POPULAR AND UNPOPULAR ART
401
"Is it possible that despite our discoveries and progress, despite
our culture, religion and world-wisdom, we still remain on the
surface of life? Is it possible that we have even covered this
surface which might still have been something, with an incred–
ibly uninteresting stuff which makes it look like drawing-room
furniture during the summer holidays?
"Yes, it is possible ...
"But
if
all this is possible ... then surely, for all the world's
sake, something must be done. The first comer, he who has
had these disturbing thoughts, must begin to do some of the
neglected things; even if he be just anybody, by no means the
most suitable person: there is no one else at hand. This
young insignificant foreigner, Brigge, will have to sit down in
his room five flights up, and write, day and night. Yes, he will
have to write; that will be the end of it".
This was written at the beginning of the century; but nothing
much seems to have been accomplished. Now that a good deal
of the drawing-room furniture lies in ruins, there may be an–
other beginning.
CONTRIBUTORS
W. H. AUDEN is now teaching at Swarthmore College. "Alonzo
to Ferdinand"
is
a section from a long poem.... LoUisE BoGAN, au–
thor of several volumes of verse, reviews new poetry for the
New
Yorker.
...
MARIO D'ANDREA is a young Italian writer who left Italy
in
1934 and is now living in New York City.... SAUL BELLOw's
first novel, of the same title as the excerpts in this issue, will be pub–
lished by Vanguard Press in the winter of 1944.... BENJAMIN FoN–
DANE is the author of
La
Conscience malheureuse
and other critical
works. A refugee from Vichy France, he is at present a resident of
Buenos Aires..•. JuLIAN SYMONS, a young English poet and critic,
has appeared frequently in PARTISAN REVIEW and other American
periodicals.•.. SIDNEY HooK's latest work is
The Hero in History,
published by John Day.•.. HAROLD RosENBERG, who now lives in
Washington, has recently published a volume of verse,
Trance Above
the
Streets.
••.
NEWTON ARVIN, who teaches at Smith College, has
written critical biographies of Hawthorne and Whitman. . . . LIONEL
ABEL, the translator of Benjamin's Fondane's article in this issue, has
contributed poetry, fiction, and criticism to PARTISAN REVIEW....
W. C. WILLIAMS, 'the well-known poet and fiction-writer, practices
medicine at Rutherford, N. J.
