Lunch & Learn: The Queen of Bohemia

Join the NYC Department of Records and Information Services (DORIS) each month for our virtual Lunch & Learn Series – an intimate conversation with agency staff and special guests focusing on the collections of the Municipal Archives and Library and the history of New York City.

On Tuesday, January 13, join independent scholar and New York Times contributor Eve M. Kahn for an in-depth discussion of her new book, Queen of Bohemia Predicts Own Death: Gilded Age Journalist Zoe Anderson Norris.

Zoe Anderson Norris was a Kentucky belle turned restless Kansas housewife who became a celebrated writer, reformer, and publisher on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Through her bimonthly magazine, The East Side, she chronicled the hardships of immigrant life, often reporting undercover dressed as a pauper. Guided by her motto, “To fight for the poor with my pen,” Zoe boldly confronted corrupt landlords, charity officials, xenophobic Ellis Island guards, and garbage collectors who ignored the unsanitary conditions that spread disease.

Queen of Bohemia retraces Zoe’s path across the city, bringing to life a New York where many of the buildings that witnessed her activism still stand today. Along the way, Kahn reveals a journalist who blended incisive social critique with a love for the city’s beauty and a deep passion for community.

About the Author:

Eve M. Kahn, a New Yorker since 1984, is a regular contributor to The New York Times as well as publications including The Art Newspaper, Preservation, Apollo, and The Magazine Antiques. Her 2019 book, Forever Seeing New Beauties: The Forgotten Impressionist Mary Rogers Williams, 1857-1907, won awards from groups including the Connecticut League of History Organizations.