WHAT is news? Webster says simply that it is "matter of interest," a definition at once prosaic yet broad. Much interests TIME'S readers, their normal curiosity whetted by headlines, radio bulletins, TV shows. Sometimes some of the most important news of the week is made by these headlines. Newsmen rarely, if ever, report the news about themselves. Last week one story that shouted out of the front pages and caused repercussions both in the U.S. and in Europe--the story of John Foster Dulles' press conference--was created by the press, and thus what reporters, pundits and editors said became the real news. In another way, the story of how the press reported, emphasized and commented on the Mikoyan visit was of perhaps greater importance than the visit itself. For both stories--stories you will read only in TIME--see PRESS, Making News That Isn't and "Objectivity" Rampant.

NEWS, Webster might have added, is also reflection--clear second thoughts on current history. A chapter of Cuban history ended the day Dictator Batista fled. Were the facts for an appraisal at hand? Could the course of the new government be predicted? To TIME, Fidel Castro's triumph was a story followed closely from the start. A month after Castro's invasion, TIME reported that "Batista's troops sent to kill the rebels lacked the heart or the ability to do so." In November 1957 a TIME correspondent interviewed Dictator Batista in Havana, met the next day in Santiago with Castro's hunted underground chief. On a later swing he took off to the hills to see Castro, watched an air-ground battle from behind rebel lines. TIME early reported that Castro was acting "like a king," and might "become the brilliant liberator his young followers see or a man on horseback.'' Last week's bloodshed provided a clearly seen guidepost for a long, reflective yet dramatic report, at a time when the crucial facts were at hand. See THE HEMISPHERE'S Cover story. The Vengeful Visionary.

NEWS is also relative. The impact of one event is invariably shaped by the force of others. Thus, when the Protestant Episcopal Church in the U.S. elected a new presiding bishop last October, that election, while duly reported in TIME and elsewhere, was overshadowed by news from Rome: the death and burial of Pope Pius XII and the election of Pope John XXIII. Last week Presiding Bishop Arthur Carl Lichtenberger was formally installed in his new post, and news could catch up with him in greater detail. In this issue TIME introduces the grocer's son from Oshkosh, Wis. who is now chief spokesman for 3,274,867 Episcopalians in the U.S. and abroad. Said he: "If this were still an aristocratic church, it would never have elected me." The "P.B." also told reporters that he hoped the Red Sox (he lived near Boston for a time) would win the American League pennant: "In St. Louis, when the Cardinals won, they rang the bells in the church tower. There is a connection there, you know." For other pronouncements by Bishop Lichtenberger, see RELIGION, New Presiding Bishop.

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