New York Intellectuals

The New York Intellectuals were a loosely connected circle of writers and critics, mostly based in New York, who shaped mid-twentieth-century debates about politics, literature, and culture.

Irving Howe: An American literary critic and socialist intellectual who co-founded the magazine Dissent. He helped define the circle’s democratic-socialist politics and literary criticism.
Partisan Review: An American literary and political magazine founded in 1934 and revived as an independent journal in 1937. It became the circle’s principal forum for modernist criticism and anti-Stalinist debate.
Anti-Stalinist left: A political current on the left that opposed Stalinism while retaining commitments to socialism or radical democracy. The circle became one of its most visible literary and intellectual centers.
Dissent: An American political and cultural magazine founded in 1954 by a group of democratic socialists. Irving Howe and Lewis Coser established it as a forum for independent left politics.
New Left: A broad political movement that emerged in the 1950s and 1960s, emphasizing participatory democracy and new forms of activism. Younger activists challenged the older left’s priorities and political style.
Lionel Trilling: An American literary critic and Columbia University professor known for essays on literature, liberalism, and culture. His criticism brought psychological and moral complexity into the circle’s literary debates.
John Reed Clubs: A network of left-wing cultural organizations in the United States, associated with the Communist Party, during the 1930s. Their political culture formed part of the background from which several intellectuals broke away.
Cold War liberalism: A postwar American political outlook that defended liberal democracy and opposed Soviet communism. Some former radicals helped shape its arguments and institutions.
The Partisan Review controversy: A series of disputes over politics, literature, and editorial direction surrounding Partisan Review. The magazine’s conflicts reveal the group’s divisions over art and political commitment.
Frankfurt School: A tradition of social theory associated with the Institute for Social Research and critical analysis of modern society. Its systematic social theory differed from the circle’s largely literary and journalistic mode.

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