The New York Intellectuals Reclaimed Jewish Masculinity by Fighting Communism

In her book Write Like a Man, Ronnie Grinberg explores what masculinity meant to that largely Jewish group of writers and critics known as the New York intellectuals. Perhaps the book’s subject can be summed up by the oft-told story of one of the early editors of Commentary getting into a fistfight over his opinions about modern art, no doubt after he and everyone present had had a generous number of drinks. Emina Melonic writes in her review that what drew this group together, despite its members’ political diversity, was their shared anti-Communism: