Carolyn Gold Heilbrun

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Carolyn Gold Heilbrun (January 13, 1926 in East Orange, New Jersey – October 9, 2003 in New York City) was an American academic and prolific feminist author of both important academic studies and popular mystery novels under the pen name of Amanda Cross.[1]

Contents

[edit] Career

Heilbrun attended graduate school in English literature at Columbia University, receiving her M.A. in 1951 and Ph.D in 1959. Among her most important mentors were Columbia professors Jacques Barzun and Lionel Trilling, while Clifton Fadiman was an important inspiration: she wrote about these three in her final non-fiction work, When Men Were the Only Models We Had: My Teachers Barzun, Fadiman, Trilling (2002).

Heilbrun taught English at Columbia for more than three decades (1960-1993). She was the first woman to receive tenure in Columbia's English department (not unlike Trilling, who had become the first tenured Jew in that department less than two decades earlier). Her academic specialty was British modern literature, with a particular interest in the Bloomsbury Group. Her academic books include the feminist study Writing a Woman's Life (1988). Upon her retirement in 1997, she was Avalon Foundation Professor in the Humanities Emerita at Columbia.

[edit] Kate Fansler Mystery Novels

She was the author of fourteen Kate Fansler mysteries, written under the name Amanda Cross. Fansler, like Heilbrun, was an English professor. Heilbrun kept her second career as a mystery novelist secret in order to protect her academic career, until a fan discovered "Amanda Cross"'s true identity through copyright records. The novels, all set in academia, often were an outlet for Heilbrun's view on feminism, academic politics, and other political issues. Death in a Tenured Position (set at Harvard University) was particularly harsh in its criticism of the academic establishment's treatment of women.

[edit] Life

Heilbrun was born in East Orange, New Jersey to Archibald Gold and Estelle Roemer Gold, and moved to Manhattan as a child.[1] She graduated from Wellesley College in 1947 at the top of her class. She married James Heilbrun (1923-2008) during World War II, and they had three children. Heilbrun committed suicide at her apartment in New York City in 2003. According to her son (novelist Robert Heilbrun) she was not ill, but felt that her life had been completed. A nearby note read "The journey is over. Love to all."

[edit] Bibliography

Cover of the 1966 Avon Books paperback edition of In the Last Analysis by Amanda Cross (Pseudonym of Carolyn G. Heilbrun). Cover art by Robert Abbett.

[edit] Kate Fansler Mysteries

  • In The Last Analysis (1964)
  • The James Joyce Murder (1967)
  • Poetic Justice (1970)
  • The Theban Mysteries (1971)
  • The Question of Max (1976)
  • Death in a Tenured Position (1981, Nero Award winner)
  • Sweet Death, Kind Death (1984)
  • No Word From Winifred (1986)
  • A Trap for Fools (1989)
  • The Players Come Again (1990)
  • An Imperfect Spy (1995)
  • The Puzzled Heart (1998)
  • Honest Doubt (2000)
  • The Edge of Doom (2002)

[edit] Non-Fiction, Academic Publications

In addition to her mystery novels, Heilbrun was the author of 14 nonfiction books, including the feminist study Writing a Woman's Life (1988). These books include:

  • The Garnett Family (1961)
  • Toward a Recognition of Androgyny (1973)
  • Lady Ottoline's Album (1976) (editor)
  • Reinventing Womanhood (1979)
  • The Representation of Women in Fiction (1983) (co-editor)
  • Writing a Woman's Life (1988)
  • Hamlet's Mother and Other Women (1990) (collection of essays)
  • The Education of a Woman: The Life of Gloria Steinem (1995)
  • The Last Gift of Time: Life Beyond Sixty (1997) ISBN 0-345-42295-3
  • When Men Were the Only Models We Had: My Teachers Barzun, Fadiman, Trilling (2002) ISBN 0-8122-3632-7

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b MccFadden, Robert D. "Carolyn Heilbrun, Pioneering Feminist Scholar, Dies at 77", The New York Times, October 11, 2003. Accessed December 18, 2007.

[edit] External links

[edit] Papers

[edit] Articles

[edit] Obituaries

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