Emdashes. The New Yorker between the lines
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Looked Into
In Praise of Potty-Mouthed Panda Saviours
Filed under: Personal Tagged: Brian Luff, comedy, England, Georgina Sowerby, podcasts
The funny U is in honor of Georgina Sowerby and Brian Luff, whose incomparable podcast “The Big Squeeze,” now known as “It’s Sowerby & Luff,” is three years old this week. These Crouch Enders, who have become my friends and houseguests (not to mention Will Franken and Eliza Skinner admirers), have some exceptional associates, from Thesaurus Walrus and Candy Carrot-Cake to Doctor Rabbit and Nursey Lamb to the Queen herself, not to mention legions of fans in London and far, far afield. Raise a pint to them, won’t you?
(continued)
Extra!
Filed under: On the Spot Tagged: awards, Blake Eskin, David Remnick, design, Joyce Rutter Kaye, newyorker.com
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!
(continued)
Of Gentle Soul, to Human Race a (Tad) Friend
Filed under: Looked Into Tagged: architecture, audio, Buffalo, Frank Lloyd Wright, interviews, Ira Glass, Malcolm Gladwell, Susan Orlean, Tad Friend
It’s Tad Friend’s turn on Mediabistro’s running interview feature; Julie Haire does the honors. I like this quote, among others: “Some people write by polishing each sentence as they go, like a jeweler. I tend to spend lots of time painstakingly making an outline that I realize, a dozen paragraphs in, makes no sense, and then I put my head down and type nouns and verbs and quotes in a kind of grumpy blur, hammering out an extremely rough, totally un-publishable draft that I then go over and over and over before I hand it in.” Some of his observations about research and reporting techniques sound a lot like Susan Orlean’s in the terrific recording An Evening with Ira Glass and the New Kings of Nonfiction, which is most definitely worth buying.
Hey, it looks like Friend and I might have lived in Buffalo at the same time. (He wouldn’t have been quite old enough to babysit me.) I was going to cite something about blizzards, one of which I certainly remember, but found this great pro-Buffalo-weather propaganda instead. I passed through the city recently, for the first time
You'll See the Honor We Have Gained By the Wearing of the Webby
Filed under: Personal Tagged: awards, design
Emdashes is a Webby Honoree! I hereby blow kisses to the whole scrappy gang: designers/programmers Patric King and Su at House of Pretty and illustrator Jesse Ewing at Inkleaf, of whom I am in awe; writers Martin Schneider and Benjamin Chambers, gentlemen and scholars who donate their righteous labor for the cause; and everyone else, including readers, guest contributors, and New Yorkerites, who makes this go. I owe you guys an Old Fashioned, and more. And congratulations to Webby nominees Design Observer, SVA, and Dwell! (You can vote, too.)
(continued)
"How Much Are Construction Deaths Worth?"
Filed under: Personal Tagged: architecture, in memoriam, labor, Michael Bloomberg, politics
In a column in the New York Post, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer compared the accident to the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, a bellwether of the last century the brought on sweeping changes in corrupt citywide labor laws. He invoked the disaster as a way of indicating that vast changes at the DOB are called for in the wake of the crane accident. Will such changes occur? Sadly, tragically, criminally, another crane accident is probably more likely.(continued)
Who she?
I'm Emily Gordon, reachable at emily@emdashes.com.
I'm an editor at PRINT magazine in New York City. I've worked at The Nation, Newsday, PEN America, and Legal Affairs. I've written for the NY Times Book Review, Salon, The Washington Post, The Village Voice... continued
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This site is neither owned nor operated by The New Yorker magazine or Condé Nast Publications.
A few clips
- Report: Learning to read with comic books edited by Françoise Mouly (for Print)
- Interview: Designer Eleanor Grosch (for Print)
- Review: Charles Addams: A Cartoonist's Life by Linda H. Davis (for Newsday)
- Review: The King's Gambit: A Son, a Father, and the World's Most Dangerous Game by Paul Hoffman (for Newsday)
- Review: Does The New Republic's recent redesign mean a change of tune? (for Print)
- Proposal: A more attractive MetroCard (for A Brief Message)
- 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 (for Print)
- 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)
Tell me more
They say that dashes “are particularly useful in a sentence that is long and complex.” Emdashes—like em dashes—emphasizes what’s between: in particular, between the lines, covers, and issues of a magazine close to my heart.
Primary sources
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Written and edited by Emily Gordon (plus various guest contributors), designed by Pretty, and illustrated by Inkleaf. Additional drawings by Carolita Johnson. Kissable pencil girl by Jennifer Hadley, based on a 1943 Dorothy Gray ad.
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