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Looked Into
How to Read The New Yorker: An Illustrated Guide
Filed under: Looked Into Tagged: design, GOAT, keeping up, movies, Profiles, reviews, Shouts & Murmurs, subscriptions, theater, TOTT
A subscription to any weekly magazine is a commitment. If you subscribe to more than one, it’s even more important to ensure you stay on top of your consumption. I’ve developed the following process to ensure a timely yet comprehensive digestion of the beauty and wonder that is The New Yorker. Here’s my 10-step approach to the 7 January 2008 issue. (Read on.)While I read the complete contents every week, or close to it, I certainly can't (and don't!) fault other people for doing less. (OK, I carp from time to time, but that's only when my patience is really being tested.) This is a magazine, after all! It should be an illuminating diversion, not a chore.
Champ's advice is similar to what I tell people who ask how to manage the overwhelmingness, as did my friend Stephen the other day (he got a subscription for Christmas). Skim the listings if you see live events in New York and the short movie reviews if you see movies anywhere; read Talk, Shouts, the cartoons if you like cartoons, the reviews of whatever interests you, and a long feature or Profile. I got an email from him just this morning, though, with this update: "actually, i've been meaning to write you to tell you that i DEVOURED the latest issue. like, read every article (almost). i'm LOVING it more than i expected." So as you can see, it's doable, even for busy actors, waiters, and other professionals!
Also, as I told Stephen, there's nothing like it for total absorption on the subway, at the post office, in the tub, and on the internet. (Then, after you've recycled, you still have the DVD archives if a missed piece is haunting you like the Telltale Heart.) As Champ writes: "If managed correctly, the above process of consumption should take about a week. In fact, that’s what you should aim for lest you become 'that' subscriber who’s hopelessly behind."
Amen to that. Thanks to Steve Heller for the tip!
About us
Hello! We are media enthusiasts and culture addicts—not to mention classically trained (as we like to say) professional journalists. This is our collection of generally civilized conversations about magazines, movies, politics, punctuation, and other things that stir us.
You'd like to read more about us individually? That's so nice! Here you can learn a lot more about the Emdashes team, the mysterious-sounding names of our daily and non-daily columns, and our guest contributors.
We welcome tips, questions, and comments, and are always looking for ardent new contributors who care about letters (postal, typographical, admiring, literary, and tough-love). Here's how to contact us.
Occasionally, we host book giveaways, and review books here as often as we can. Publishers, please e-mail us and we'll send you an appropriate mailing address.
Tell me more
They say that dashes “are particularly useful in a sentence that is long and complex.” Emdashes—like em dashes—provides a thoughtful pause amid the hubbub.
Emdashes, founded in 2004, is currently written and drawn by Emily Gordon, Martin Schneider, Pollux, Jonathan Taylor, and Benjamin Chambers, as well as occasional guest contributors. (Unsigned posts through October 2008 are by Emily Gordon.)
The site is designed and maintained by House of Pretty and illustrated by Jesse Ewing for Inkleaf Studio. Additional drawings are by Carolita Johnson and Pollux (who also draws our daily comic, "The Wavy Rule"). The kissable Emdashes logo is by Jennifer Hadley, based on a 1943 Dorothy Gray ad.
Other writing by Emily Gordon
- Profile: Valerie Casey, Designers Accord founder, is spearheading the design of sustainability (for SXSW World; PDF, p. 20)
- Feature: Rea Irvin: visionary art director, man about town, and New Yorker founding father (for Print)
- Report: Learning to read with comic books--that are edited by Françoise Mouly (for Print)
- Interview: Designer Eleanor Grosch (for Print)
- Proposal: a better-designed Metrocard (for A Brief Message)
- Review: Charles Addams: A Cartoonist's Life by Linda H. Davis (for Newsday)
- Review: King's Gambit: A Son, a Father, and the World's Most Dangerous Game by Paul Hoffman (for Newsday)
- Review: Does a New Republic redesign mean a change of tune? (for Print)
- Interview: James Surowiecki on what's next for the wisdom of crowds (for Assignment Zero)
- Report: Eustace Tilley spruces up for The New Yorker's website redesign (for Print)
- Feature: Muslim immigration iconography in the Netherlands, and an interview with Ayaan Hirsi Ali (for Print)
- Micro-essay: on saving time through inspiration (for A Brief Message)
- Review: books about various New Yorker cartoonists by Liza Donnelly and Iain Topliss (for Newsday)
- Profile: screenwriter and novelist Joe Keenan (for Newsday)
- Review: The Complete New Yorker (for Print)
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Comments
Do I follow any kind of a pattern when I read The New Yorker? I’d like to think not, but I do tend to start at the back with the reviews. This tendency is often overridden by the irresistible urge to read a favorite writer – Ian Frazier, say, or Alice Munro – if he or she happens to have a piece in the magazine. I reserve GOAT for study while I’m in the bathroom or on a plane. But never in a bathroom on a plane. I guess that’s probably enough disclosure for now. It’s an interesting topic.