Together they began Perspective: A Quarterly of Literature and the Arts in 1947, which she edited for the next twenty years.

(It included poet Howard Nemerov, novelist and critic William Gass, novelist Stanley Elkin, poets Donald Finkel and John Morris, critic Richard Stang, authors Wayne Fields and Naomi Lebowitz, and others.)

[3] Continuing to edit Perspective until it ceased publication in 1975, they are recognized for their role in fostering literary talent nationwide and for publishing early works by Anthony Hecht, W. S. Merwin, Douglas Woolf, and many others.

[citation needed] Van Duyn was a friend of poet James Merrill and instrumental in securing his papers for the Washington University Special Collections in the mid-1960s.

[5] In 1981 she became a fellow in the Academy of American Poets and then, in 1985, one of the twelve Chancellors who serve for life.

[8] She died of bone cancer at her home in University City, Missouri, on December 2, 2004, aged 83.