Tribune and The Jerusalem Post.

Shechner has held positions as a Fulbright lecturer in American literature at the University of Kobe (Japan), visiting lecturer at Doshisha University (Kyoto, Japan) and last year as Fulbright lecturer in American literature at the Hebrew University (Jerusalem) and the University of Tel Aviv.

He frequently lectures to university and community audiences both here and abroad.

A native of Newark, N.J., he received bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of California at Los Angeles and a doctorate from the University of California at Berkeley.

Shechner resides in Buffalo.