What has made it possible for this publication with its considerable shelf life to reach such a lofty plateau—a fiftieth anniversary? The answer lies, of course, in the large number of editors and writers who have seen fit to sustain what they thought was a good idea in the first place. Many come first as readers—often interns fresh from their university studies. Over 20,000 manuscripts come in annually, all read with diligent care and in hopes that perhaps this one will spring apart from the others and get passed on to the editors. In the homey clutter of the Review’s small office, the readers work in its basement—a worn blue carpet, stuffingless armchairs to disguise its semblance of a boiler room with its overhead pipes, electric meters clicking on a wall, Some stay on to become editors and give years rather than a summer to the Review.

Those who have come to the magazine for a short period, and even those who have remained with editorial positions, rarely have had the time to browse through all the contents in the issues that line the office shelves. Fifty years’ worth! But that, of course, has been the procedure for those who put together this anthology. One of the particular pleasures for the undersigned has been the number of times in the process of selection they would exclaim their wonder and delight at what they’d come across. It is hard to imagine that the contents herein will not produce a similar reaction in the reader…