Starling Ransome Lawrence

Starling Ransome Lawrence, known to all as Star, died on Aug. 21 in the hospital at the age of 82, due to complications from a fall in April. Starting as an assistant editor at W.W. Norton in 1969, he rose to become editor-in-chief and vice-chairman during his 55-year career there. Known for actually reading manuscripts in the slush pile, the unsolicited submissions, he found best sellers now and then, such as

Sebastian Junger’s “A Perfect Storm” and Michael Lewis’s “Liar’s Poker.” He fell in love with the Aubrey/Maturin sea-going novels of Patrick O’Brian and brought them to the American audience and accumulated a long list of illustrious authors. Though his managerial role ended in 2011, he continued as an editor and was still working with Michael Lewis and many of his other authors until just before his last illness.

Soon after college, Star and his first wife, Virginia Hornblower Lawrence, traveled to Cameroon to spend two years as teachers in the Peace Corps, getting to explore much of that diverse country during their time off. The experience remained one of the most important and formative in his life.

Star loved Norfolk, spending as much time here as he could from childhood on. Along the way, favorite activities included camping, tennis, golf, hiking and riding through Great Mountain Forest, swimming in Tobey, and, a bit later in life, gardening with a passion, a passion that led to random gifts of just-picked kale, sun gold tomatoes and tender green beans to friends, family and work colleagues alike. Ever interested in local history, especially the remnants that survive on the land, such as old foundations, cellar holes and the dressed stone walls of the industrial past, Star drew inspiration from that history for his own works, the novels “Montenegro” and “The Lightning Keeper.” He also authored a collection of short stories, “Legacies,” and another novel, “The Thief of Words.” He is survived by his wife, Jenny Preston; by his three children, Dune Lawrence, Josh Lawrence and Peter Lawrence; his sister, Susannah Wood; and by his four grandchildren. In lieu of flowers to the family, please consider a gift in his honor to the The Clemente Course in the Humanities, an organization he helped establish to bring college level courses for free to anyone over 17 and able to read a newspaper.