Elinor Lipman papers

Elinor Lipman was born in Lowell, Massachusetts, the second daughter of Julia M. and Louis S. Lipman. She attended public schools and graduated from Simmons College in 1972 with a BA in journalism. While still in college, Lipman worked as an intern for the "Lowell Sun." During the 1970s she was a staff writer and editorial assistant for the Massachusetts Teachers Association monthly newsletter,"Massachusetts Teacher."Lipman also worked for a time for Boston's public television station, WGBH, writing press releases. She credits the adult education creative writing class she took at Brandeis University in 1978 for propelling her into writing fiction. Her first short story appeared in "Yankee Magazine" in 1981 and after publishing several more short stories, she published a collection of "seven linked stories, which gave [her] the courage to try a novel" (http://elinorlipman.com/biography.html). That novel was "Then She Found Me" (1990) and since then, as of 2015, Lipman has published nine more novels and two collections of essays. Known for her wit and her keen observations of people, her fiction has addressed issues as far-ranging as Anti-Semitism ("The Inn at Lake Devine") and widowhood ("The View from Penthouse B"). Her essays have also appeared in multiple venues, including the "Boston Globe," the "New York Times," Salon.com, and Parade.com. In addition to her own writing career, Lipman has inspired others through her teaching at Simmons, Hampshire and Smith Colleges. For the 2011-2012 academic year she held the Elizabeth Drew Chair in Creative Writing at Smith. For many years, Lipman and her husband, Robert Austin, a radiologist, lived in Northampton, Massachusetts, raising their son, Benjamin Lipman Austin (b.1982). In 2009, after thirty-four years of marriage, Robert Austin died from complications associated with frontotemporal dementia. Elinor Lipman now makes her home in New York City and continues to write very popular fiction.