The Evergreen Review

The Evergreen Review
Title	The Evergreen Review
Editor	Barney Rosset
Category	Literary magazine
Frequency	Quarterly (various)
Format	Print; later digital
Publisher	Grove Press
Firstdate	1957
Finaldate	2013 (print), revived online later
Country	United States
Based	New York City
Language	English

The Evergreen Review was an influential American literary magazine founded in 1957 that became a central platform for avant-garde literature, political dissent, and experimental art during the mid-20th century. Under the aegis of Grove Press and editor Barney Rosset, it published fiction, poetry, essays, and translations by leading and emergent writers, and fostered connections with international movements and publishers. The magazine played a pivotal role in debates over censorship, modernism, and countercultural expression, drawing contributors and attention from across the English-speaking and continental literary worlds.

History

Launched amid postwar literary ferment, the magazine emerged from the milieu that produced Grove Press, Galterio-era translations, and a transatlantic network including Paris Review circles. Its founding editor, Barney Rosset, had previously challenged liabilities associated with obscenity prosecutions through publication strategies involving authors like D. H. Lawrence and Henry Miller. Early issues juxtaposed American voices with translated work from authors such as Jean Genet, Samuel Beckett, and Albert Camus, reflecting affinities with avant-garde journals like transition and institutions such as The New York Review of Books. The Evergreen Review evolved across decades, reacting to events including the Civil Rights Movement, the Vietnam War, and the rise of Beat Generation figures, before transitioning to intermittent digital publication in the 21st century.

Editorial Influence and Contributors

Editorial direction under Barney Rosset and successive guest editors cultivated ties with figures across literary and artistic fields. The magazine published work by Nobel laureates like Samuel Beckett, Albert Camus, and Jean-Paul Sartre as well as American innovators such as William S. Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg, and Jack Kerouac. Poets and novelists including Langston Hughes, Robert Duncan, Adrienne Rich, and Dylan Thomas appeared alongside critics and theorists like Norman Mailer, Susan Sontag, and Herbert Marcuse. International contributors included Octavio Paz, Pablo Neruda, Boris Pasternak, and Italo Calvino, while visual art and photography from figures linked to Andy Warhol, Robert Frank, and Man Ray augmented literary offerings. The magazine also spotlighted playwrights and dramatists connected to Samuel Beckett and Eugène Ionesco, and engaged translators associated with Harold Pinter productions and Martin Esslin's theater criticism.

Content and Themes

The Evergreen Review's pages mixed fiction, poetry, political reportage, and translations, emphasizing experimental narrative, candid explorations of sexuality, anti-imperialist commentary, and avant-garde aesthetics. It serialized excerpts and controversial texts including works resonant with Henry Miller's candid prose, the cut-up experiments of William S. Burroughs, and the beat poetics of Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac. The magazine published essays on decolonization movements in Africa and Asia referencing leaders like Kwame Nkrumah and Ho Chi Minh, and pieces addressing jurisprudence and civil liberties invoking cases related to Roth v. United States and debates in the Supreme Court of the United States. Visual essays connected to Pop Art and Abstract Expressionism linked its pages to galleries such as Tate Gallery and institutions like Museum of Modern Art.

Censorship and Legal Challenges

From its inception the magazine intersected with legal controversies over obscenity and free expression. Its publisher, Grove Press, had previously been party to landmark battles over works by D. H. Lawrence and Henry Miller that reached the attention of courts and civil libertarians such as Edward Mitchell and organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union. The Evergreen Review itself ran material that provoked prosecutions and moral outrage in contexts shaped by decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States and statutes enforced by municipal authorities. These disputes connected the magazine to broader cultural litigation alongside defendants and appellants in cases influenced by changing standards after decisions like Roth v. United States and later challenges that reshaped First Amendment doctrine.

Design, Format, and Publication History

Visually the magazine combined dense typographic layouts with striking cover art, photography, and graphics, echoing design innovations present in periodicals such as Life (magazine), The New Yorker, and European journals like Les Temps Modernes. Initially a quarto-sized periodical printed in New York, it shifted formats across its run, experimenting with paperback collections, supplements, and special issues devoted to themes or single authors. Publication frequency varied from bimonthly to quarterly; special issues featured curated portfolios on topics such as the Beat Generation, postwar European theater, and translations from Latin America. With the decline of print periodicals in the late 20th century, the title oscillated between hiatuses and revivals, ultimately migrating toward digital presentation while maintaining archival projects and reprints tied to printers and small presses.

Reception and Legacy

Contemporaries and later scholars credited the magazine with accelerating acceptance of modernist and postmodernist voices in the Anglophone mainstream, influencing editors at The New Yorker, Esquire, and academic programs at universities like Columbia University and Harvard University. Its role in normalizing frank portrayals of sexuality, political dissent, and experimental techniques linked it to cultural shifts evident in the 1960s counterculture, the expansion of creative writing programs, and the emergence of independent publishing houses including City Lights Booksellers & Publishers and New Directions Publishing. Despite critiques from conservative commentators and periodic financial instability, the publication remains cited in literary histories, anthologies, and archival collections alongside periodicals such as The Paris Review, Partisan Review, and Harper's Magazine for helping to define mid-century literary modernity.

Category:Literary magazines published in the United States