Nora Clemens Sayre (September 20, 1932 – August 8, 2001) was an American film critic and essayist. She was a reviewer of films for ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' in the 1970s, and, from 1981, a writing teacher for many years at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

. She specialised in the

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...

and authored books such as ''Running Time: Films of the Cold War'' (1982) in which she examined Hollywood movie-making in the 1950s.

Personal life

Born in

Hamilton, Bermuda The City of Hamilton, in Pembroke Parish, is the territorial capital of the British Overseas Territory of Bermuda. It is the territory's financial centre and a major port and tourist destination. Its population of 854 (2016) is one of the sm ...

, her father was

Joel Sayre Joel Grover Sayre, Jr (December 13, 1900 – September 9, 1979) was an American novelist, war reporter, and screenwriter born in Marion, Indiana. Early life and education Sayre was the son of businessman Joel Grover Sayre and Nora Clemens S ...

of ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

''; family friends were

A. J. Liebling Abbott Joseph Liebling (October 18, 1904 – December 28, 1963) was an American journalist who was closely associated with ''The New Yorker'' from 1935 until his death. He was known for, among other things, the aphorism "Freedom of the press bel ...

and

Edmund Wilson Edmund Wilson Jr. (May 8, 1895 – June 12, 1972) was an American writer and literary critic who explored Freudian and Marxist themes. He influenced many American authors, including F. Scott Fitzgerald, whose unfinished work he edited for publi ...

. She attended

Friends Seminary Friends Seminary is an independent K-12 school in Manhattan within the landmarked district in the East Village. The oldest continuously coeducational school in New York City, Friends Seminary serves 794 students in Kindergarten through Grade 1 ...

, and was a graduate of

Radcliffe College Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and functioned as the female coordinate institution for the all-male Harvard College. Considered founded in 1879, it was one of the Seven Sisters colleges and he ...

. A mentor was the English critic and book reviewer John Davenport; he had become acquainted with the Sayre family whilst working as a screenwriter at

MGM Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and abbreviated as MGM, is an American film, television production, distribution and media company owned by Amazon through MGM Holdings, founded on April 17, 1924 a ...

, when she was a child, and would later visit the adult Sayre with suggestions of things she should read and about which she should write. Sayre noted "after a dose of Davenport, one was all the more responsive to words—either to classical or contemporary prose, or to the random eloquence of the street... his conversation made one immediately want to go home and write. Hence he served as an igniter: He gave one momentum." She married the economist

Robert Neild Robert Ralph Neild (10 September 1924 – 18 December 2018) was a Professor of Economics at Cambridge University. Robert Neild was born in Hertfordshire in 1924, and was educated at Charterhouse School and Trinity College, Cambridge. Elected ...

in 1957 but the marriage was dissolved four years later. She died in 2001, at the age of 68, in New York City.

Legacy

The Nora Sayre Endowed Residency for Nonfiction was created at

Yaddo Yaddo is an artists' community located on a estate in Saratoga Springs, New York. Its mission is "to nurture the creative process by providing an opportunity for artists to work without interruption in a supportive environment.". On March ...

, an artists' community in

Saratoga Springs, New York Saratoga Springs is a city in Saratoga County, New York, United States. The population was 28,491 at the 2020 census. The name reflects the presence of mineral springs in the area, which has made Saratoga a popular resort destination for over 2 ...

, to support her literary legacy.

Bibliography

* (1973) ''Sixties Going on Seventies'' (

Arbor House Arbor House was an independent publishing house founded by Donald Fine in 1969. Specializing in hard cover publications, Arbor House published works by Hortense Calisher, Ken Follett, Cynthia Freeman, Elmore Leonard and Irwin Shaw before being ac ...

; reprinted 1996,

Rutgers University Press Rutgers University Press (RUP) is a nonprofit academic publishing house, operating in New Brunswick, New Jersey under the auspices of Rutgers University. History Rutgers University Press, a nonprofit academic publishing house operating in New B ...

) * (1982) ''Running time: Films of the Cold War'' (

Bantam Doubleday Dell Doubleday is an American publishing company. It was founded as the Doubleday & McClure Company in 1897 and was the largest in the United States by 1947. It published the work of mostly U.S. authors under a number of imprints and distributed th ...

Publishing Group) * (2001) On the Wing: A Young American Abroad (

Counterpoint In music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more musical lines (or voices) which are harmonically interdependent yet independent in rhythm and melodic contour. It has been most commonly identified in the European classical tradi ...

)

References

External links

''New York Times'' obituary
1932 births 2001 deaths 20th-century American essayists 20th-century American women American women film critics American film critics American women essayists People from Hamilton, Bermuda Radcliffe College alumni Columbia University faculty Friends Seminary alumni {{US-film-bio-stub