Junk Mail

For me, it is rather like the fianl eradication of the Black Death plague from medieval Europe, but by God's mercy, wheedled out of Him with some vicious self-scourging, several bouts of high pitched keening and a whole lotta repentance, my subscription to the The New Yorker will thankfully terminate this week.
It only ever seems to be me who criticizes this disgracefully wretched magazine. I suppose proper critics and journalists won't write anything anti because they desperately desire to be published in the pallid rag someday and fear black marks against their name - shirking their duty, I call it, since The New Yorker is so unremittingly dire that in any proper cultural dialogue all the talking would cease while the speakers took turns to spit in its face. Only the cartoonist BEK produces any work of interest from the ruined pages of that weekly decline-in-progress. But, hurrah, as of next week, I will no longer be obligated to use up valuable garbage bag space with the discarded pages that comprise this miserable waste of ink suitable only for stablizing rickety table legs in gloomy dentist's offices in the most backwoods and backwards of suburbs.
So New Yorker, in the name of God: go!

Comments

[Mr. Peperium]

Verily I say, Amen and Amen! In my "profession", advertising, The New Yorker casts a long and durable shadow. To have it adorning the table in your office is the next best thing to adorning your car with a Public Radio bumper sticker ("Think Radio"...eeks!). Both are one-way express tickets with no stop-overs to intellectual respectability. Funny though, because during my freshman year at Princeton no issue of the Tiger, P's student humor magazine, was complete without a send-up of a New Yorker short story in which nothing happened and no one said anything that made the remotest sense. Odd how when an institution declines we can parody it and mock it but we just can't let go of it. With the notable exception, of course, of yourself.

[stephenesque]

It is a shame, actually. All those great writers like Barthelme who used to trudge through its pages. Where are they now?
I mean, I used to like the New Yorker - I don't know if that was because I was young and didn't know any better, or because it was actually good back then.

[DarkoV]

I've been subscribing for the last 20 years or so and still enjoy the 'toons and the writing. Aside from Mr. Kaplan, Roz Chast also is good for a laugh or two. Has the mag changed in the last 20 years or so? Absolutely. Tina Brown's editorial work has had a long-term affect, both in a positive & negative fashion. The magazine is still alive, perhaps not as "rigorous, from a literary standpoint. You can't discount the talent though, what with regular contributors like Hertberg, Auletta, Toobin, Hersh, Orlean, Lane, Trillin, Gopnik, & Gawande. Is there a Joseph Mitchell there now? No, but what other magazine can, on a regular weekly basis, consistently provide a new & interesting piece of writing? None that I've read. Perhaps it's the current dearth of writing talent, rather than the current sate of The New Yorker that's an issue? Your thoughts or suggestions on other magazines (especially weekly ones)that could replace TNY.

[stephenesque]

You make good points, DarkoV, and, as you may suspect, I was venting a little spleen. However, I am very tired of the "Shouts and Murmurs" which has really taken the express train downhill. It is not funny at all. I have watched Ian Frazier become boring there. Also, I am tired of tedious "Fiction" by Toni Morrison or whomever illustrated by a huge B&W close-up
photograph of an eggplant.
Gushing profiles of circus freaks and avant-garde dancers with accompanying portrait by Richard Avedon should also be expunged without delay.
The movie and music criticism is passable, I suppose.
Obviously, I am in favor of a weekly magazine similar to the UK's Spectator, which, for all its faults, is a magazine I love. But, admittedly, it is a publication that caters for a smaller public in a much smaller country: the Spectator and - to some extent - Private Eye can flourish in Britain's rather incestuous intellectual and literary climate in a way that is impossible for similar American journals. So, frustration on my part? Oh yes indeed.
Anyway, thanks for your comment!

[The Misspent Life]

The Atlantic was superb for a while under M. Kelly's reign. His death was a great loss and the magazine just isn't the same--I just let them sit on my table most of the time.

The only time I ever bought a copy of the New Yorker was when they had a Pikachu on the cover (I was really into Pikachu in college).

[John Fitzgerald]

I only occasionally pick it up to find out about event going on around town; that section, anyway, never disappoints.

[Dan]

Since my New Yorker subscription is yearly Christmas gift I continue to subscribe.

I do, however, avoid any and all fiction and poetry contained therein.

[stephenesque]

Dan - poor you!
I forgot to whine about the poetry. It's often written by somebody who is dead.
Meanwhile, I fear that they will keep sending me copies even after my subscription dies, or so I am told. Will we never be set free?

[Sebastian]

I got here by searching "chubby yellow wanker". Doesnt the internet work in strange ways?

Anyway, I really enjoy your writing style. Keep it up.

Third and final thought - I enjoy the spectator, although, as a "right of centre" publication, it does tend to make some rather startling non-sequiturs.