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About Us |
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EDITORIAL
You may have heard that one of the capital’s institutions has been a victim of the Arts Council funding cuts. This is, unfortunately, true. Recently there have been reports in some newspapers that The London Magazine does not intend to continue. This is categorically not the case. We fully intend to bring our readers the best and brightest of both the UK and International artists and writers, for another 270 years.
From the 1700's until the present day, The London Magazine has played a vital role in the literary world.
First founded in 1732, The London Magazine appeared for 53 years as a counterbalance to The Gentleman’s Magazine. Re-launched in 1820 under John Scott’s editorship, The London Magazine championed the work of Wordsworth, Lamb, De Quincey and Clare, as well as the ‘Cockney School’ of poets. Welcoming the publication under John Lehmann’s editorship, T.S.Eliot saw it as ‘the magazine which will boldly assume the existence of a public interested in serious literature’.
Today The London Magazine continues its illustrious history, giving space to the best and brightest of writers, artists and commentators working in London and farther afield. Nobel Prize winners and unpublished writers, renowned artists and neglected poets have graced the pages of The London Magazine with equal welcome. Our most recent issues have included some of today’s best writers, such as Nicholas Royle, Penelope Shuttle, Anne Stewart, Tim Turnbull, Trevor Hoyle, Annie Freud, Roddy Lumsden, Graham Buchan, Leah Fritz, John Hartley Williams, Todd Swift, Martyn Crucefix, Tim Cumming, Andy Brown, Neil Curry and many more…
Consistently on the pulse of the literary scene, The London Magazine is a meeting place for the day’s greatest minds.
Sara-Mae Tuson
Acting Editor
When John Lehmann began editing The London Magazine in 1954, he made a remark which sums up our intentions in publishing a new series of the magazine. He said the magazine was ‘for those who enjoy reading stories, poems and articles by the leading authors of today; for those who want to follow the development of new talent at home and abroad; [and] for those who look for first-class criticism by a first-class team of reviewers.’
Under the subtitle ‘A Review of Literature and the Arts’, we aim to carry on this tradition; but also that of Alan Ross, who broadened the magazine’s horizon to include all the arts.
Alan Ross edited The London Magazine from 1961 to 2001. His death last year was an irreplaceable loss to the arts. However, the magazine and the nature of the talents he presented and encouraged did not die with him. We will continue to present and encourage such talents.
First founded in April 1732, The London Magazine was published for 53 years as a counterbalance to The Gentleman’s Magazine. It was re-launched in 1820 under John Scott’s editorship. He championed the work of Wordsworth, Lamb, De Quincey, Clare, Hood, Carlyle, and the ‘Cockney School’ of John Keats, Leigh Hunt, and William Hazlitt. Like any good editor, Scott fought for his beliefs, but in his case the results were disastrous. In 1829 in a battle over literary rivalry, he was killed in a duel with a representative from Blackwood’s Magazine. If nothing else, this teaches us the value of moderation.
Welcoming The London Magazine under John Lehmann’s editorship, T.S.Eliot saw it not as ‘a vehicle of expression for critics occupying university posts’, but as ‘the magazine which will boldly assume the existence of a public interested in serious literature’. Its principal purpose ‘is to be in the best sense international.’
This was the standard against which new and established talent was to be measured. Lehmann said he avoided being narrowly British or political in content and aimed to reach Dr Johnson’s ‘common reader’. There can be no doubt that he achieved his aim. He was succeeded by the poet, journalist, and cricket lover, Alan Ross, to whom our first six issues are dedicated.
Glancing back through Alan Ross’s hundreds of distinguished contributors, it is difficult to take in the scope of his interests. But we do not need to eat the whole chicken to get the flavour of the bird. Frank Auerbach, Bill Brandt, William Burroughs, Odysseus Elytis, Nadine Gordimer, W.S.Graham, Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, Laurie Lee, Harold Pinter, and Derek Walcott give some idea of his legacy.
No other review of literature and the arts claims such a history. For 270 years, poets, writers, and artists have graced the pages of The London Magazine. Its re-launch in 2002 provides, therefore, a unique place for the artistic intelligence of the age to register itself in the public eye. This is not solely a matter of contributors and readers meeting in the pages of the magazine. It is also an opportunity for them to meet in person from time to time.
Christopher Arkell
Sebastian Barker
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