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PARTISAN REVIEW
Essential in the shift of attitudes is the relationship of America
to Europe. For more than a hundred years, America was culturally
dependent on Europe; now Europe is economically dependent upon
America. And America is no longer the raw and unformed land of
promise from which men of superior gifts like James, Santayana, and
Eliot departed, seeking in Europe what they found lacking in
America. Europe is no longer regarded as a sanctuary; it no longer
assures that rich experience of culture which inspired and justified
a criticism of American life. The wheel
has
come full circle, and now
America has become the protector of Western civilization, at least
in
a military and economic sense.
Obviously, this overwhelming change involves a new image of
America. Politically, there is a recognition that the kind of democracy
which exists in America has .an intrinsic and positive value: it is not
merely a capitalist myth but a reality which must be defended
against Russian totalitarianism. The cultural consequences are bound
to be far-reaching and complex, but some of them have already be–
come apparent. For bettr.r or worse, most writers no longer accept
alienation as the artist's fate in America; on the contrary, they want
very much to be a part of American life. More and more writers
have ceased to think of themselves as rebels and exiles. They now
believe that their values,
if
they are to be realized at all, must be
realized in America and in relation to the actuality of American life.
In one way or another, this change has involved us all, but
it
has
not yet been the subject of critical reflection and evaluation. Hence
we think there is much to be gained by the exchange of impressions
which a symposium fosters.
The problem as we see
it
is this: the affirmative attitude toward
America which has emerged since the Second World War may be a
necessary corrective of the earlier extreme negation, but the affirma–
tion cannot be unequivocal. For American economic and political
institutions have not suddenly become ideally beneficent, and many
intellectuals are not prepared to give up all criticism of them. In
addition, the enormous and ever-increasing growth of mass culture
confronts the artist and the intellectual with a new phenomenon
and creates a new obstacle: the artist and intellectual who wants to
be a part of American life is faced with a mass culture which makes
him feel that he is still outside looking in. Ortega y Gasset has formu-
