Random House's Jason Epstein Remembrance

I have often said that we are not going to be judged by the best thing, or the worst thing, that we do in our lives. We will be judged by those moments, failures and successes in between. And that those who take risks will be at the forefront of failure?and?success. I try now to be outside the 'safe' box of certainty in what I’m attempting to leave behind.

An icon in business and in life died today who lived the way I want to be remembered. You might not know his name. Jason Epstein.

He was the editor for some of the finest American authors of the last century. Gore Vidal. Normal Mailer. Doctorow. Eisenhower.?And, he founded?Sesame Street, with Joan Cooney. And, the?NY Review of Books. And, and, and. He and my sister lived together for many years, and he served as best man in my wedding to H2 (my second husband),?and?he was a large part of my life for a number of years … many years ago. Oh did I mention he was a chef? The dinners he cooked all those years ago remain some of the finest meals I’ve ever tasted. For our five-person wedding luncheon, he made lamb, mashed potatoes, and a rabe. Best meal ever.

Following are some musings I thought I’d share that stand out for me as a man to emulate, not in everything he did, but the passion and commitment he showed to everything he did.

Jason was a thoughtful person, and he worked hard. When I visited their home in Sag Harbor, there were always books lying around that he was editing. One day, I picked up David Eisenhower’s biography of his grandfather and flipped through it. Each and every page contained notes — like,?a lot?of notes — and I suddenly realized that the writers with whom he worked had his voice imprinted in everything they wrote. Vidal. Mailer. Need I go on?

I saw him a few years after his and my sister’s breakup, which was not an amicable, “let’s respect each other” type of ending. He asked how I was doing, but didn’t listen to my answer any more than he had all those times I’d seen him years earlier. My strengths were not of interest to him, so I wasn’t someone (or should I say,?something)?he wanted to invest in. Then he said, “Your sister is still cross with me. I heard she was cross with you too?” He was like that, a person who used words that others wouldn’t have chosen, and they made an impression. In that split second, I added “cross” to my vocabulary, and I still use it when speaking about irritation or anger. Try it; you will like it. On another occasion, I mentioned someone I’d met who had finished writing a book that was being published by Random House. The book was about Twyla Tharp. Jason responded, “He’s a very tall man who wrote a very small book about a very large ballerina.” Words mattered to Jason, and he was enormously talented at putting them together, on the fly.?

Jason had a lifelong quest to create the perfect blueberry muffin. I’d stop by on a Saturday, and there were always muffins on offer for a taste test. He’d pay close attention to what the taster thought — even though, to be honest, they all tasted the same to me. I think he may have written an article about the muffins at some point. He was a clever writer, to be sure, and his topics were always a little off the beaten path, which was part of their charm, and his.?His book about his love of food is titled,?Eating. You won't be disappointed.

One weekend, he arrived at our home for dinner, bursting with excitement over a story he had to tell us. It seems he had brought a dessert fork from the country to New York City to have replacements made, and he was carrying it in his pocket as he arrived at work at Random House on Third Avenue and, I think, 53rd street. He was about to enter the building when some boys formed a circle around him and demanded his watch. (I never thought to ask where everyone else from the building was during morning rush hour, but the details don’t matter.) He didn’t want to give them his watch, so he pulled the dessert fork from his pocket and circled around inside their circle, “brandishing it like a knife.” Yes, he said “brandishing.” The boys decided that whatever kind of watch he was wearing wasn’t worth it, and with the pride of a hero, he showed us the watch his father had given him, still safe on his wrist.?Who would say, “I brandished my dessert fork to protect myself?”

Jason had some terrible times as well. Once, he and Norman Mailer helped get someone, a writer they wanted to champion, out of jail, and a week later, the man killed someone. Jason was hounded by the press, with journalists questioning why he’d had the hubris to think he could tell if someone was a good witch or a bad witch. I saw him the next weekend, and he never mentioned it.?

His dinner parties were famous for providing the literati of New York City a place to congregate on Saturday nights to congratulate themselves on their incredible writing skills. It was not surprising to encounter someone with a book coming out, with the person reviewing said book sitting right next to them. (I should note that Jason’s?New York Review of Books?was founded at the dinner table because he missed the New York Times Sunday Book Review supplement when the Times went on strike for a few months.) I commented to H2 on our way home that I wasn’t sure anyone would pan a book written by their dinner party companion, but truth be told, these were the some of the great writers of our time, and somehow, it didn’t really matter.?

In 1970, Jason had a book published that he’d written about the Chicago Seven. It was called?“The Great Conspiracy Trial: An essay on law, liberty, and the Constitution.”?He wrote it long before Aaron Sorkin brought the issues to life in his highly acclaimed film “The Trial of the Chicago 7.” Jason loved talking about the subject, and when the film was released in 2020, I thought how much Jason would have loved the experience of seeing it, had he been able to.

Jason was ninety-three when he passed away. Ninety-three. I knew him at the height of his success and zest for life. I have no idea what took place in the later years of his life, but I can tell you that the man mattered. The man cared. About a lot of things. He added to my life. Not everyone does. Thank you, Jason. Know that your imprint will sit on the shelves of history in all the libraries of the world. That’s?quite a legacy.?