Doris Grumbach, the novelist, critic, and memoirist whose work frequently dealt with the lives of lesbians, has died at 104, the New York Times reports.
Grumbach, a New York City native, worked as an editor and teacher before making her literary debut in 1962 with the novel The Spoil of the Flowers, which she followed up two years later with The Short Throat, The Tender Mouth. She would go on to write novels including Chamber Music, The Missing Person, and The Book of Knowledge.
She was equally known for her memoirs, including Coming Into the End Zone, Fifty Days of Solitude, and The Presence of Absence. She also wrote a biography, The Company She Kept: A Revealing Portrait of Mary McCarthy.
In a 1994 interview with Charlie Rose, Grumbach talked about first becoming a writer when she was 54 years old.
“I’ve often thought about…how much more I would have written had I started earlier,” Grumbach said. “But on the other hand, I wonder if I would have had as much to write about. I seem to have stored it up, and when the time came, when I thought I knew enough about writing to write, I began to do so.”
Admirers of Grumbach paid tribute to her on Twitter, including former NPR producer Seán Collins, who wrote, “Hers was one of those voices from the early days of Morning Edition -- voices that lifted the broadcast above the fray and gave it real distinction: Michael Harrington, Red Barber, John Ciardi, and Doris Grumbach.”
Michael Schaub, a journalist and regular contributor to NPR, lives near Austin, Texas.
