Edward M. Cohen Papers

Edward M. Cohen (April 15, 1936 – November 5, 2023) was born and raised in Manhattan and attended the High School of Performing Arts, where his love of theater developed into the foundation of a career. He enrolled at Queens College as a theater major in 1953, during the peak of McCarthyism in America.

In his memoir (Stories for My Grandson, Box 4), Cohen describes the miasma of fear permeating campus during that period of national moral panic, which also led to the Lavender Scare—when the United States government persecuted and fired hundreds of LGBTQ+ employees—and an increase in homophobia amid the general public. In his memoir, Cohen describes witnessing the ostracization of an openly gay classmate at Queens College, at the same time that he was struggling with his own homosexuality.

While at Queens College, Cohen participated in the school’s theater program as an aspiring actor and developed an interest in writing. In 1955, Queens College awarded him a Certificate of Excellence in Playshop (Scrapbook, Box 3), an early acknowledgement of his talent.

Through theater, Cohen met Julia Wolfson, another Queens College student and an aspiring actress. They began dating and eventually moved in together (an uncommon practice in the fifties), in an apartment in Sunnyside, Queens. They married when Julia became pregnant with their first child, a son, Noel (b. 1956). Cohen quit school in order to work, thirteen credits shy of graduating. Shortly after Julia gave birth to their daughter, Joy (b. 1957), she left Cohen and the children.

Single fatherhood was unusual at the time; but despite pressure to give-up his children from family and social workers, Cohen decided to raise them on his own (with support from hired nannies and housekeepers). He found a full-time job with a classical music record company and eventually moved his family back to Manhattan. He continued to write at night after the kids were in bed and started selling some of his stories.

In the early 1960s, Cohen began dating a man who introduced him to New York City’s vibrant but hidden gay social scene. In his memoir, Cohen describes the pleasure of discovering places where he could be fully himself, but details the fear of exposure, and worse. During this time, NYC politicians and police relentlessly hounded gay establishments and their customers, frequently raiding the businesses, and harassing, arresting, and even assaulting the people within. Cohen also describes worrying that his neighbors would become suspicious about his boyfriend’s increased presence in his life and call Child Protective Services. Eventually, administrators at Joy’s school discovered Cohen’s relationship and forced him to end it under the threat of having his kids taken from him.

In 1967, Cohen published his first and only novel, $250,000. Around that same time, he met Susan Simon (b. 1940, d. 2023), through a mutual friend and they began dating. They eventually married in 1969. Susan, a psychoanalyst, set up her practice in Manhattan.

Several years after the Stonewall riots, Cohen began to come out to his family, first to Susan, then a few years later to his children, who were then in their late teens. According to his memoir, around this time, Cohen also started publishing stories in gay literary journals using his real name, as well as embarking on his career in theater as a playwright, producer, and director.

During Cohen’s career in theater, he received the John Golden Award for Cakes with the Wine, a National Endowment for the Arts Directing Fellowship, a grant from the New York State Council on the Arts, and fellowships at the Edward F. Albee Foundation and the Eugene O'Neill Playwrights Conference. He was a director at Playwrights Horizons, and served as the associate director of the Jewish Repertory Theatre in New York City for many years.

In addition to his theater work, Cohen published several nonfiction works, including Working on a New Play, New Jewish Voices, and Plays of Jewish Interest. He also continued to publish stories and essays in literary journals and anthologies. In 2021, he published Before Stonewall, an award-winning collection of stories about “a generation of men whose homosexuality forced them into lives of public exile” (Awst Press, 2021).

Cohen's writing won multiple awards during his career, including the Awst Press Book Prize (Before Stonewall) and the Key West Tennessee Williams Prize (“Peroxide Blonde”).

Cohen died on November 5, 2023.

RESOURCES:

• Angel Rust Magazine, Edward M. Cohen, undated. https://angelrustmag.com/edward-m-cohen. Accessed 15 Feb 2025.
• Awst Press. Before Stonewall, 2021. https://awst-press.com/shop/beforestonewall. Accessed 19 Dec. 2024.
• Cohen, Edward M. Stories for My Grandson, Edward M. Cohen Papers. Box 4. Queens College (New York) Special Collections and Archives.
• Dignity Memorial. Obituary: Edward M. Cohen, 2023. https://www.dignitymemorial.com/obituaries/new-york-ny/edward-cohen-11532525. Accessed 19 Dec. 2024.
• Haynes, Suyin. “You’ve Probably Heard of the Red Scare, but the Lesser-Known, Anti-Gay ‘Lavender Scare’ Is Rarely Taught in Schools.”
• TIME, 22 Dec. 2020, https://time.com/5922679/lavender-scare-history/. Accessed 2 Dec. 2024.
• Legacy. Susan Cohen Obituary, undated. https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/nytimes/name/susan-cohen-obituary?id=54063699. Accessed 30 Jan. 2025.
• Lucille Lortel Foundation. Internet Off-Broadway Database. Edward M. Cohen, undated. http://www.iobdb.com/CreditableEntity/6968. Accessed 19 Dec. 2024.
• SUNY Press. New Jewish Voices, undated. https://sunypress.edu/Books/N/New-Jewish-Voices. Accessed 30 Jan. 2025.