ISSUE: Spring 1925
The broader fields of human interest. Its reviews will include chiefly four types: descriptive reviews, giving rather a reflection of the book than a discussion, thematic reviews that treat an important book or group of books from one significant point of view; essay reviews, interesting when a thoughtful reviewer has an original view, to develop for which the discussion of the book in hand gives a fruitful text; and analytic reviews wherein the specialist weighs for the general reader the values of a work. Short reviews and notices may be carried but the preference will be given to reviews that are themselves critical studies of value.
For its first issues the editor has naturally sought out writers of recognized reputations whose approved ability assured articles of beauty and strength. In the more leisurely gathering of material for later numbers he hopes frequently to secure work of vigor and charm, not only from authors of established authority but from writers new to the public, and covets the adventure of presenting distinguished first work wherever it can be found. The QuarteRly will in a measure be peculiarly concerned with themes growing out of the life and problems of the people of the South and especially cordial to the work of able Southern writers, yet it will in no sense be a magazine of a section. It will welcome interesting themes and brilliant contributors wherever it can find them. It will seek the “fellowship of uncongenial minds,” the diversity of themes of varied interests, and the freshening impact of writers from other lands.
The aim of The Virginia Quarterly is to be liberal but reasonable; open to the discussions of all topics and to all stimulating and engaging points of view. It will seek to escape the technically dry without becoming trivial and to approach exactly the taste of some men while including something of interest to all. In brief, The Quarterly
