Austryn Wainhouse

Austryn Wainhouse moved to Paris in 1949. He is the award winning translator of The Marquise de Sade and The Story of O. When The Story of O was banned, the publisher changed the title to “Wisdom of the Lash.” In 1973, when the US Supreme Court declared Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer to be a work of literature and not pornography, other similar books became legally acceptable. This opened the way for Sade and “O”.

In 1954, his book Hedyphagetica, which was described as a “powerful satire, a ribald comedy…” , was published by Grove Press . In 1970, Austryn was the Writer in Residence at the Salk Institute in La Jolla, California, where he joked that Jonas Salk shamed him into quitting smoking.

His translation of Jacques Monod’s Chance and Necessity: An Essay on the Natural Philosophy of Modern Philosophy won the National Book Award . He has also translated books by French literary figures Simone de Beauvoir, Maurice Blanchot, Pierre Klossowski, Georges Bataille and Jean Cocteau. Ellen Wright , the wife of Richard Wright was his agent. Paris in the 50’s and 60’s was a magical time. Christopher Logue, William Smith, Samuel Beckett, and Richard Seavers, were among his friends and colleagues. His extensive archives have been acquired by Syracuse University.

Deborah Clayton Wainhouse

Deborah Clayton Wainhouse is the Director of the Marlboro Press , which her husband Austryn Wainhouse founded in 1982. At the present time, she is compiling and archiving Austryn’s numerous translations, journals, and personal papers. She has been on both sides of the stage curtain. She is the author of two plays: Pocketbooks and The Peach Panties . As an actress she has received critical acclaim as the character Crooks in Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men . She is author of Flowers in My Basket a chapbook. She is former editor of the Onion Horton Express Magazine and has reviewed books for California State University’s publication: The Lesbian Review of Books . She has served on the Committee of The International Writers Center at Washington University in St. Louis; and has also served on the Board of River Styx literary and Arts Magazine which is in its 37th year of publication.

She has written and delivered numerous speeches and authored many newspaper articles.

Deborah is credited with creating the word womanistics. Womanistics is 1. Study of woman’s ability to thrive in an environment. It endeavors to dissect what challenges her in an environment simply because she is a woman. Womanistics also addresses what aids and what hinders her ability to thrive. 2. Methods used by a woman attempting to meet such challenges. Deborah sees art as a tool of strength and critical thinking.

Deborah and Austryn live in the south of France, where she is caring for him as they struggle with his declining health.