Barbara Epstein

Barbara Epstein
Epstein in 1993
Born	Barbara Zimmerman (1928-08-30)August 30, 1928 Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
Died	June 16, 2006(2006-06-16) (aged 77) New York City, U.S.
Occupation	Literary editor
Spouse	Jason Epstein ​ ​ (m. 1954; div. 1990)​
Partner	Murray Kempton (until 1997)
Children	2

Barbara Epstein (née Zimmerman; August 30, 1928 – June 16, 2006) was a literary editor and founding co-editor of The New York Review of Books.^[1]

Life and work

Epstein, née Zimmerman, was born in Boston, Massachusetts, to a Jewish family, and graduated from Radcliffe College in 1949. In 1953, she and editor Jason Epstein began a marriage that lasted 37 years.^[2]

Epstein rose to prominence as the editor at Doubleday of Anne Frank's The Diary of a Young Girl, among other books.^[3] She next worked at Dutton, McGraw-Hill, and the Partisan Review.^[2] During the New York newspaper strike of 1963, Barbara and Jason Epstein, together with friends Robert Lowell and Elizabeth Hardwick, founded the biweekly magazine The New York Review of Books, which Barbara called "the paper".^[4] She and Robert B. Silvers became the editors. Barbara Epstein remained at the New York Review of Books as an editor for 43 years.^[5][2]

The Epsteins divorced in 1990; Barbara Epstein lived with journalist Murray Kempton until his death in 1997.^[2] She continued in her editing until shortly before her death.

Epstein died on June 16, 2006, of lung cancer^[5] in New York City at the age of 77.^[6]

Publication

• The Minsk Ghetto 1941-1943: Jewish Resistance and Soviet Internationalism. University of California Press; 1. Edition 2008, ISBN 978-0520242425

References

1. "Barbara Epstein". The New York Review of Books. Retrieved April 26, 2020.
2. Mcgrath, Charles (17 June 2006). "Barbara Epstein, Editor and Literary Arbiter, Dies at 77". The New York Times. Retrieved March 27, 2012.
3. Sawyer, Kem Knapp (September 21, 2006). "Barbara Epstein and 'The Diary of Anne Frank'". New York Review of Books. Retrieved March 5, 2015.
4. Atlas, James (September 18, 2006). "The Ma and Pa of the Intelligentsia". New York Magazine. Retrieved February 6, 2013.
5. "Obituary: Barbara Epstein", The Economist, June 29, 2006.
6. Ashbery, John (June 16, 2006), "Barbara Epstein (1928–2006)" The New York Review of Books . Retrieved August 30, 2006.

External links

• David Remnick, Postscript: Barbara Epstein, The New Yorker, July 3, 2006 - Obituary.
• Obituary, n+1, June 27, 2006