Emily Hahn

Born in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1905, Emily Hahn became one of the most distinctive American writers of the 20th century. She studied at the University of Wisconsin and built a reputation for doing things the hard way, traveling widely and writing from direct experience rather than from a safe distance.

Her life took her across the world, including time in Africa and China, and those years shaped much of her journalism and nonfiction. She became closely associated with The New Yorker and produced a remarkable body of work over her career, including dozens of books as well as many articles and stories.

Hahn died in 1997 in Manhattan. She is often remembered not just for how much she wrote, but for the independence and fearlessness that ran through both her life and her work.