transition (literary journal)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


The journal transition was founded in 1927 by poet Eugene Jolas and his wife Maria McDonald, along with editors Elliot Paul, Robert Sage, and Stuart Gilbert. Caresse Crosby and Harry Crosby did some editing as well.

It was intended as an outlet for experimental writing and featured modernist, surrealist and other linguistically innovative writing and also contributions by visual artists, critics, and political activists. It ran until spring 1938. A total of 27 issues were produced.

Published quarterly, transition also featured Surrealist, Expressionist, and Dada art. It became notorious in 1929, when Jolas issued his personalized manifesto. He personally asked writers to sign "The Revolution of the Word Proclamation", which appeared in issue 16/17 of transition. The Proclamation was signed by Kay Boyle, Whit Burnett, Hart Crane, Caresse Crosby, Harry Crosby, Martha Foley, Stuart Gilbert, A. L. Gillespie, Leigh Hoffman, Eugene Jolas, Elliot Paul, Douglas Rigby, Theo Rutra, Robert Sage, Harold J. Salemson, and Laurence Vail.

Authors published in transition included Gertrude Stein, Ernest Hemingway, Hart Crane, Samuel Beckett, Dylan Thomas, Robert McAlmon, Andre Gide, Philippe Soupault, Archibald McLeish, Rainer Maria Rilke, Bryher, Laura Riding, Georg Trakl, Rhys Davies, Allen Tate, Andre Breton, Robert Desnos, Hans Arp, Robert Graves, William Carlos Williams, Malcolm Cowley, George Ribemont-Dessaignes, Franz Kafka, Morley Callaghan, Kathleen Cannell, Paul Bowles, Victor Llona, and Man Ray. Some of these works were published in translations by Maria McDonald.

Perhaps the most famous work to appear in transition was Finnegans Wake by James Joyce. Many segments of the unfinished novel were published there in the 1920s and 1930s.

[edit] External links

This article about a literary magazine is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.