North American Review
Encyclopedia
The North American Review (NAR) was the first literary magazine in the United States
. Founded in Boston
in 1815 by journalist Nathan Hale
and others, it was published continuously until 1940, when publication was suspended due to J. H. Smyth, who had purchased the magazine, being unmasked as a Japanese spy. Publication subsequently resumed in 1964 at Cornell College
(Iowa) under Robert Dana
. Since 1968 the University of Northern Iowa
(Cedar Falls) has been home to the publication. Nineteenth-century archives are freely available via Cornell University
's Making of America.
and probably the entire United States. For all its lasting impact on American literature and institutions, however, the Review had no more than 3000 subscribers in its heyday.
The NAR's first editor, William Tudor (1779-1830)
, and other founders had been members of Boston's Anthology Club
, and launched The North American Review to foster a genuine American culture. In its first few years the NAR published poetry, fiction, and miscellaneous essays on a bi-monthly schedule, but in 1818 it became a quarterly with more focused contents intent on improving society and on elevating culture. The NAR promoted the improvement of public education and administration, with reforms in secondary schools, sound professional training of doctors and lawyers, rehabilitation of prisoners at the state penitentiary, and government by educated experts.
The NAR's editors and contributors included several literary and political New Englanders as John Adams
, George Bancroft
, Nathaniel Bowditch
, William Cullen Bryant
, Lewis Cass
, Edward T. Channing, Caleb Cushing
, Richard Henry Dana, Sr.
, Alexander Hill Everett
, Edward Everett
, Jared Sparks
, George Ticknor
, Gulian C. Verplanck, and Daniel Webster
.
Between 1862 and 1872, its co-editors were James Russell Lowell
and Charles Eliot Norton
. Henry Adams also later served as an editor. Although the Review did not often publish fiction, it did serialize The Ambassadors
by Henry James
.
In 1876, Allen Thorndike Rice
purchased the NAR for $3000 and made himself the editor. He continued as editor until his death in 1889. In 1899, George Harvey
(former managing editor of the New York World
) purchased the NAR, made himself editor and kept control until 1926, except for 1921-1924, when he was United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom
. In 1924, circulation had fallen to 13,000, and the monthly reverted to a quarterly. In Fall 1926, NAR was sold to Walter Butler Mahony. Joseph Hilton Smyth purchased the NAR from Mahony in September 1938, but publication was suspended in 1940, when Smyth was found to be a Japanese spy, pleading guilty in 1942 to receiving $125,000 from 1938-1941 to establish or buy publications for the purpose of spreading Japanese propaganda.
Poet Robert Dana
rescued the NAR in 1964, resuming its operation and serving as editor-in-chief from 1964-68. During these years, the NAR was based at Cornell College
, where Dana taught at the time. To revive the NAR, Dana successfully negotiated arrangements with Claiborne Pell
, at the time Senator from Rhode Island
, who asserted that he had the rights to the magazine.
When the NAR moved from Cornell College to the University of Northern Iowa in 1968, its editor was Robley Wilson
. The current editors are Grant Tracey and Vince Gotera, since 2000.
, Maxine Chernoff
, Jim Krusoe
, Joshua Henkin, Jacob M. Appel
, Ron Carlson
, Raymond Abbott
, and William Tester
.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. Founded in Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
in 1815 by journalist Nathan Hale
Nathan Hale (journalist)
Nathan Hale was an American journalist and newspaper publisher who introduced regular editorial comment as a newspaper feature.-Life and career:...
and others, it was published continuously until 1940, when publication was suspended due to J. H. Smyth, who had purchased the magazine, being unmasked as a Japanese spy. Publication subsequently resumed in 1964 at Cornell College
Cornell College
Cornell College is a private liberal arts college in Mount Vernon, Iowa. Originally called the Iowa Conference Seminary, the school was founded in 1853 by Reverend Samuel M. Fellows...
(Iowa) under Robert Dana
Robert Dana
-External links:Links to poems*, poetry by Robert Dana including "Heat", "A Short History of the Middle West", and "Beach Attitudes" on The Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor*, poetry by Robert Dana including the poem "Rapture" on Anhinga Press....
. Since 1968 the University of Northern Iowa
University of Northern Iowa
The University of Northern Iowa is a college located in Cedar Falls, Iowa, United States. UNI offers more than 120 majors across the colleges of Business Administration, Education, Humanities and Fine Arts, Natural Sciences, and Social and Behavioral sciences, and graduate college.UNI has...
(Cedar Falls) has been home to the publication. Nineteenth-century archives are freely available via Cornell University
Cornell University
Cornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...
's Making of America.
History
Until the founding of the Atlantic Monthly in 1857, the NAR was the foremost publication in New EnglandNew England
New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...
and probably the entire United States. For all its lasting impact on American literature and institutions, however, the Review had no more than 3000 subscribers in its heyday.
The NAR's first editor, William Tudor (1779-1830)
William Tudor (1779-1830)
William Tudor was a leading citizen of Boston, sometime literary man, and cofounder of the North American Review and the Boston Athenaeum. It was Tudor who christened Boston The Athens of America in an 1819 letter...
, and other founders had been members of Boston's Anthology Club
Anthology Club
The Anthology Club, or Anthology Society was organized in 1804 in Boston, Massachusetts by the Rev. William Emerson, father of Ralph Waldo Emerson....
, and launched The North American Review to foster a genuine American culture. In its first few years the NAR published poetry, fiction, and miscellaneous essays on a bi-monthly schedule, but in 1818 it became a quarterly with more focused contents intent on improving society and on elevating culture. The NAR promoted the improvement of public education and administration, with reforms in secondary schools, sound professional training of doctors and lawyers, rehabilitation of prisoners at the state penitentiary, and government by educated experts.
The NAR's editors and contributors included several literary and political New Englanders as John Adams
John Adams
John Adams was an American lawyer, statesman, diplomat and political theorist. A leading champion of independence in 1776, he was the second President of the United States...
, George Bancroft
George Bancroft
George Bancroft was an American historian and statesman who was prominent in promoting secondary education both in his home state and at the national level. During his tenure as U.S. Secretary of the Navy, he established the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1845...
, Nathaniel Bowditch
Nathaniel Bowditch
Nathaniel Bowditch was an early American mathematician remembered for his work on ocean navigation. He is often credited as the founder of modern maritime navigation; his book The New American Practical Navigator, first published in 1802, is still carried on board every commissioned U.S...
, William Cullen Bryant
William Cullen Bryant
William Cullen Bryant was an American romantic poet, journalist, and long-time editor of the New York Evening Post.-Youth and education:...
, Lewis Cass
Lewis Cass
Lewis Cass was an American military officer and politician. During his long political career, Cass served as a governor of the Michigan Territory, an American ambassador, a U.S. Senator representing Michigan, and co-founder as well as first Masonic Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Michigan...
, Edward T. Channing, Caleb Cushing
Caleb Cushing
Caleb Cushing was an American diplomat who served as a U.S. Congressman from Massachusetts and Attorney General under President Franklin Pierce.-Early life:...
, Richard Henry Dana, Sr.
Richard Henry Dana, Sr.
Richard Henry Dana, Sr. was an American poet, critic and lawyer. His son, Richard Henry Dana, Jr., also became a lawyer and author.-Biography:...
, Alexander Hill Everett
Alexander Hill Everett
Alexander Hill Everett was a noted American diplomatist, politician, and Boston man of letters. His brother was Edward Everett....
, Edward Everett
Edward Everett
Edward Everett was an American politician and educator from Massachusetts. Everett, a Whig, served as U.S. Representative, and U.S. Senator, the 15th Governor of Massachusetts, Minister to Great Britain, and United States Secretary of State...
, Jared Sparks
Jared Sparks
Jared Sparks was an American historian, educator, and Unitarian minister. He served as President of Harvard University from 1849 to 1853.-Biography:...
, George Ticknor
George Ticknor
George Ticknor was an American academician and Hispanist, specializing in the subject areas of languages and literature. He is known for his scholarly work on the history and criticism of Spanish literature....
, Gulian C. Verplanck, and Daniel Webster
Daniel Webster
Daniel Webster was a leading American statesman and senator from Massachusetts during the period leading up to the Civil War. He first rose to regional prominence through his defense of New England shipping interests...
.
Between 1862 and 1872, its co-editors were James Russell Lowell
James Russell Lowell
James Russell Lowell was an American Romantic poet, critic, editor, and diplomat. He is associated with the Fireside Poets, a group of New England writers who were among the first American poets who rivaled the popularity of British poets...
and Charles Eliot Norton
Charles Eliot Norton
Charles Eliot Norton, was a leading American author, social critic, and professor of art. He was a militant idealist, a progressive social reformer, and a liberal activist whom many of his contemporaries considered the most cultivated man in the United States.-Biography:Norton was born at...
. Henry Adams also later served as an editor. Although the Review did not often publish fiction, it did serialize The Ambassadors
The Ambassadors
The Ambassadors is a 1903 novel by Henry James, originally published as a serial in the North American Review . This dark comedy, one of the masterpieces of James's final period, follows the trip of protagonist Lewis Lambert Strether to Europe in pursuit of Chad, his widowed fiancée's supposedly...
by Henry James
Henry James
Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....
.
In 1876, Allen Thorndike Rice
C. Allen Thorndike Rice
Charles Allen Thorndike Rice was a journalist and the editor and publisher of the North American Review from 1876 to 1889.-Early life and family:...
purchased the NAR for $3000 and made himself the editor. He continued as editor until his death in 1889. In 1899, George Harvey
George Brinton McClellan Harvey
George Brinton McClellan Harvey was an American diplomat, journalist, author, administrator for electric rail construction and owner and editor of several newspapers, all positions that brought him great wealth....
(former managing editor of the New York World
New York World
The New York World was a newspaper published in New York City from 1860 until 1931. The paper played a major role in the history of American newspapers...
) purchased the NAR, made himself editor and kept control until 1926, except for 1921-1924, when he was United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom
United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom
The office of United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom was traditionally, and still is very much so today due to the Special Relationship, the most prestigious position in the United States Foreign Service...
. In 1924, circulation had fallen to 13,000, and the monthly reverted to a quarterly. In Fall 1926, NAR was sold to Walter Butler Mahony. Joseph Hilton Smyth purchased the NAR from Mahony in September 1938, but publication was suspended in 1940, when Smyth was found to be a Japanese spy, pleading guilty in 1942 to receiving $125,000 from 1938-1941 to establish or buy publications for the purpose of spreading Japanese propaganda.
Poet Robert Dana
Robert Dana
-External links:Links to poems*, poetry by Robert Dana including "Heat", "A Short History of the Middle West", and "Beach Attitudes" on The Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor*, poetry by Robert Dana including the poem "Rapture" on Anhinga Press....
rescued the NAR in 1964, resuming its operation and serving as editor-in-chief from 1964-68. During these years, the NAR was based at Cornell College
Cornell College
Cornell College is a private liberal arts college in Mount Vernon, Iowa. Originally called the Iowa Conference Seminary, the school was founded in 1853 by Reverend Samuel M. Fellows...
, where Dana taught at the time. To revive the NAR, Dana successfully negotiated arrangements with Claiborne Pell
Claiborne Pell
Claiborne de Borda Pell was a United States Senator from Rhode Island, serving six terms from 1961 to 1997, and was best known as the sponsor of the Pell Grant, which provides financial aid funding to U.S. college students. A Democrat, he was that state's longest serving senator.-Early years:Pell...
, at the time Senator from Rhode Island
Rhode Island
The state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, more commonly referred to as Rhode Island , is a state in the New England region of the United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area...
, who asserted that he had the rights to the magazine.
When the NAR moved from Cornell College to the University of Northern Iowa in 1968, its editor was Robley Wilson
Robley Wilson
Robley Wilson is an American poet, writer, and editor.-Life:He taught at Beloit College, the University of Iowa, Northwestern University, Pitzer College, and the University of Central Florida, and the University of Northern Iowa from 1963 to 1996.He was editor of The North American Review from...
. The current editors are Grant Tracey and Vince Gotera, since 2000.
Contributors
More recent contributors of note include Barry LopezBarry Lopez
Barry Holstun Lopez is an American author, essayist, and fiction writer whose work is known for its environmental and social concerns.-Biography:...
, Maxine Chernoff
Maxine Chernoff
Maxine Chernoff is an American novelist, writer, poet, academic and literary magazine editor. She was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois, and attended the University of Illinois at Chicago....
, Jim Krusoe
Jim Krusoe
Jim Krusoe is an American novelist, poet, and short story writer. His stories and poems have appeared in Antioch Review, Denver Quarterly, BOMB, Iowa Review, Field, North American Review, American Poetry Review, and Santa Monica Review, which he founded in 1988...
, Joshua Henkin, Jacob M. Appel
Jacob M. Appel
Jacob M. Appel is an American author, bioethicist and social critic. He is best known for his short stories, his work as a playwright, and his writing in the fields of reproductive ethics, organ donation, neuroethics and euthanasia....
, Ron Carlson
Ron Carlson
-Life:Carlson was born in Logan, Utah, and grew up in Salt Lake City. He received a masters degree in English from the University of Utah. He then taught at The Hotchkiss School in Connecticut, where he began his first novel....
, Raymond Abbott
Raymond Abbott
-Biography:Raymond Herbert Abbott was born in Newburyport, April 21, 1942. He was the son of Myron E., a ship worker, and Evelyn . He was educated at University of Massachusetts in 1965 with a B.A. and University of Kentucky graduate studies, 1967–68. He is a member of the Authors Guild. He...
, and William Tester
William Tester
William Tester is an American short story writer and novelist. He was raised on a cattle ranch in Florida and is a graduate of Columbia University and Syracuse University . He published the novel Darling in 1991 and the story collection Head in 2000...
.
Further reading
- North American Review. v.10, 2nd ed. (Boston: CummingsJacob Abbot CummingsJacob Abbot Cummings was a bookseller, publisher, schoolteacher and author in Boston, Massachusetts, in the early 19th-century.-Biography:...
& HilliardWilliam HilliardWilliam Hilliard was a publisher and bookseller in Boston and Cambridge, Massachusetts, in the early 19th-century. He worked with several business partners through the years, including Jacob Abbot Cummings, James Brown, and Charles C. Little...
, 1821); v.88 (Boston: Crosby, Nichols & Co., 1859); v.103 (Boston: Ticknor & FieldsTicknor and FieldsTicknor and Fields was an American publishing company based in Boston, Massachusetts.-Early years:In 1832 William Davis Ticknor and John Allen began a small publishing business which operated out of the Old Corner Bookstore located on Washington and School Streets in Boston, Massachusetts...
, 1866).