April 19, 1983

Braniff International left the door open yesterday for further negotiations to revive part of the airline while meeting a court deadline to submit a plan of reorganization. The plan, which was filed in a bankruptcy court in Fort Worth, calls for liquidation of most of Braniff's assets, leaving only a small company that would provide ground services employing about 200 people and with sales of about $12 million a year. However, the plan also states that the board of directors will continue until May 16 ''to develop and propose a flying operation'' using up to 31 of its Boeing 727-200 aircraft to be leased at market prices. Braniff can amend its reorganization plan as long as the changes are made within 60 days, and still allow time for the 50,000 Braniff creditors to vote on it.

President Reagan denounced ''the vicious terrorist bombing'' of the United States Embassy in Beirut today as ''a cowardly act.'' He vowed that the United States would not be deterred from its efforts to bring peace to the Middle East and the withdrawal of foreign troops from Lebanon. In a brief statement in the White House Rose Garden about six hours after the attack, Mr. Reagan said he would ''rededicate the efforts of the United States'' to those goals. Washington was unable to provide exact casualty figures immediately because some bodies were unrecognizable, officials said, and more dead and wounded were expected to be found in the rubble.

While they were students at the Harvard Business School two years ago, three young men undertook a study for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration addressing the question of how the Government might encourage more private investment in space operations. One problem, they discovered, was the lack of entrepreneurs willing to take risks to ''make things happen.'' So, upon graduation, David W. Thompson, 29 years old; Bruce W. Ferguson, 28, and Scott L. Webster, 30, decided to act on their own recommendations by setting up their own company, the Orbital Systems Corporation. They borrowed money from banks and other financial institutions and raised capital from private investors, including the Space Foundation of Houston. And finally, they negotiated a deal with NASA, which was announced yesterday in Washington, to develop and market a privately financed propulsion system for launching satellites from the space shuttle.

A Government study, ordered by President Reagan, of the foreign debt crisis has apparently concluded that the problem will be solved by economic recovery among the major industrial nations. This finding is likely to play a critical role in determining the American negotiating position at the seven-nation economic summit conference to be held at Williamsburg, Va., in late May. It would argue, for example, against any major new initiatives to deal with the debt problem. However, according to officials who have read the 28-page, doublespaced third draft of the classified report, there are strong dissents to this optimistic view from both the Central Intelligence Agency and the staff of the National Security Council. Both agencies are said to be quite concerned about the ability of developing countries to keep up with their debt repayment. According to one account, these agencies argue that the problem could become unmanageable in the next 12 to 18 months, even with fairly strong economic recovery.

Pulitzer Prizes were awarded yesterday to '' 'Night, Mother,'' a play by Marsha Norman, and to ''The Color Purple,'' a novel by Alice Walker. The play, about a mother and her daughter, who announces that she is about to commit suicide, was reviewed by the Pulitzer's nominating jurors at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Mass., before it moved to Broadway. The novel, published by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, is written in the form of the letters of two black sisters, one living in the rural South and the other a missionary in Africa. In journalism, The New York Times and The Washington Post each won two awards. The prize for international reporting was shared by Thomas L. Friedman of The Times and Loren Jenkins of The Post for their coverage of the war in Lebanon.