Elaine Feinstein was educated at Newnham College, Cambridge and has been awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Leicester. Before becoming a full-time writer, she worked as an editor for Cambridge University Press (1960-62), as Lecturer in English at Bishop's Stortford Training College (1963-6), as Assistant Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Essex (1967-70), and as a journalist.

She has contributed to many periodicals, including the Times Literary Supplement, and was formerly Writer in Residence for the British Council in Singapore and Tromsø, Norway.

Of Russian-Jewish ancestry, she has been influenced by Russian writers, especially Marina Tsvetayeva and Anna Akhmatova.

She is the author of a number of plays for television and radio and several biographies, including singer Bessie Smith, writer D. H. Lawrence, Poet Laureate Ted Hughes and Anna Akhmatova.