Son of Saturday Review

From the day he resigned last November as editor of the Saturday Review in a policy disagreement with its new owners, it was a foregone conclusion that Norman Cousins would try a comeback with a new magazine. He had headed SR for 31 years, shaped it to his own personal tastes, and considered it to be "what my life is all about." Sure enough, Cousins confirmed last week that plans are well along for a new fortnightly that will probably appear in late spring.

Cousins promises that the publication will be somehow different from both the SR he left and the reorganized magazine being prepared by SR's new owners. But he is making little effort to avoid a kind of son-of-Saturday Review personality. The tentative title, Review, and initial cast of characters indicate that substantial shades of the old SR will remain. He has already recruited his former managing editor, general editor, art editor and advertising manager. They now work with Cousins in a modest mid-Manhattan office with a noncommittal sign on the door that reads N.C. AND COLLEAGUES. He has also signed up former U.N. Secretary-General U Thant and Architect Buckminster Fuller as members of his editorial board.

Cousins, 56, says that he envisions "a journal of international scope, concerned with the life of the mind, the principal problems of our time: war and peace, environment, the squandering of human resources." He wants Review to "be concerned with our biggest challenge--the need for planetary planning. We are beset by world problems, but we have no world philosophy for dealing with them."

Cash Pledges. When he left SR, Cousins considered offers of three college presidencies and 15 university professorships. But a "deluge of readers' letters" helped make up his mind. Overwhelmingly, he says, the letters urged that he return to journalism.

Cousins claims "an amazing response" from initial market samplings for the projected magazine, at $12 for a year's subscription. Another demographic cross section is now being tested. If it confirms earlier indications of widespread reader interest, he will make a final decision next month to go ahead.

Cousins is already seeking cash commitments from potential subscribers, and will aim for a circulation of about 250,000 by the end of the first year. Says he: "There are large numbers of well-educated people with highly cultivated tastes who enjoy the experience of reading and thinking and who take the world seriously without being solemn about it." This sounds suspiciously like the same audience that Cousins has always aimed at. If he does deliver a new offspring, it will likely be a direct competitor of Saturday Review.

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