Novelist, playwright, poet, essayist, Alfred Doblin was one of the most prolific writers of his time. He was also a practicing physician in Berlin's working-class district of Alexanderplatz. His novel of this name (1930) is considered his best work, and represents, in its montage technique, Doblin's experimental attitude toward prose writing. Doblin fled the Nazi regime in 1933 and lived for a while in the United States. Later, he became a French citizen and a convert to the Roman Catholic Church.