Pathfinding Former Doubleday & Crown Editor-in-Chief Betty Prashker Dies at 99
Betty Prashker. “Foto” courtesy of her daughter, Lucy Prashker.
We remember Betty Prashker. The pioneering woman editor in the then male-dominated publishing community of the late twentieth century, died on July 30 at her daughter’s home in the Berkshires. She was 99.
During her half-century career, she was an associate publisher at Doubleday, and in 1982, became editor-in-chief of the Crown Publishing Group.
Random House Oral History interview in 2001.
At Doubleday, her authors included Kate Millett, who wrote the ground-breaking “Sexual Politics,” Gay Talese, William F. Buckley, and Phyllis Chesler. She launched the careers of Judith Krantz, Dominick Dunne, Jean M. Auel, Erik Larson, and Susan Faludi, as their editor at Crown.
“In all, Prashker is estimated to have edited more than 500 books,” according to Publishers Weekly. In 1998, Vanity Fair cited her as one of 200 Women Legends, Influencers, and Trailblazers.
Prashker’s diminutive physical stature contrasted with the towering respect she commanded from competitors and colleagues alike for the expertise and empathy she brought to supporting her authors and her publishing-team members in achieving their best work. Her no-nonsense determination to overcoming disadvantages for women in the books workplace was matched by a quick wit and good heart.
Tina Constable, Executive Vice President and Publisher in the Random House Publishing Group, who worked closely with Prashker, “Without Betty, there would have been no Crown Publishing as we knew it, with its fabulous roster of authors whose editorial collaboration with her helped them achieve an enormous, devoted readership. I am just one of many colleagues who benefitted greatly from her experience, and from her unwaveringly championing of higher pay for women in publishing.”