Remembering Irving Howe

I first encountered Irving during merger negotiations between his political organization, the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee, and mine, the New American Movement. It was 1979, and among NAM’s ex New Leftish, Gramsci-loving negotiators, Irving was known as the leader of their social democratic right wing. Over the next decade, he and I became official comrades (the merger did take place), collaborators when I joined Dissent’s board, and then, to my delight, friends. In reality, we had no political scores to settle. I had never been a sixties hardliner, and Irving (the socialist) had never been a social democrat.

I’ve tried to describe to people who didn’t know Irving or Dissent what it was ...