In 1994, when I was living in LA, my grandmother got me a New Yorker subscription. At first I couldn’t figure it: Gram, a lifelong Connecticut-ian, was more likely to drive to Vermont to cross-country ski than to zip to the city to attend the theatre. I was working at Disney, writing for the music ‘zine Fizz, and going to a lot of rock shows. One of my roommates even played in a rock band. The other? A hairdresser. We didn’t spend a lot of time talking about foreign policy, or contemporary literature, or even media powerhouses like Lew Wasserman. (Maybe David Geffen came up once in a while. We weren’t Philistines.) Perhaps my grandmother noticed that my conversation was slipping. Or maybe one of those blowout cards landed on her desk. Who knows.
Doesn’t matter, because The New Yorker was amazing. Politics, profiles, art, music — opera? was I actually reading about opera? — science, new fiction. Shit, Anthony Lane’s film reviews opened a new world of hysterical. Sure, it was during the much-derided Tina Brown years. And no, I couldn’t get through one before the next week’s arrived. Didn’t matter. The New Yorker provided — provides — broad cultural discourse that is also deep and funny and smart.
When I moved to New York, I’d whip through the magazine in less than a week, and I finally got to use the listings up front. That year, Gram died suddenly. I renewed The New Yorker on my own.
The magazine isn’t perfect: Joan Acocella is unbearable, the war coverage — Sy Hersch aside — is wearing, James Surowieki is a cut-rate Malcolm Gladwell, and the new fiction issue has dropped from a dozen authors to 3 or 4. Nevertheless, The New Yorker sets the bar, week after week.
No matter where I live, I wager I’ll remain a New Yorker subscriber until I shuffle off this mortal coil.
(Not a lifetime subscriber, which has been trouble for another mag — what I mean is, I’ll pay for each year as it comes along).
I love my New Yorker subscription too. I sometimes dream of living in New York and getting to make use of the stuff in the front — or of living here and jetting up every few weeks to at least go to the theater.
I’m going to have to disagree with you about James Surowieki. I like reading Gladwell — he’s got this easy flowing style that makes things go easy — but Surowieki covers a wide range of economic topics quite nicely. Really challenging stuff, and he makes the ideas clear without dumbing anything down. I like him.
The fiction editing is nowhere near what it used to be though. That’s kind of funny, because I started reading the New Yorker primarily for the fiction. Now I sometimes skip it altogether.
Have you seen Daniel Radosh’s blog? (http://www.radosh.net/) He does a parody of the Caption Contest every week. Good stuff.
Hey Carolyn,
If you want to tote those memories without a steamer trunk…
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1400064740/km-20/ref=nosim
Got this for Lisa, who’s a New Yorker fiend, and it’s pretty durn cool!
db
thanks, Doug! I’m already a proud owner. And I even use it.