#OnThisDay in 1916 American literary critic, essayist, and novelist Elizabeth Hardwick was born in Lexington KY. Hardwick burst into the public sphere with a piece in Harper's in 1959 "The Decline of Book Reviewing", applying harsh criticism to the periodicals of the day. Three years later Hardwick, along with Robert Lowell, Jason Epstein, Barbara Epstein, and Robert B. Silvers founded The New York Review of Books. #HistoryGetsLIT