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Autumn 1994 • Vol. XVI No. 4 |

To Our Readers

By David H. Lynn

To Our Readers This is the last issue in which Marilyn Hacker’s name will appear at the top of the masthead (opposite page). Beginning with our Winter 1995 issue, my name will appear in that spot. That will be a bit misleading, however. Marilyn Hacker’s term as the first full-time editor of the Kenyon Review officially ended June 30, 1994. Nevertheless, our Summer issue (out in July), this issue and our upcoming Winter issue were prepared exclusively under her editorial direction. Indeed, most of the works that will appear in the Kenyon Review through all of 1995 (and much in issues beyond that) have been selected by her. Marilyn Hacker is, as well as being one of the leading poets of our time, a brilliant literary editor. Her tenure at the Review may well be regarded as one of the highlights of the magazine’s illustrious history. Not the least of her accomplishments was firmly establishing KR as an environment for the very best in new writing, not only by established writers but also by emerging writers and those working in non-traditional genres and with perspectives of diverse populations. I feel privileged to have been associated with Marilyn Hacker as a colleague, a friend and as an associate editor. Because any literary magazine must in many respects be a personal reflection of its editor, my approach to the task may vary from hers in detail. You may, for example, see in these pages more prose, more international literary thought, more new writing in traditional forms. But my vision for the journal will not be at variance with those principles of excellence, balance and inclusiveness which she so ably championed. The months ahead will be challenging. Kenyon College, our publisher and underwriter, has renewed its commitment to continue the Review but has said it must reduce its contribution. That contribution, along with grants and gifts from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Lannan Foundation, the Ohio Arts Council, the Smart Family Foundation, the Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest foundation and individual donors, has been our mainstay. Now we must work to increase our support from individuals and organizations, increase revenue and reduce operating costs-all while maintaining the quality of the magazine.We will hold our individual subscription and single-copy prices at the present level. But, in order to reduce our printing and mailing costs, we will adopt the practice of a number of other literary magazines and combine our Summer and Fall numbers into an expanded double issue beginning in the fall of 1995. (Current subscriptions running through summer 1995-and those that subscribe before the end of this year-will receive four magazines, including the expanded Summer/Fall issue. Future subscriptions will cover the regular Winter and Spring issues and the expanded Summer/Fall issue.) I urge you to help sustain the Kenyon Review and the cause of writing excellence by subscribing now-for yourself or for a friend. Your subscriptions-and your individual financial contributions-are espe- cially important to us. Last, but not least, I would like to ask you to write me with your comments and suggestions about the Review, and if you are a writer as well as a reader please consider submitting your best work to us. Thank you for your attention. And now I invite you to turn to the excellent poetry, essays, fiction, interview and review that Marilyn Hacker has selected for presentation in the pages that follow. DAVID H. LYNN

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Photo of David Lynn
David H. Lynn is the editor emeritus of The Kenyon Review, a professor of English, and special assistant to the president of the college. He was the editor of the Review from 1994 to 2020. As an author, he received a 2016 O. Henry Award for "Divergence." His latest collection, Children of God: New & Selected Stories, was published in 2019 by Braddock Avenue Books.

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Editor’s Notes

By David H. Lynn

Beginning in this issue of KR you will find the first installment of “Just Not for Us,” a new series of essays by Roger Rosenblatt. For those of you blessed […]

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Editor’s Notes

By David H. Lynn

It’s the Internet, stupid!I confess I don’t recall when it first came to me that we’d be wise to develop a Web site for The Kenyon Review. Certainly not a […]

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