Introduction

What is The New Yorker? I know it’s a great magazine and that it’s a tremendous source of pleasure in my life. But what exactly is it? This blog’s premise is that The New Yorker is a work of art, as worthy of comment and analysis as, say, Keats’s “Ode on a Grecian Urn.” Each week I review one or more aspects of the magazine’s latest issue. I suppose it’s possible to describe and analyze an entire issue, but I prefer to keep my reviews brief, and so I usually focus on just one or two pieces, to explore in each the signature style of its author. A piece by Nick Paumgarten is not like a piece by Jill Lepore, and neither is like a piece by Ian Frazier. One could not mistake Collins for Seabrook, or Bilger for Goldfield, or Mogelson for Kolbert. Each has found a style, and it is that style that I respond to as I read, and want to understand and describe.

Monday, December 18, 2023

On the Horizon: Top Ten "New Yorker & Me"

Photo by John MacDougall



















The New Yorker & Me has been around nearly fourteen years. Hard to believe. During that time, I've posted 1,433 notes – over a million words. Blogging is an ephemeral business. Roger Angell compared it to launching paper airplanes from an upstairs window. But thanks to blogspot.com’s archive, all my posts still exist. How long they’ll last is anyone’s guess. Some are better than others. Some were easy to write; others more difficult. I hope it doesn’t seem too self-indulgent if I look back and pick ten favorites. A new series then – “Top Ten New Yorker & Me” – one per month, for the next ten months, starting January 15, 2024. 

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