A City Sampler

Item is the first number of City, titled A City Sampler, published in July 1967. The item was edited by Marilyn Hacker, William McNeill, and Russell FitzGerald. Contributors include Harold Reynolds, Anne Waldman, Helen Adam, DGF, Lewis Ellingham, Kirby Congdon, Samuel R. Delany, Betty Davis, and Carol Emshwiller. 
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Acclaimed science-fiction writer Samuel R. Delany and his then-wife, the poet Marilyn Hacker, were a bohemian couple who spent time in San Francisco and their native New York. Through their friendship with the FitzGeralds, sci-fi became a new arena for Russell’s interest in mysticism and surrealism to flourish. Delany commissioned him to illustrate the covers for several of his books. With Hacker, FitzGerald also co-edited the small literary magazine City; issue 3 paired designs from FitzGerald’s tarot deck (see adjacent vitrines) with poems by Helen Adam (1909–1993). Adam was a Scottish balladeer beloved by the San Francisco Renaissance poets who was fascinated by the occult and whose gritty subject matter resonated with FitzGerald’s (see video in adjacent vitrine). 
-Jon Davies, 2024