JAMES AGEE On New York City

n 1939, with New York City playing host to the World’s Fair, magazine dedicated its July issue to commemorating the editor Russell Davenport chose not to run the prose poems, or the foreword that Agee wrote to open the magazine. The reasons remain unclear, but none of Agee’s work for the issue found its way into print during his lifetime, ending up in boxes stored above the false ceiling of the front room of his home at 17 King Street in SoHo. They remained undisturbed until 2015, when Agee’s youngest daughter moved away from the house. The unpublished pieces are now with the author’s papers at the University of Tennessee, and his foreword, reproduced here, offers a glimpse of how 1939 New York inspired Agee, and a taste of his lyrical vision.