NEW YORK - Robert Loomis, one of publishing's most accomplished and longest serving editors, is retiring. In a memo shared with The Associated Press, the Random House Publishing Group announced Friday that Loomis was stepping down after 55 years with the company, effective the end of June.
Loomis has worked with such commercially and critically successful writers as William Styron, Edmund Morris, Calvin Trillin and Maya Angelou, who has credited Loomis with pushing her into completing her first book, the classic "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings."
"Robert Loomis has been my editor since 1968," Angelou said Friday. "He has guided and encouraged me through 31 books. I can't imagine trusting a manuscript in the hands of anyone else. I am not finished writing, so I cannot let him retire."