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Commentary Magazine, 1945-59: "A Journal of Significant Thought and Opinion.".

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Commentary Magazine, 1945-59: "A Journal of Significant Thought and Opinion." By Nathan Abrams. London: Vallentine Mitchell, 2007. xx + 201 pp.

The New York Jewish intellectual community has long been a popular field of study. Intellectual, literary, and political historians have produced numerous books and articles chronicling the rise and decline of the community during the mid-twentieth century, detailing the personal quarrels and shifting political leanings of its members, and assessing the influence of its two best-known journals, Partisan Review and Commentary. With so much having already been written, it would seem that there is little new to say about the New York intellectuals. Indeed, finding a fresh perspective is the fundamental challenge facing Nathan Abrams in his book Commentary Magazine, 1945-59, a detailed history of the magazine's first fifteen years.

Abrams believes that historians have not paid enough attention to Commentary. He argues that previous histories of Commentary have been short, narrowly focused, and highly partisan. In his...

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