Elliseva Sayers:Irish woman Elliseva Sayers, who headed an eponymous New York public relations firm for more than 40 years after leaving a successful career as a reporter in London's Fleet Street, died in hospital on February 27th aged 95. She had been unwell for several months.
Born in Cork to parents who had emigrated from Russia, Sayers overcame many obstacles to establish a career as a writer, her lifetime obsession. She gained acceptance in the competitive world of Fleet Street, eventually becoming a pioneer in the field of public relations in New York, where she established one of the first firms to have international clients after the second World War.
Sayers initiated what were then innovative media programmes for foreign government agencies, such as Japan's, when its export business was critical to economic recovery after the war. Her work with Jetro (Japan External Trade Recovery Organisation), the Japan Trade Centre, Portuguese, Venezuelan and Greek consulates and trade groups proved highly successful, and she found herself in demand by a wide range of businesses including Kent of London, the Guinness-Harp company, Sherle Wagner International, the Hotel George V in Paris and the Swiss Wine Growers Association, among others.
Sayers never left behind her Irish roots. A student of Samuel Beckett at Trinity College Dublin, she maintained correspondence with him and also with George Bernard Shaw. Her account of her friendships with Beckett and Shaw and her reminiscences of Joyce were published in The World of Hibernia magazine in 1995.
As an undergraduate, she contributed regular book reviews to The Irish Times (selling the books after reading them to fund her fashionable wardrobe). After graduating, she was invited to write a bi-weekly column for the Dublin Evening Mail, which covered the fashionable goings-on of society in the recently established Irish Republic. Once the Dublin-Bristol air flight was inaugurated, she moved to Britain, but not before attending a huge party in her honour, which even the lord mayor, Alfred Byrne, attended. Intrepid and adventurous, she worked for a time at the Manchester Daily Express, cutting a dash through the newsroom usually wearing a cloche hat that covered her red hair (she had the fiery temperament to match).
Proceeding to London by train, she worked as a Fleet Street reporter during the second World War, contributing to the Daily Mail, among other British publications, and cultivated lifelong friendships with many well-known figures of the time.
Knowing her admiration for George Bernard Shaw, WB Yeats's sister, Elizabeth Yeats, provided her with a letter of introduction and she paid a visit to him in his London home. This began a fond acquaintance (he had been an absentee student at the same school, Wesley College, purportedly spending all his days in the public library). He agreed to allow her to publish a formal interview with her when she told him she wanted to sell it to buy a new hat. The editor who paid £10 for it afterwards told her he would have paid £100, much to her chagrin.
As a personable, single career woman, she faced many challenges but her keen intelligence, wit and charm helped her eventually become a staff writer for the Daily Telegraph.
Moving to the United States after the war, Sayers continued to write, contributing to publications such as the Saturday Evening Post, Connoisseur and the New York Times magazine. She appeared on numerous television shows and co-produced a radio interview show in addition to running her public relations consultancy.
Eventually she devoted herself to writing full time, producing scripts and articles on a huge range of subjects from gourmet dog food to the legendary life of Princess Nina Mdivani Conan Doyle. Syndicated in the US, Canada and overseas, she retained a lifelong curiosity and love of a good story.
Sayers never stopped writing. Just recently a poem of hers, Why Aren't I Famous and Rich? (subtitled A Disconsolate Reporter's Lament) was set to music and produced for distribution in Australia. Her sense of humour and sometime biting wit was legendary and she maintained extensive correspondence with friends and family.
She was a member of the Overseas Press Club of America, the Foreign Press Association, the English-speaking Union of New York, the British-American Chamber of Commerce and the Wine and Food Society of New York.
The last survivor of five sisters, Sayers has nieces and nephews who live around the world, from the US to Australia, Taiwan, Israel and Ireland.
While she remained a citizen of Ireland, she considered New York her home and although she never married, she was considered an incorrigible flirt even in her 90s.
Elliseva Sayers: born December 28th, 1911; died February 27th, 2007