The New York Public Intellectuals and Beyond: Exploring Liberal Humanism, Jewish Identity, and the American Protest Tradition

New York Public Intellectuals and Beyond gathers a variety of distinguished scholars, from Eugene Goodheart to Peter Novick to Nathan Glazer, from Morris Dickstein to Suzanne Klingenstein to Ilan Stavans, to revisit and rethink the legacy of the New York intellectuals. The authors show how a small New York group, predominantly Jewish, moved from communist and socialist roots to become a primary voice of liberal humanism and, in the case of a few, to launch a new conservative movement. Concentrating on Lionel Trilling as the paradigmatic liberal intellectual, the book also includes thoughtful reconsiderations of Irving Howe and Dwight MacDonald, and explores the roots of the neoconservative movement and its changing role today.

Ethan Goffman is the Discovery Guide's editor for CSA and actively writes on environmental topics for such publications as Grist and E: The Environmental magazine. His book, Imagining Each Other: Blacks and Jews in Contemporary American Literature, was published in 2000. Daniel Morris is professor of English at Purdue University and editor of SHOFAR: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies.