Publisher's Synopsis
As the primary source for important political and literary ideas from its founding in 1934 until the post-World War II era, the "Partisan Review" is a useful guide to the changing nature of 20th-century American socialism. James Gilbert uses the "Partisan Review", "Masses" and "Seven Arts" to show how avant-garde literature became identified with radical politics and art, and how literary radicalism matured beyond the confines of Marxist philosophy and literary criticism.;Throughout "Writers and Partisans" Gilbert places the history of literary radicalism within the larger perspective of cultural history and the centralization of literary life in New York City. He traces the development of this radicalism from its Bohemian birth in Greenwich Village to the post-World War II era, when America returned to its middle-class values and intellectuals began to question political radicalism and the Bohemian life.
