Art Drama Architecture Music: An Anthology of Miron Grindea’s ADAM Editorials, Volume II

ADAM International Review was the longest-running literary magazine to exist under one editor. It started life in Romania as a Jewish magazine, but relocated to Britain, where its editor, Miron Grindea, sought refuge from Nazi-occupied Europe. It first appeared in 1941 and continued to challenge and entertain its readers until Grindea’s death in 1995 brought its lively story to an end. He was working on number 500 when he died. The life of ADAM reflects the main currents in literary and artistic life through five decades, and the magazine counts among its contributors Picasso, Bertolt Brecht, Graham Greene, Jean Cocteau, Ungaretti, Andre Gide, Francois Mauriac, Walt Whitman, W. H. Auden, Igor Stravinsky and Benjamin Britten. ADAM introduced the British reader to writing from all around the world - Chile, India, Sweden, Senegal, Ecuador - long before the translation industry had made global literature standard fare. However, French culture was Grindea’s greatest passion and he dedicated ADAM to the task of cultural bridge-building between Britain and France. He believed that the artist and the intellectual had a responsibility to further the task of an active humanism.