TRIBUTES TO WILLIAM PHILLIPS
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of the inequities of democratic Western society and of those who in
the name of anticommunism support the most reactionary ideas.
This credo, laden with shades of gray and nuance, was not the kind of per–
spective likely to inspire passionate certainties. Yet it was typical of William
and of the best of what
Partisan Review
under his guidance has stood for.
I am glad that William stuck to his priorities, just as I am disap–
pointed that
PR
in the past two decades contained much too little criti–
cism of "the inequities of democratic Western society." As a result of the
criticisms of our society not appearing in the magazine, the balance that
he sought in 1985 too often evolved into a message more conservative
than that of the glory days.
Some political intellectuals of William's generation devoted all their
efforts to cataloguing and denouncing the evils of communism, while
others focused on fascism and Nazism. William and
PR
stressed that
there were two, not just one, evils of the twentieth century and that
opposition to communism and then to post-communist anti-Western
sentiments was a fitting task for liberal intellectuals in the 1980s and
1990S, just as it had been in the 1940S and 19 50S. William did not think
that support for American opposition first to communism and then to
Islamic fascism and terrorism should be the monopoly of conservatives
whose mantra was lower taxes and less government. William conveyed
to me that passion and engagement were compatible with confronting
liberalism's enemies from both the illiberal Right and Left.
That
PR
in the 1980s and 1990S continued to be a vital and distinc–
tive voice in American intellectual life was due to William and, of course,
to Edith Kurzweil. Together, they made it into a bridge across which the
generation of centrist liberalism of the 1940S and 1950S found common
ground with some of us older and wiser veterans of the 1960s. I will
always cherish the memory of those years when William reached out to
me, then an untenured and unestablished scholar. He won a place in my
heart and made an important difference in my life. He reassured me that
my views and my willingness to express them stood in a grand tradition
which he defended with pride, humor, and eloquence, but above all, with
quiet, steady, and unwavering courage and intelligence. That courage and
intelligence meant a great deal to those of us who remained engaged in
the public events of the day but did not want to abandon old certainties
for new ones. His passing is a great loss. His life was a blessing to us all.
