Djuna Barnes (/ˈdʒuːnɑː/, June 12, 1892 – June 18, 1982) was an American artist, illustrator, journalist, and writer best known for her novel Nightwood (1936), a cult classic of lesbian fiction and an important work of modernist literature.[2]
In 1913, Barnes began her career as a freelance journalist and illustrator for the Brooklyn Daily Eagle.[3] By early 1914, Barnes was a highly sought feature reporter, interviewer, and illustrator whose work appeared in the city’s leading newspapers and periodicals.[4] Later, Barnes’ talent and connections with prominent Greenwich Village bohemians afforded her the opportunity to publish her prose, poems, illustrations, and one-act plays in both avant-garde literary journals and popular magazines, and publish an illustrated volume of poetry, The Book of Repulsive Women (1915).[4][5]