Philip Rahv is chiefly remembered as the co-founder (with William Phillips) of Partisan Review, one of the most influential literary journals published in America. Active in the "New York School" of left-wing literati, widely considered a leading Neo-Marxist critic, recognized as an astute book reviewer, respected as an austere copy editor, and active in liberal political causes, Rahv deserved his reputation as an important and influential twentieth-century man of letters.

Philip Rahv was born Ivan Greenberg, the second of three sons, on 10 March 1908 in Kupin, Ukraine. He would adopt the name Philip Rahv when he became a Communist in 1933; Rahv is the Hebrew word for rabbi. His parents were Jewish shopkeepers living in the midst of a peasant population. Rahv's parents were early Zionists, and after the revolution they immigrated to Palestine, where Rahv's father opened a small furniture factory. Rahv came to America in 1922, settling in Providence...