The New Yorker (1-year) | almost forgot to mention the cool covers

The New Yorker (1-year) | Best Magazine in America

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The New Yorker (1-...

	The New Yorker (1-year) Conde' Nast Publications average customer review:based on 92 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

almost forgot to mention the cool covers

The New Yorker is both a blessing and a curse for me. It's a great magazine, but sometimes I feel so compelled to keep up with my weekly New Yorkers that I find it feeling like a burden.

My brother has a system, he just shared it with me, I hope he doesn't mind me sharing with you. The day a new issue arrives, he immediately goes through page by page, removes the subscription cards and advertisements, reads the cartoons and asides ("constabulary notes from around the world," "Block that Metaphor"), scans the poems, and gets the lay of the land. He then goes back later with a map in mind of which articles need to be read, and can tackle them undistracted by the rest of the magazine. I don't know, he says it works for him, he never falls behind.

My grandfather read the New Yorker every week. He had a coffee table filled with the newspapers and magazines he subscribed to. He also drank tanqueray. He did not do Sudokus or listen to Gabby La La, but perhaps would have if born in a different era. He had big bookcases filled with wonderful books. Sometimes a visitor would marvel at how many books he owned, and ask "have you really read all these books?" He would answer, "no, not all." And after the visitor left, he would gently and with remarkable restraint, explain to us why the question asked reveals a lack of education and sophistication. "...any serious reader knows that nobody has read all the books in their collection"

In my review of Highlights Magazine (or as my daughter calls it, "Maz-a-Gine"), I called it the New Yorker of kids literature. So it is only fair for me to now pronounce the New Yorker to be the Highlights Magazine of adult lit. A little old-fashioned, snobby, a touch stale, but still the best there is. I didn't even mind it during the Tina Brown era, it lost a little of its uniqueness temporarily but was still a cut above the rest. I wouldn't mind if there was a little more variety in the poetry, less of the same types of dreary poems about growing older and having your lover die from the same dreary poets, more of an effort to discover new poets. I love the fiction issues when they attempt to showcase new writers.

I'd possibly get more out of it if I lived in New York. As it is, I'm mostly taunting myself by reading the "Goings on about town."

Lately I've been especially enjoying the political essays in "The Talk of the Town" by the likes of Hendrik Hertzberg, David Remnick, as well as the journalism of Seymour Hersh. This kind of reporting is more important than ever, important to be appearing in a mainstream, respected publication during a time when the executive branch is doing everything in its power to intimidate an already cowed media. Henrick Hertzburg's recent essay on the proposed flag burning amendment. I intuitively know what he is saying, intuitively believe it to be morally and philosophically correct, but can't articulate my thoughts with the elegance and clarity of Mr. Hertzburg. He concisely lays out not just how wrong the amendment is, but also how irrelevant the issue is in all but a symbolic, abstract dimension. He writes that Republic and Democrat supporters "do not seriously regard it is as a good let alone necessary idea," and sprinkles in the beautiful parenthetical "(intellectual corruption, like the venal variety is no stranger to either party, even if, in the present era, both varieties are more common among the Republicans.)" Good stuff, Papa would have appreciated it.

Buy it, subscribe, enjoy.

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Best Magazine in America

The New Yorker is consistently the most well-written, readable, and important magazine in America. For anyone wondering how the Abu Ghraib scandal broke: New Yorker. For anyone wondering which magazine wrote a prescient profile on John Kerry when he was perhaps the biggest long shot for the 2004 Democratic nomination: New Yorker. Simply put, the New Yorker, as many reviewers have already acknowledged, is the best written and most substantial magazine hitting newstands every week.

For those who criticize the magazine as "snobby," feel free to go back to Time or Newsweek, which dilute what might be good reporting with hundreds of ads and the twice-a-year "Who Was the Real Jesus?" issue to perk up sales.

For those who criticize the magazine as too liberal, I will be the first to admit that liberalism (in its traditional sense) is a motivating factor in the magazine's editorial decisions. But if you think the New Yorker "tows the Democratic line," I'd advise you to compare it to the Nation or other such publications. Normally, the New Yorker's reportage is so intricate and off-the-beaten-path that politics rarely enters the debate.

Pick up an issue and actually read every article (even the long ones). It's incredibly rewarding.

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As necessary as the air I breathe

I encountered the New Yorker in my best friend's house when I was ten years old, becoming hooked from the first time I opened the magazine. Ever since I have been an enthusiastic, appreciative reader. I delight in the quality of the prose;I laugh uproariously at the deliciously witty cartoons; savor the poems; marvel at the creative covers and other artwork. Five stars plus plus plus!

Yes, as other amazon reviewers have pointed out, the quality of the magazine declined drastically during the Tina Brown era. Happily for all concerned, the New Yorker is back on track after that unfortunate detour.

Throughout its illustrious history, some critics have said that the magazine is too focused on New York City. While the events listings are invaluable to people living in the area, this best of all American magazines offers in-depth articles, rich humor, superb book, music, movie, dance, and art reviews aimed at a reading public all over the country. I would even expand that to say, all over the world.

If you have time only to read one weekly magazine, make it this superlative one. Since the day I first turned it pages, reading the New Yorker has been as necessary, and as life-giving, as the air I breathe.

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The classic classy magazine

'New Yorker' has a look of its own , a feel of its own, a flavor of its own.
It is one of the great magazines.
Its cartoons are classics of the genre.
It provides the calendar of NY events in a quite detailed and helpful way.
Its smartness, sharpness are felt usually in the 'Talk of the Town' feature.
If nothing else, historically, it has its place as the locus of publication of some of America's greatest fiction. Salinger and 'the New Yorker' go together. Isaac Singer and Updike also published some of their best work in 'The New Yorker'.
The new non- fiction star Malcolm Gladwell did his breakthrough work in 'The New Yorker'.
The 'New Yorker' has each week a long feature article often of the greatest possible interest. The magazine seems to bring out the highest quality in its writers.
With all this I nonetheless have strong criticism of the 'New Yorker' especially in regard to one investigative reporter who in my opinion has often shown more imagination than investigation, Seymour Hersh.
I know that the general opinion is that David Remnick, the current editor has done a great job in bringing up circulation and restoring quality to the journal.

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you don't have to be a New Yorker to love it, but it helps

I was introduced to the New Yorker when I first arrived at grad school--and have been an avid fan ever since. You don't have to live in NY to love this magazine! Its articles, stories, cartoons, poems and commentary never fail to turn a cup of tea on an afternoon break into something more--like being invited to engage with the clever minds of our day. If you are no longer in school, staying well informed in this way is priceless. There are insights here that appeal to our need to be reading something with style so thoroughly that they make you wish your busier friends had enough time to discuss some of the controversial or witty contents with you. The cutting edge reporting is unparallelled in "literary" magazines of this sort. I will never forget the provocative articles on low energy radiation and cancer that caused such a stir in the late 80's, when people began exposing themselves to computers on a regular basis. The New Yorker is a gem. Picking up a copy is like fine dining in an era of junk food. Treasure it.

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