Beatrice Kaufman

Beatrice Bakrow Kaufman (January 20, 1895 – October 6, 1945) was an American editor, writer, and playwright.

Although chiefly remembered as the wife of director, humorist, and playwright George S. Kaufman, she had a distinguished literary career of her own, and during the 1930s and 1940s, was regarded as "one of the wittiest women in New York" who was "influential in shaping American taste and culture in the early twentieth century".

Although she was admitted to Wellesley College in 1913—a rare accomplishment, at the time, for a Jewish woman—she was expelled during her first year for breaking curfew.

[1] In 1918, Kaufman began her career as an assistant to the press agent for silent movie actresses Natalie, Constance, and Norma Talmadge.

After a stint the following year as a play reader for Broadway producer Al Woods, Kaufman joined the publishing company Boni & Liveright.

During her five years as head of its editorial department, she edited works by important novelists, poets, and playwrights, including T.S.

[1] Both were long-time members of the Algonquin Round Table, and were close friends with many of the most famous literary and entertainment luminaries of the period, including Moss Hart, Frank Sinatra, Yip Harburg, Ethel Merman, Helen Hayes, Irving Berlin, Alfred Lunt, Julius Tannen, Ruth Goetz, Fred Saidy, Russel Crouse, and all of the Round Table regulars.

According to their friend Alexander King, "Beatrice was one of those great, daring women who knows that her husband is having extramarital relations and knows that everybody else knows it, and knows that this can be borne either by throwing fits in lobbies or by being Wife Number One.

"[2] Kaufman died at the age of 50 in their Park Avenue apartment on October 6, 1945 after several years of poor health.