The play is currently being revived at Manhattan's Bouwerie Lane Theater. A claustrophobic piece about an abusive mother and her two young daughters, the story was later made into a film, directed by Paul Newman and starring Joanne Woodward. The Effect Of Gamma Rays, written by Zindel in 1965, opened off-Broadway in 1970. After working as a technical writer for a chemical company over "six dreadful months", he spent 10 years as a high school chemistry teacher, writing in his spare time.ĭespite his work as a novelist, it was a play that first won Zindel national recognition. It was here that he took a course in creative writing, taught by the playwright Edward Albee. Zindel claimed that he never read much as a child, and that he wrote for children who didn't like to read.Ī conscientious student, he studied at Wagner College, earning both his undergraduate and master's degrees in chemistry. His mother, a nurse, also worked as a hot-dog vendor and hat-check attendant, and supplemented her income by taking in dying patients as boarders. Born in Staten Island, New York, his father was a police officer who abandoned the family when Zindel was two years old. Zindel's own traumatic childhood provided him with a life-time's worth of material.
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