Books in Brief: The Years with Ross

The Years with Ross, by James Thurber (Penguin, 310 pp., $6.95)

Penguin Books here rescues from neglect a splendid antique, James Thurber’s history of The New Yorker. First published in 1959, The Years with Ross traces the history of the magazine from its founding in 1925 by Harold Ross, formerly of Stars and Stripes and numerous newspapers across the country, through its glory days until the editor’s death in 1951. Thurber’s memoir predates the torrent of self-indulgent memorial volumes about The New Yorker, and it is by far the best. Its reappearance will undoubtedly remind many former New Yorker readers of just how bad Brendan Gill’s vitriolic 1975 history was. The familiar cast is all here—E. B. White, Wolcott Gibbs, Joseph Mitchell, John McNulty, Charles Addams— but it is Ross who lives in these pages, Ross getting out a magazine against all odds. He was, by all accounts, a wild man, yet a precise and meticulous editor. He is largely unknown today, even to journalists, although his spirit lives on in many editorial chambers. Ross was one of those great reactionary dinosaurs who in every age are entrusted with the rearguard action against the barbarians, be they social, political, or journalistic. Thurber knew it, and his book is a tribute, albeit a maniacal one. The Years with Ross is also the book containing the line said to have been spoken by H. L. Mencken and cherished by managing editors everywhere: “All managing editors are vermin.”

JM

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Joe Mysak

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The Years with Ross, by James Thurber (Penguin, 310 pp., $6.95)

Penguin Books here rescues from neglect a splendid antique, James Thurber’s history of The New Yorker. First published in 1959, The Years with Ross traces the history of the magazine from its founding in 1925 by Harold Ross, formerly of Stars and Stripes and numerous newspapers across the country, through its glory days until the editor’s death in 1951. Thurber’s memoir predates the torrent of self-indulgent memorial volumes about The New Yorker, and it is by far the best. Its reappearance will undoubtedly remind many former New Yorker readers of just how bad Brendan Gill’s vitriolic 1975 history was. The familiar cast is all here—E. B. White, Wolcott Gibbs, Joseph Mitchell, John McNulty, Charles Addams— but it is Ross who lives in these pages, Ross getting out a magazine against all odds. He was, by all accounts, a wild man, yet a precise and meticulous editor. He is largely unknown today, even to journalists, although his spirit lives on in many editorial chambers. Ross was one of those great reactionary dinosaurs who in every age are entrusted with the rearguard action against the barbarians, be they social, political, or journalistic. Thurber knew it, and his book is a tribute, albeit a maniacal one. The Years with Ross is also the book containing the line said to have been spoken by H. L. Mencken and cherished by managing editors everywhere: “All managing editors are vermin.”