The just reissued Saul Steinberg 1945 collection, All In Line, caused me to dig out my 1947 paperback copy (shown above) I’ve had for quite a while. Because the paper is brittle and the pages threaten to detach, I don’t go to it very often. It took this 2024 edition to remind me — gadzooks! — that I do not have a hardcover copy of the book (originally published in 1945).
While in our local bookstore the other day, I looked at a copy of the new edition, and then put it back down. I felt like I was skipping a step by not spending time with the original edition. So the hunt begins for a dust-jacketed copy.
When I think of All In Line, I immediately think of my first art/cartoon editor at The New Yorker, Lee Lorenz. Lee, in his capacity as the magazine’s art (and later cartoon) editor was Steinberg’s editor for twenty-four years, from 1973 through 1997. Here’s a section from my unpublished memoir about a moment I asked Lee a simple question. The paragraph picks up as I describe my professional relationship with Lee during his years as my editor:
With Lee, I had no desire to communicate any further than a brief note attached to my weekly batch. I’d come into the magazine under the impression that my work spoke for me. The magazine’s editors either liked it, or they didn’t.
Above: l-r, Lee Lorenz, Bill Franzen, Roz Chast, and myself at Lee’s home, Easter time, around 1995. Photo by Liza Donnelly
My one social interaction with him in my years with him as my editor was an Easter Sunday party at his home. He invited Liza [Donnelly] and I and our girls along with Roz Chast and her husband and their kids. It was a wonderful day. Lee’s home had some great New Yorker original cartoon art on the walls. I was in his kitchen with him as he was uncorking a bottle of wine. I asked him a non-Eastery question: “What was the first cartoon collection you ever owned?” He paused his uncorking. I thought for a second I’d made the mistake of not leaving work at the office, but his pause was simply him taking a moment to think. He smiled as he answered, “Steinberg’s All In Line.”