SOURCE: Eder, Doris L. “Janet Malcolm's Difficult Pursuit of Truth.” Contemporary Literary Criticism, edited by Jeffrey W. Hunter. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale, 2004.

In the following essay, specially commissioned for Contemporary Literary Criticism, Eder discusses Malcolm's work and career.

Janet Malcolm was born in Prague in 1925, one of two daughters of a psychiatrist. Her ancestors were secular Jews who immigrated to the United States in 1939 and settled in New York City. Malcolm was educated at Manhattan's High School of Music and Art and then at the University of Michigan. Both she and her sister became writers. Malcolm's career in journalism has been tied to The New Yorker, for which she first began writing about interior design and decoration and photography. Later she became well known for her profiles. She was married to Donald Malcolm, who also wrote for The New Yorker and died in 1975; she then married Gardner...