Thus did Irving contribute to the founding of Quadrant, probably the most important and successful magazine of ideas in Australia’s history. (Its only significant rival in recent decades has been the leftist Meanjin, but it has not been a serious one. The Australian writer Frank Moorhouse once explained that “meanjin” was an Aboriginal word meaning “rejected by the New Yorker”.) Indeed, Quadrant was destined to outlast Encounter; forty years after that conversation in the Russian Tea Room—a long time for a little magazine—it is still a lively and substantial monthly, capable of starting a vigorous controversy and frequently quoted in the national media. It has even acquired a small but devoted following in the United States. William F. Buckley, Jr, was once generous enough to describe an issue of the magazine (a special one on China, put together by Simon Leys) as “the single most liberating issue of any magazine I can remember”.