This commitment to the young is a matter of affinity as well as policy: he likes the company of young people. When I was beginning to write this piece in the fall of 1994, Irving and Bea gave a party for those who had worked on the two magazines as interns over the past twenty-five years. Nearly fifty men and women turned up, a fair sample of Irving’s young people over three decades and with an age range from the early twenties to the early fifties. They included many who now hold prominent positions in government, universities, think-tanks, newspapers, foundations—as well as some editors of magazines. These are all people who, at a crucial stage of their lives, benefited greatly from exposure to Irving: from his instruction, his advice, his encouragement and care and friendship—and most of all from his example of how to live honestly and creatively on that uncertain ground where the worlds of ideas and of public policy meet. At that party, affection for him radiated through the company. Brilliant writer though he is, and enormously influential though he has been, I suspect that Irving might regard the people in that room as his most satisfying achievement.