Natalia Danesi

Natalia Danesi Murray (December 14, 1901 – June 9, 1994) was a Rome-born actress, publishing executive, and book editor who emigrated to the United States in 1924. Her mother, Ester Danesi, edited the Italian women's magazine La Donna, and her son later wrote that as a young woman Danesi was seduced by the soldier and writer Gabriele D'Annunzio. Following her arrival in the United States, she married William Murray, head of the William Morris Agency in New York; the two divorced in 1936, and Murray died in 1949.

During the 1930s, Danesi pursued a career as a Broadway actress, appearing in productions between 1934 and 1938. Her stage credits included the musical Revenge with Music, as well as Spring Thaw and To Quito and Back.

Her professional life shifted significantly during World War II. From 1938 to 1944 she contributed to an NBC radio program that broadcast short-wave news to Italy. In 1944 she served as director of the press bureau of the Office of War Information in Rome, and in 1945 she headed the Special Projects Division of the United States Information Service, also in Rome. By 1946 she was working as a freelance correspondent in Italy.

Murray went on to build a distinguished career in Italian-American publishing. In 1951 she became head of the New York headquarters of Arnoldo Mondadori, the Italian publishing house, playing a central role in bringing American writers to Italian readers. In 1966 she moved to the New York office of Rizzoli Editore as vice-president, a position she held into the 1970s. In recognition of her contributions, the Italian Republic decorated her with the Order of Cavaliere al Merito in 1972.

Murray maintained a close involvement with the work of writer Janet Flanner, with whom she began a relationship in 1940, the year the two met at Cherry Grove on Fire Island. From 1940 to 1944 they lived together in New York City, after which their relationship continued long-distance, with Murray based in New York and Flanner in Paris. Flanner returned permanently to New York in 1975 and was cared for by Murray until Flanner's death in 1978. In 1979 Murray was the main stakeholder in the publication of Janet Flanner's World: Uncollected Writings, 1932–1975, edited by Irving Drutman. In 1985 she edited and annotated Darlinghissima: Letters to a Friend, a collection of correspondence between the two women, describing their bond as a "passionate friendship."

Murray's son, William Murray, later wrote Janet, My Mother, and Me, published by Simon & Schuster in 2000, a memoir about his upbringing alongside his mother and Flanner. The Janet Flanner and Natalia Danesi Murray papers, covering 1940 to 1984, are held at the Library of Congress. Murray died on June 9, 1994, in Del Mar, California, at the age of 92. She was cremated, and her ashes were mingled with those of Flanner and scattered over Cherry Grove on Fire Island, where the two had first met.