There are already parodies of The New Yorker‘s chilling elevator video. The spooky music, by the way, which opens with a repeated note that sounds a little like an elevator that might be opening its doors to trap you for days (or minutes), is “The Storm Begins†by Jennifer Haines.
Monthly Archives: May 2008
I Love New York in June: Ian Frazier and Bill McKibben at the Y
Martin Schneider writes:
I was just riffling through my inbox (such a tactile metaphor), and the following event at the 92nd Street Y jumped out at me. From the Y’s latest press release:
Tuesday, June 10, 8:15 pm, $26
The Lamentations of Ian Frazier
Whether flat-out funny in his Shouts and Murmurs columns in The New Yorker (most recently, the column about the man who bought and is renovating Wyoming), thoughtful and moving in books like On the Rez or far-ranging and perceptive in essay collections like the upcoming Lamentations of the Father, Ian Frazier is an American original. A mix of journalist and comedian, heir to Mark Twain and James Thurber, Frazier brings a sharp but loving eye to the vagaries of American life. He talks with WNYC’s Leonard Lopate.
I’ve never seen Frazier speak, I bet he’s very entertaining. I wish I were in NYC for this but—ain’t.
Plus, don’t overlook this event at the same venue:
Monday, June 2, 8:15 pm, $26
Bill McKibben on the Environment
When, in the 1980s, Bill McKibben started writing about climate change and the environment in The New Yorker, he was one of the first mainstream writers to draw attention to the subject. His writing profoundly affected Al Gore, among others. McKibben’s books include The End of Nature, The Age of Missing Information and Enough; this spring, Times Books has published a collection of his essays, The Bill McKibben Reader, and he is the editor of American Earth: Environmental Writing Since Thoreau (Library of America).
Extra!
General Excellence, over 2,000,000 circulation: The New Yorker, David Remnick, editor, for the February 19 & 26, August 13, October 8 issues. Congratulations to everyone at The New Yorker, including Blake Eskin, who was rightly nominated for leading the extraordinarily dedicated and creative group at newyorker.com.
Three elated cheers, too, for my former colleagues at The Nation—where I first learned about em dashes and a heck of a lot more—and, especially, to our scrappy gang at Print, my friends and role models, who were honored with the General Excellence award for magazines with a circulation under 100,000. Coincidentally, both David Remnick and Print captain Joyce Rutter Kaye are celebrating ten years at their respective magazines. It’s a nice way to cap the decade!
Joyce Rutter Kaye and David Remnick, generally excellent. Click to enlarge.
Google Goes All New Yorker-Eyed
It is impossible to have too many New Yorker cartoons in one’s daily life, although Bob Mankoff may occasionally feel otherwise, amid a downpour. To this end, today three new iGoogle themes have debuted, courtesy of Mankoff and a brace, flutter, brood, pladge, loveliness of New Yorker cartoonists.
After You’re Done Reading Everything in Edith Wharton’s Library…
You can move on to the book collections of Carl Sandburg, Susan B. Anthony, and noted fallen rhymester Tupac Shakur. These and other literary libraries are on the Lilbrarything group I See Dead People[‘s Books]. A perfect way to fill in those gaps in your shelves! (Thanks to the indispensable Very Short List for the link.)
On the other hand, space may be tight, and life is certainly short, so you could also get rid of books instead—or at least contemplate the bookshelf with half an eye to getting rid of them, which is what my friends Caleb Crain and Scott McLemee have been doing and debating.
As for Edith Wharton, whose foundation’s house-preserving troubles Rebecca Mead documented in a recent issue, there’s another defender of her home: Kate Bolik in Slate; it looks like Slate readers (and others?) have helped delay the foreclosure of The Mount to May 31. Finally, here’s John Updike’s review in The New Yorker, from 2007, of a recent Edith Wharton biography.
If you’re the good-vibes-sending type, please direct some over to the National Magazine Awards this evening, won’t you?