Interesting Emendations: Ian Frazier's "Paradise Bronx"

Sometimes a New Yorker piece appears that's been carved out of a larger work. Ian Frazier’s wonderful “Paradise Bronx” (The New Yorker, July 22, 2024) is such a piece. It comes from his recent book of the same name. Comparing the two versions, I found a number of interesting differences – some minor, some more substantive. For example, in the New Yorker piece, Frazier writes, 

Walking on Bruckner Boulevard one morning, I was stunned by the loudness of the trucks. (No other borough has truck traffic like the Bronx’s, partly because its Hunts Point market, for produce, meat, and fish, is the largest food-distribution depot in the world.) I also heard cars, vans, motorcycles, an Amtrak train, airplanes, and, on the lower Bronx River nearby, the horn of a tugboat pushing a barge. 

In the book version, Frazier combines the three sentences into one:

Walking on Bruckner Boulevard one morning, stunned by the loudness of the trucks (no other borough has truck traffic like the Bronx’s, partly because its Hunts Point market, for produce, meat, and fish, is the largest food-distribution depot in the world), I also heard cars, vans, motorcycles, an Amtrak train, airplanes, and, on the lower Bronx River nearby, the horn of a tugboat pushing a barge. 

Which do you prefer? The New Yorker version is more concise, less rambling. Nevertheless, the book version appeals to me. It’s less honed, more spontaneous. 

Here’s another example. In the New Yorker version, Frazier writes,

On the heights above the Hudson River, in Riverdale, I found the white stucco Moorish-Dutch-style mansion, empty and in disrepair, that John F. Kennedy moved into with his family in 1927, when he was ten. 

Here's the book version:

On the heights above the Hudson River, in Riverdale, I found the white stucco Moorish-Dutch-style mansion, now empty and in disrepair, which John F. Kennedy moved into with his family in 1927, when he was eleven.

The New Yorker version deletes “now” and substitutes “that” for “which.” It seems slightly smoother. But what I find startling is the change in Kennedy’s age – ten in The New Yorker, eleven in the book. Which is correct? I’m betting on the New Yorker version. It’s had the benefit of the magazine’s vaunted fact-checking.

Here's another example. In the New Yorker version, Frazier writes,

From the former Kennedy mansion, one can walk 4.7 miles to 825 East 179th Street, in the East Tremont neighborhood, where a thirteen-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald lived with his mother in 1953. The building that Oswald lived in no longer exists, and there is no historic marker.

Here's the book version:

From the former Kennedy mansion, one can walk 4.7 miles to 815 East 179th Street, in the East Tremont neighborhood, where a twelve-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald lived with his mother in 1952. Not only is there no historic marker, but the building that Oswald lived in no longer exists, and the address itself seems to have been abolished.

Again, the New Yorker version is smoother and more concise – more Strunk-and-White-compliant. But the book version’s extra “and the address itself seems to have been abolished” serves to emphasize the total vanishing of the Oswald address. What’s startling are the factual discrepancies: “825 East 179th Street” in the New Yorker version; “815 East 179th Street” in the book; “thirteen-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald” in The New Yorker; “twelve-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald” in the book; “1953” in The New Yorker; “1952” in the book. 

One more example. In the New Yorker version, Frazier writes,

You could swim in the Bronx River and in the East River, climb the beech trees in Van Cortlandt Park, sit on your fire escape and hear your neighbors’ different accents and languages, smell five different culinary traditions wafting through your building’s stairwell at suppertime: Paradise.

It's one of my favorite sentences in the piece. Checking the book version, I find it’s been lengthened to include additional details:

You could see the zoo animals over and over until you knew them by heart, swim in the Bronx River or the East River, climb the beech trees in Van Cortlandt Park, spend afternoons in a branch of the New York Public Library, sit on your fire escape and hear your neighbors’ different accents and languages coming from nearby apartments, smell five different culinary traditions wafting through your building’s stairwell at suppertime: Paradise.

Both versions are delightful. I relish the extra details in the book version. 

There are at least a dozen differences between the two texts. The New Yorker version reflects the style of New Yorker editing, with its emphasis on concision. And there’s nothing wrong with that. The New Yorker version is probably more accurate, too, due to the magazine’s rigorous fact-checking. But I also like the book version. It might be closer to Frazier’s actual voice – the singular way he thinks and expresses himself. Both versions are superb. It’s fascinating to compare them.