person1930–

Norman Podhoretz

Disciplines:

Summary

American editor and intellectual — editor of Commentary magazine (1960–1995) — founding father of neoconservatism — author of Making It (1967) and Breaking Ranks (1979) — who transformed Commentary from a Jewish intellectual journal into the flagship publication of the neoconservative movement.

Core Contribution

Creates Commentary as the institutional home of neoconservatism — Podhoretz's 35-year editorship transformed a liberal Jewish magazine into the intellectual headquarters of the movement that would shape Reagan-era foreign policy and supply the ideology for the Iraq War.

Key Spikes & Highlights

Making It was rejected by his entire New York literary circle — the book's frank discussion of ambition and wanting to 'make it' violated the norm of New York intellectuals who were supposed to pursue ideas disinterestedly; its rejection by his friends accelerated his political migration toward conservatism
His son John Podhoretz became a Commentary editor and continuing the magazine into the 21st century — a rare case of direct father-son intellectual succession in American magazine journalism

Notable Works & Achievements

Doings and Undoings

Making It

Breaking Ranks

Why We Were in Vietnam

My Love Affair with America

World War IV

Historical Influences

Lionel Trilling Irving Kristol Hannah Arendt

Intellectual Lineage

Brooklyn Columbia Cambridge Commentary

Contemporaries & Peers

Irving Kristol Daniel Patrick Moynihan Nathan Glazer

Minds Influenced

Neoconservative movement

Intellectual Posterity

Commentary magazine Making It My Love Affair with America

Discussing