Dear Irving, what? Suppression? Chicago? Are you weeping? I hear from Ginsberg that you are tiny, wet-eyed, low-voiced, a rose in a terrible giant’s land; do you wet the bed? shiver because of human ice? Yes, that’s what suppression is, human ice. But why? I always thought Chicago University was a great happy free soulful institute of sparkle and joy; something like Reed, but only on a grander scale. Is it because of Burroughs? Poor Bill, the Elysium of Al Capone tommy-guns his scathless soul; I mean the Chi Review was his only intelligent outlet; what happens to you now? Do you flee? Abandon all? I have a funny feeling here in Paris, I feel America is suddenly going to open up, that a great rose will be born, that if you flee, it will die; so stay; nurse it with your vision, it’s as good as sunlight. Death to Van Gogh’s ear! Long live Fried Shoes!
gregory
On October 25, 1958, Jack Mabley, a columnist in the Chicago Daily News, attacked the Autumn 1958 Chicago Review under the banner “Filthy Writing on the Midway.” His column ends: “But the University of Chicago publishes the magazine. The trustees should take a long hard look at what is being circulated under this sponsorship.” I have heard that a number of trustees called on the Chancellor, Mr. Lawrence A. Kimpton, who in any case took the position of expediency: Between November 3 and November 18, about six conferences took place between Mr. Napier Wilt, Dean of the Division of Humanities, and me, in my capacity as editor of the Chicago Review. At first I was told flatly that the Review would be discontinued. Then I was told that the magazine had a chance to survive if the coming Winter Issue were “toned down,” but Mr. Wilt was unable to tell me exactly what “toning down” the Chancellor had in mind. At this time I think Mr. Wilt and I assumed that at worst I would have to substitute asterisks for any four-letter words. On November 7, just before I brought the manuscript of the Winter Issue to Press, I called Mr. Wilt and asked him if I should read the manuscript for four-letter words, and asterisk them. I told him that I was willing to go this far, if it would insure the continuation of the magazine. He said he thought it was a puerile thing to do, and “let’s not do it unless we have to.” I assumed that the prospects both for saving the magazine and for Mr. Kimpton’s keeping his hands off my Winter Issue were good ones.
I brought the manuscript to the University of Chicago Press; within an hour (I learned later) it had been delivered to “someone in the Administration Building.” It was returned three days later. I recovered the manuscript, added some material which had come in late, and delivered the manuscript myself to the foreman of the printing department, and this time I found it in the possession of the Press office manager, who returned it to me from the safe behind his desk.
Meanwhile, back in Dean Wilt’s office, I learned on one day that I absolutely could not publish Kerouac or Burroughs in the Winter Issue, though I could publish Dahlberg, and I could publish a note saying that I had planned to publish Kerouac and Burroughs in this issue, “but was unable to do so”—nothing stronger. On the next day Mr. Wilt added Dahlberg to my Index and told me there could be no prefatory note at all. He said that the Winter Issue must be “completely innocuous,” and that the manuscript would have to be read by him before it was taken to Press. He urged me to put together a new Winter Issue, and asked me what manuscripts I had on hand. I told him we had been planning a German Expressionist number—“German Expressionism would be too strong,” he said. On November 17 I had my last conference with him. I told him that I could not edit a magazine under the conditions he gave me. On November 18 six of the seven staff-members who held the rank of editor resigned; the seventh is my successor. The editors who left with me are Paul Carroll, Charles Horwitz, Eila Kokkinen, Doris Nieder, and Barbara Pitschel.
The suppression was a bad administration mistake of the Chancellor’s, and I hope he never lives it down. A few faculty members spoke up privately against the breach of academic, or in this case artistic, freedom, but the faculty position which appeared in print was to deny that any censorship or suppression had taken place, and finally, to pretend that I was asked to modify the Winter Issue because of my narrow and irresponsible editorial policies. The faculty spokesmen so quick to protect the administration were Richard G. Stern and Joshua Taylor. Both of these men earn their bread by teaching literature and the arts.
A careful and well-documented account of the suppression has just been published by the Student Government of the University of Chicago (Chicago 37, Illinois) as “Report of the Special Committee of the Student Government In Re: The Chicago Review.” It is well worth the attention of anyone interested in censorship problems (or administrative skulduggery). In the event that the report is suppressed by Chancellor Kimpton, it will be made available by Big Table. The only fault I find in it is that Mr. Stern, from a few quotations, emerges as a kind of champion of the freedom of literary expression; nothing could be further from the truth. After the suppression had been accomplished he was zealous in his support of it, and his justification in the Maroon of December 12, 1958 is composed of lies.
Another account of the suppression will appear in the second issue of the San Francisco Review. I have read it and think it offers several very interesting speculations about what Mr. Kimpton hoped to accomplish in suppressing the Chicago Review. His act was rigidly consistent with his program to placate the trustees by “normalizing” the University—to increase the endowment at the expense of everything that a university in a free society is supposed to support (and seldom does). Mr. Kimpton does not want free expression at the University of Chicago; he wants money.
The editors who resigned determined first of all to publish what would have been our Winter Issue, and secondly to form a literary magazine in Chicago which would not be subject to the review of a Chancellor loyal to the philistines. Thanks to the hard work and financial support of a large number of people, it has been possible for us to do both. I especially want to thank John Fles, who flew to Chicago from California when he heard of my trouble, to put himself at my disposal; Allen Ginsberg and Gregory Corso, who promised the first financial backing for the magazine by offering to read for us free; and Bill Smith, who introduced us to our first patron. It was the promise of a donation by this patron, Jac Worth, and a donation from William E. Hartmann which brought the magazine into the realm of printer’s estimates and cover planning. Barbara Siegel made sure that everybody in Chicago knew that Allen Ginsberg and Gregory Corso were going to read poems on January 29. The Shaw Society of Chicago sponsored the reading, and during the week that the poets were in town, Mr. and Mrs. Albert H. Newman and Mr. and Mrs. Leonard Solomon helped us in a hundred ways. In all matters technical and legal we had the help of Lewis Manilow.
A non-profit corporation has been formed, and so we have launched Big Table. Paul Carroll will be its editor, and I can hardly wait to see his first issue. For I have stolen number 1 from him to fulfil [sic] what I wish to be my last editorial responsibility.