Sybil Claiborne (November 1, 1923 – December 16, 1992) was an American novelist,

short story A short story is a piece of prose fiction that typically can be read in one sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the oldest t ...

writer,

pacifist Pacifism is the opposition or resistance to war, militarism (including conscription and mandatory military service) or violence. Pacifists generally reject theories of Just War. The word ''pacifism'' was coined by the French peace campaig ...

and member of the Board of the

War Resisters League The War Resisters League (WRL) is the oldest secular pacifist organization in the United States. History Founded in 1923 by men and women who had opposed World War I, it is a section of the London-based War Resisters' International. It continues ...

, and antiwar activist. She published stories in magazines like ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issue ...

'' and ''Esquire''. Some of her writing was the basis for a program of comedy-dramas performed in Manhattan in 1978 at Symphony Space. Her collection of short stories, ''Loose Connections'', was published by Academy Chicago in 1988, and a novel, ''A Craving for Women'', was published by Dutton in 1989. Her final book, ''In the Garden of Dead Cars'', nominated for a

feminist science fiction Feminist science fiction is a subgenre of science fiction (abbreviated "SF") focused on theories that include feminist themes including but not limited to gender inequality, sexuality, race, economics, reproduction, and environment. Feminist ...

James Tiptree, Jr. Award The Otherwise Award, formerly known as the James Tiptree Jr. Award, is an American annual literary prize for works of science fiction or fantasy that expand or explore one's understanding of gender. It was initiated in February 1991 by science f ...

, is a

dystopia A dystopia (from Ancient Greek δυσ- "bad, hard" and τόπος "place"; alternatively cacotopiaCacotopia (from κακός ''kakos'' "bad") was the term used by Jeremy Bentham in his 1818 Plan of Parliamentary Reform (Works, vol. 3, p. 493). ...

n novel about a

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

plagued by insects and a

Fascist Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy and the ...

government, was published in 1993. She was close friends with writer

Grace Paley Grace Paley (December 11, 1922 – August 22, 2007) was an American short story author, poet, teacher, and political activist. Paley wrote three critically acclaimed collections of short stories, which were compiled in the Pulitzer Prize and Na ...

who dedicated her ''Collected Stories'' to Claiborne "my colleague in the Writing and Mother Trade... we talked and talked for nearly 40 years. Then she died. Three days before that, she said slowly, with the delicacy of an unsatisfied person with only a dozen words left, Grace, the real question is—how are we to live our lives?"

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* 1923 births 1992 deaths 20th-century American novelists American science fiction writers American women short story writers American women novelists Women science fiction and fantasy writers 20th-century American women writers 20th-century American short story writers {{US-novelist-1920s-stub