Gotfryd, Bernard, photographer · Public domain

A novelist who reimagined American history as living fiction, placing invented characters alongside real historical figures in novels like Ragtime, Billy Bathgate, and The March. Ragtime became both a landmark film and a Tony-winning Broadway musical. Doctorow won the National Book Critics Circle Award three times, was shortlisted for the Man Booker International Prize, and was called by President Obama, at his death, one of America's greatest novelists.