Masses & Mainstream
New York: Masses & Mainstream, Inc., 1948.
Octavo (8 x 5 1/2 inches; 204 x 135 mm), 10 issues bound together into a single volume, title in gilt to spine.
The first 10 issues of Masses & Mainstream, a cultural magazine (with generous dollops of politics) closely associated with the Communist Party USA. Masses & Mainstream featured articles by numerous left-wing authors, such as W.E.B. Du Bois, Pablo Neruda, Howard Fast, Meridel Le Sueur, Thomas McGrath, Louis Aragon, Anna Louise Strong, Paul Éluard, Philip Bonosky, Herbert Aptheker, and many more. Illustrators included William Gropper, Ben Shahn, and Milton Avery, among others. Vol. 1, No. 1 contains an illustration by Picasso accompanying an article about him.
Masses & Mainstream had a distinguished lineage, being the successor to a number of left-wing magazines that included The Masses, The Liberator, and New Masses. It ceased publication in 1963.
Bound copies of the first year's 10 issues are uncommon in the antiquarian book trade.
CONDITION: Rubbing to cloth, fading to spine, some stains to outside edges. Internally, closed tear to leaf in the first issue, occasional scuffing to covers (all of which are bound in), but otherwise bright and unmarked. Very Good or better. Item #2562
Price: $200.00