Trilling, Diana Rubin

▪ 1997

      U.S. writer (b. July 21, 1905, New York, N.Y.—d. Oct. 23, 1996, New York), was one of the last members of the circle of writers and critics in the 1930s through the '50s that was known as the New York intellectuals. Her social and literary criticism was published in many of the most highly respected magazines, including The New Yorker, Harper's, The Nation, and The Partisan Review. Educated in fine arts at Radcliffe College, Cambridge, Mass., and having married (1929) the critic Lionel Trilling, she began (1941) her writing career after she overheard her husband in a telephone conversation with the literary editor of The Nation, who was seeking someone to write the literary notes column; she suggested herself. For much of the following decade, she read a book and a half a day—some of the most important new works—and produced trenchant reviews. Trilling's political essays reflected the liberal anticommunism she espoused after having been a member of a number of communist front organizations in the 1930s. After her husband died (1975), Trilling edited a 12-volume uniform edition of his work. Her own writings were collected in such volumes as Claremont Essays (1964), We Must March My Darlings (1977), and Reviewing the Forties (1978). Trilling achieved more widespread renown in 1981 with the publication of Mrs. Harris: The Death of the Scarsdale Diet Doctor, a report of the trial of Jean Harris for the murder of her lover. That was followed by The Beginning of the Journey (1993), an account of her married life. Shortly before her death, Trilling finished A Visit to Camelot, recounting an evening the Trillings spent at the White House during John F. Kennedy's presidency.

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