Lenore Guinzburg Marshall

September 7, 1897–September 23, 1971

In Brief

A talented writer and poet in her own right, literary editor Lenore Guinzburg Marshall pushed her publishing company to publish William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury after it had been rejected by twelve other publishers. She published her first novel, Only the Fear, in 1935 and her first poetry collection, No Boundary, in 1943, going on to write three poetry collections, three novels, and a short story collection, as well as numerous essays and a posthumously published memoir. She was a member of PEN, the Poetry Society of America, Pen and Brush, the Authors’ League, and the MacDowell Colony. A lifelong activist, Marshall co-founded the Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy in 1956 and was founding co-director of the Committee for Nuclear Responsibility in 1971.

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Lenore Guinzburg Marshall, novelist, poet, and activist, was born in New York City on September 7, 1897. She was the daughter of Harry and Leonie (Kleinert) Guinzburg. A student at Barnard College, class of 1919, where she was an editor of the monthly literary magazine The Bear, and a member of the Intercollegiate Socialist Society, Lenore was described in her class yearbook with the following verse: “Our manner toward her’s friendly / and even rather gracious, / For no one slings / Such odes and things / As does our lauriger Horatius.”

After graduation in 1919, she married James Marshall, an attorney who also served as president of the New York City Board of Education. The couple had two children, Ellen and Jonathan, who became the publisher of the Scottsdale, Arizona, Daily Progress.

From 1929 to 1932, Marshall worked as an editor at the publishing firm of Cape and Smith, where she convinced her company to take a chance on William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury, which had been rejected by twelve other publishers. She served as the poetry editor of American Mercury in 1938 and during World War II was active in the founding of children’s writing clubs in the New York City public schools. Throughout her career, she contributed articles and reviews to New York literary magazines. A poet in her own right, Marshall published No Boundary (1943), Other Knowledge (1957), and Latest Will (1969). She wrote the novels Only the Fear (1955), Hall of Mirrors (1937), and The Hill Is Level (1959). The last of these was the story of three generations of mothers and their daughters in a quest for personal emancipation and happiness. Unknown Artists was published in 1947; The Confrontation and Other Stories appeared in 1972, shortly after Marshall’s death; and Invented a Person: The Personal Record of a Life was published in 1979. Marshall was a member and director of PEN, the Poetry Society of America, Pen and Brush, the Authors’ League, and the MacDowell Colony in Peterborough, New Hampshire. In 1957, a selection of her poems was recorded on the Spoken Arts label.

Marshall’s social concern and political activism were perhaps as important to her career as her literary accomplishments. A member of the Post-War World Council from 1940 to 1962, Marshall expressed profound concerns for the fate of humanity in the wake of world war. She was a founder, in 1956, and member to her death of the Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy. In 1971, she helped to found and was co-director, with nuclear physicist Charles E. Goodell, of the Committee for Nuclear Responsibility, an organization committed to enhancing public awareness of the dangers of nuclear power. This group targeted as especially dangerous the use of nuclear power for generating electricity and the reliance on nuclear weapons as a major component in foreign policy and national security.

Throughout her life, Marshall championed independence of spirit, both literary and political, and she worked consciously and tirelessly in the literary and political realms for the betterment of humanity. Lenore Guinzburg Marshall died on September 23, 1971, at age 72 the Doylestown (Pennsylvania) Hospital after suffering an embolism.