Letter

To the Editors:

I was excited to find The New York Review on the newsstand. I have been reading it, off and on, in the evenings, all week. I believe it is the most comprehensive and intelligent review to appear in America.

Reading it, I realized how flat and thin is the pablum we have generally been getting in the weekly newspaper reviews. Your writers really think, and have their own opinions. When they grind their axes they do so obviously, without apology, and with intelligence. I disagree sharply with some, but I always knew I was dealing with a human intelligence, not some sort of reviewing machine.

Inevitably, the reviews differed considerably in quality. Partly, this can be corrected as you continue to publish—and I hope you will! Partly also, some uneven quality results inevitably from the healthy independence you allow, I much prefer this to the consistently high quality (or tone) of polished flatness that has been our usual fare. Perhaps the best example, in its blend of exposition and intelligent opinion, was set in the lead review by F. W. Dupee…

STANLEY J. ROWLAND, JR.

United Presbyterian Church

New York City