Journal Issue
Published in October 1923, no. 6 of The Lyric West gives readers several clear ways into the magazine. It contains 42 named pieces or sections, beginning with Three Sonnets by Mary Brent Whiteside, You Shall See the Wind by Mary Brent Whiteside, and Seasons by Vivienne Thew. That opening offers a direct path through the issue, but it is not the only one. A reader can follow the printed order, pause over a familiar contributor, or start with a title that catches the eye. No special background is needed. The magazine explains itself gradually through the choices it makes and through the company each piece keeps.
A Pastel by Leonora F. Curtin marks the issue’s most conspicuous opening toward modernist practice. The poem compresses perception into short, image-bearing lines around “The leaves of a Tulip-tree”; pause and white space become part of the measure, bringing ordinary experience as formally unsettled lyric material into the magazine’s field of subjects. Weare Holbrook’s The Belle of the Ball answers it from another angle: it organizes description through sentence-length lines around “She was the last to leave”; emphasis shifts through image, enjambment, and changes in syntactic pace. The presence of a named form such as Three Sonnets makes the contrast especially legible: innovation occurs beside inherited measure, not after its disappearance. In this Los Angeles setting, modernism appears less as a manifesto than as a widening of permissible rhythm, image, and subject within a magazine still hospitable to rhyme.
The contents page also works like a small map. Early entries establish the issue’s first set of voices; around the middle, A Pastel by Leonora F. Curtin changes the view; the closing stretch reaches “Lacquered Mandarin Moments” by Vera Frances Morse. The works differ in length, subject, and manner, yet their placement creates connections that a simple list of names cannot show. The pleasure comes from those changes. A short piece can clear the air after a longer one, a new voice can redirect the mood, and an unexpected title can make an earlier page look different when the reader thinks back to it.
The contributor list includes Mary Brent Whiteside, Vivienne Thew, Dorothy Pinckney Pillsbury, Gustav Davidson, Ethelean Tyson Gaw, Ethel Hope, Jessica Nelson North, and Elliott C. Lincoln, along with 27 additional contributors. Some readers will arrive looking for a particular name; others will meet these contributors here for the first time. Either approach works. The publication details add useful context: the issue was edited by Roy Towner Thompson, published by The Lyric West, and issued from Los Angeles, California. A journal is also a made object, assembled by people deciding what to print, how to order it, and which voices should share a number. Reading from beginning to end lets those choices appear naturally.
The catalog subjects—Los Angeles literary culture, American poetry, Little magazines, Desert, and Sea and coast—are useful starting points, especially for searching, but they do not set limits on what a reader may find. For a first visit, begin with Three Sonnets by Mary Brent Whiteside, turn next to A Pastel by Leonora F. Curtin, and finish with “Lacquered Mandarin Moments” by Vera Frances Morse. The clean reading edition is designed for that kind of movement. Original scan: 36 PDF pages. Reader’s edition: 64 PDF pages. It keeps the contents in a stable, legible form and makes names and titles easier to find. A source facsimile remains part of the project’s private editorial record, but it is not included in the public upload. What appears here is the reading copy: a practical way to spend time with the issue and discover which pieces invite a return.
Contributors
- Mary Brent Whiteside — Poet
- Vivienne Thew — Poet
- Dorothy Pinckney Pillsbury — Poet
- Gustav Davidson — Poet
- Ethelean Tyson Gaw — Poet
- Ethel Hope — Poet
- Jessica Nelson North — Poet
- Elliott C. Lincoln — Poet
- Raine Bennett — Poet
- Charles Winship — Poet
- Nora B. Cunningham — Poet
- Ruth Harwood — Poet
- Virginia Taylor McCormick — Poet
- Ruth Corley Hoskins — Poet
- Virginia Lyne Tunstall — Poet
- Henry Fitzgerald Ruthrauff — Poet
- Sydney King Russell — Poet
- Julia Cooley Altrocchi — Poet
- Saidee Gerard Ruthrauff — Poet
- Leonora F. Curtin — Poet
- Helene Mullins — Poet
- Robert Haven Schauffler — Poet
- Ruth H. Willian — Poet
- Weare Holbrook — Poet
- E. MacAlister Hepburn — Poet
- Penelope Russ — Poet
- Wright Field — Poet
- Pierre Loving — Poet
- G. G. Bostwick — Poet
- Paul Eldridge — Poet
- Cecelia Hennel Hendricks — Poet
- Dorothy Haddox — Poet
- Georgina S. Townsend — Poet
- Almira Richardson Wilcox — Poet
- Vera Frances Morse — Poet
Publication details
Full contents
- Three Sonnets — Mary Brent Whiteside [Poem, p. 3]
- You Shall See the Wind — Mary Brent Whiteside [Poem, p. 4]
- Seasons — Vivienne Thew [Poem, p. 5]
- Camp Fires — Dorothy Pinckney Pillsbury [Poem, p. 6]
- Autumn Portrait — Gustav Davidson [Poem, p. 7]
- The Desert — Ethelean Tyson Gaw [Poem, p. 8]
- Masquerade — Ethel Hope [Poem, p. 8]
- Sand — Jessica Nelson North [Poem, p. 9]
- Loss — Elliott C. Lincoln [Poem, p. 11]
- In Fabre’s Garden — Raine Bennett [Poem, p. 12]
- The Usurer — Charles Winship [Poem, p. 13]
- The Wind — Nora B. Cunningham [Poem, p. 14]
- Allegro — Ruth Harwood [Poem, p. 14]
- Pain — Virginia Taylor McCormick [Poem, p. 15]
- The Early Morning Crowd — Ruth Corley Hoskins [Poem, p. 15]
- A Prayer for Crippled Men — Virginia Lyne Tunstall [Poem, p. 16]
- She Wants Such Simple Gifts — Henry Fitzgerald Ruthrauff [Poem, p. 16]
- The Enigma — Sydney King Russell [Poem, p. 17]
- Mists — Sydney King Russell [Poem, p. 17]
- Disseverance — Julia Cooley Altrocchi [Poem, p. 18]
- Wan Water — Saidee Gerard Ruthrauff [Poem, p. 18]
- A Pastel — Leonora F. Curtin [Poem, p. 19]
- The First Visit — Leonora F. Curtin [Poem, p. 19]
- Prelude — Helene Mullins [Poem, p. 19]
- Before the Great Adventure — Robert Haven Schauffler [Poem, p. 20]
- Music in Hospital — Robert Haven Schauffler [Poem, p. 20]
- Circumstance — Ruth H. Willian [Poem, p. 21]
- To an Old Lover — Ruth H. Willian [Poem, p. 21]
- Kin — Ruth H. Willian [Poem, p. 21]
- The Belle of the Ball — Weare Holbrook [Poem, p. 22]
- Nocturne — E. MacAlister Hepburn [Poem, p. 22]
- Two Paths — Penelope Russ [Poem, p. 23]
- To a High-Born Lady — Wright Field [Poem, p. 24]
- Mountain Hunger — Pierre Loving [Poem, p. 24]
- Sanctuary — G. G. Bostwick [Poem, p. 25]
- Defiance — Paul Eldridge [Poem, p. 25]
- You — Paul Eldridge [Poem, p. 25]
- Wyoming Sunset — Cecelia Hennel Hendricks [Poem, p. 26]
- To a Kimono — Dorothy Haddox [Poem, p. 27]
- His Will — Georgina S. Townsend [Poem, p. 27]
- Scars — Almira Richardson Wilcox [Poem, p. 28]
- “Lacquered Mandarin Moments” — Vera Frances Morse [Poem, p. 28]
Rights and citation
Copyright remains with the respective authors, artists, publisher, or successors.
Copyright Status Unresolved
Rights in the individual contributions and the periodical compilation have not been fully resolved.
*The Lyric West*, vol. 3, no. 6, October 1923. Text/Tech Journals, reader’s edition.