Anna Quindlen

In 1999, she joined Newsweek, writing a bi-weekly column until she announced her semi-retirement in the May 18, 2009, issue of the magazine. Quindlen is known as a critic of what she perceives to be the fast-paced and increasingly materialistic nature of modern American life. Much of her personal writing centers on her mother, who died from ovarian cancer, when Quindlen was 19 years old.

In 1999, Villanova University invited Anna Quindlen to deliver the annual commencement address. But once the announcement was made, a group of pro-life students planned a protest against Quindlen's positions on reproductive rights and she withdrew as speaker. The following year, however, she spoke at Villanova's graduation.

She has written nine novels, two of which have been adapted into motion pictures. One True Thing was made into a feature film in 1998. It starred Meryl Streep, who received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress. Black and Blue and Blessings were made into television movies in 1999 and 2003, respectively.

Anna Quindlen left journalism in 1995 to become a full-time novelist.

In 1994, her semi-autobiographical novel was published, titled One True Thing. The book focuses on the relationship between a young woman and her mother who is dying from cancer. In real life, Quindlen's mother, Prudence Quindlen died in 1972 while in her 40s from ovarian cancer. At the time Quindlen was a college student, but would come home to take care of her mother. In 1998, a film of the same name was released. The movie starred Meryl Streep and Renée Zellweger as Kate and Ellen Gulden, fictional versions of Prudence and Anna Quindlen. Streep was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance.

Her New York Times column, Public and Private, won the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary in 1992. She began her journalism career in 1974 as a reporter for the New York Post. Between 1977 and 1994 she held several posts at The New York Times. Her semi-autobiographical novel One True Thing (1994) served as the basis for the 1998 film starring Meryl Streep and Renée Zellweger.

Writing in The New Republic, critic Lee Siegel cited Quindlen as an example of the "monsters of empathy" who "self subjugate and domesticate and assimilate every distant tragedy." He coined the term "The Quindlen Effect" to describe this phenomenon and suggested that it began with her Times column of December 13, 1992, in which Quindlen assailed the four alleged perpetrators of the Glen Ridge rape. "True to her niche," Siegel wrote, "Quindlen attacked with scathing indignation actions that no sane Times reader would ever defend." Siegel also referred to Barbara Kingsolver in the same essay, along with Quindlen, derisively as "Nice Queens."

Anna Marie Quindlen (born July 8, 1952) is an American author, journalist, and opinion columnist.

Anna Quindlen was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on July 8, 1952, the daughter of Prudence (née Pantano, 1928–1972) and Robert Quindlen. Her father was Irish American and her mother was Italian American. Quindlen graduated in 1970 from South Brunswick High School in South Brunswick, New Jersey and then attended Barnard College, from which she graduated in 1974. She is married to New Jersey attorney Gerald Krovatin, whom she met while in college. Their sons Quindlen Krovatin and Christopher Krovatin are published authors, and daughter Maria is an actress, comedian and writer.