Martin Schneider writes:
When I pondered William Buckley with reference to The New Yorker, my first thought was that someone so conservative must surely have scorned such a bastion of liberal sentiment. The Complete New Yorker archive shows such a supposition to be hostage to more recent Rove-ian (and not just Rove-ian) categories of political discourse. Buckley was a creature of a no less heated but perhaps a less doctrinaire age; his byline appeared in The New Yorker no fewer than 11 times.
His work for The New Yorker fell into two broad categories: articles about sailing and journal-like accounts of his daily lot. As Buckley in National Review possessed a vessel for his own political opinions, it likely never occurred to him to rail against the welfare state in the pages of The New Yorker.
I confess that to me, Buckley was a figure out of Doonesbury cartoons and Woody Allen movies from the 1970s. I don’t remember Firing Line. I have caught him on old episodes of The Dick Cavett Show, and I can tell that he must have been a delicious object of abhorrence for the East Coast liberals of the day. Next to Rove he looks positively benign; judging from his views on Iraq he was closer to the Upper West Side liberal of today than either side of that dyad ever would have imagined.
Buckley’s first contribution, a two-parter from 1971 billed in the Complete New Yorker as an account of his “activities in November,” looks especially interesting. Go check it out.
Update: On his blog, Hendrik Hertzberg posts this fond reminiscence of his encounter with the preeminent conservative. Elsewhere on the site, Ben Greenman directs us to a YouTube clip of Buckley and Gore Vidal being nasty to one another (these clips of Buckley debating Noam Chomsky are almost as compelling).
Author Archives: Emdashes
Comment Spam Verges On Ern Malley Grandeur
Martin Schneider writes:
Like most blogs’ comments sections, ours is daily inundated with quizzical and nonsensical appeals of indeterminate origin. Just now I came across this, which I think has a daft poetic integrity all its own:
Greetings!..
There was merrily!
The Regard! The Excellent forum! Thank you!
I feel like taking a bow.
Paul Noth Unlikely to Win Midwestern Delegates?
First New Yorker cartoonist Matt Diffee pissed off Scranton, PA, although I think they forgave him eventually.
Now, Paul Noth (whom you may know as one of the masterminds behind Conan O’Brien’s Pale Force, among other things) has rattled Sheboygan with a cartoon that, as the local paper puts it, “depicts an expansive suburban landscape with a long wall meandering through it with the caption: ‘The Great Drywall of Sheboygan.'” For its part, Dubuque, which can surely take its New Yorker association for granite (as Pogo would say), seems a little miffed at being left out.
Who’s next? Martin, want to investigate which other town names have been mentioned in cartoons? (Who could forget Roz Chast’s DKNJ?) And what happens if the cartoonist is pardoned? Does he or she get a two-dimensional, Flat Stanley/Harold-esque key to the city, maybe?
Lizzie Widdicombe: An Ingenious Talk Technique
Widdcombe covered a festive book event (Not Quite What I Was Planning). Each pithy phrase is subtly witty: It’s no longer than six words. Appropriate for the book in question! I couldn’t make the party, sadly. But I did contribute a tale. Oh, you’d like to hear it? “Do as say, not as did.” (P. 180, in all its glory.) Another memoirist compiled a master list. Moved to write your short story? Show off your quick, dirty syntax.
Fact: “New” Plus “Jack Handey” Often Equals Laughter
Jack Handey has a book coming out! I just learned this, and it made me happy. Pub date is April 8! The title story, “What I’d Say to the Martians,” might be the funniest thing I’ve read in the past five years; you can read it here. How much “Shouts & Murmurs” stuff has made it to book form? I reckon Woody Allen and Steve Martin have pulled it off. Anyone else?
I love the cover, too:
New York’s Upright Citizens Brigade has been hosting a series of highly entertaining reading events to promote Ben Karlin’s new anthology, Things I’ve Learned From Women Who’ve Dumped Me. I went to the one last Thursday, and fellow “Shouts and Murmurs” alum Paul Simms read part of his very funny chapter.
At one point Brooke Shields showed up and told a great story about dating the not-yet-outed frontman for a very popular 1980s singing duo that must, alas, remain nameless.
Fun fact: Brooke Shields has never written a “Shouts & Murmurs” item!
Michael Specter on Fresh Air, on Those Pesky Carbon Footprints
Wasn’t that a good piece? He spoke about it on Fresh Air, and in a New Yorker Out Loud audio interview with Matt Dellinger.
Later: There’s a fascinating debate at Speak Up about whether artists and designers, and Stefan Sagmeister in particular, are or should be obligated to keep their footprint, or bananaprint, small. (And speaking of being green, here’s my sister Kate’s letter in yesterday’s Times on the best bet for “EcoMoms.”)
Who’s Published the Most Short Stories in The New Yorker?
The third installment of a new column on New Yorker fiction, past and present, by writer and editor Benjamin Chambers.
A couple of weeks ago, I rashly declared that John Updike had to be the record-holder when it came to publishing the most short stories in The New Yorker. Should’ve known better than to venture so boldly into speculation: as it happens, The New Yorker‘s librarians, Jon Michaud and Erin Overbey, covered this for Emdashes a while back in “Ask the Librarians,” and it turns out that James Thurber and S.J. Perelman are the neck-and-neck front-runners by far. Despite his prodigious output, Updike isn’t even in the top three—he comes in sixth.
Here’s the librarians’ list. Each author is followed by the number of short stories he published in The New Yorker during his career (or to date):
1. James Thurber—273
2. S.J. Perelman—272
3. John O’Hara—227
4. Frank Sullivan—192
5. E.B. White—183
6. John Updike—168
Now, there’s a reading list! (Albeit an all-male one.)
Thanks, Emily (and Erin and Jon), for setting me straight!
Happy February 21st! And What’s Your Favorite Cartoonist Quirk?
I shouldn’t have to tell you what day this is, but in case you’re still in the dark, let this lovely reminiscence enlighten you.
Meanwhile, over at the New Yorker cartoon blog, Michael Maslin has been doing a bang-up job as Cartoonist of the Month. All of his posts so far are worth reading (and seeing!); here’s his partial list of favorite things—visual, conceptual, ocular, sartorial, mechanical, typographical, architectural, nasal, and feline—about his comrades’ cartooning. Off the top of my head, I’d add Carolita Johnson’s befuddled boyfriends, Gahan Wilson’s noses (human and otherwise), Charles Barsotti’s beards, Barbara Smaller’s lamps, William Hamilton’s gravity-defying bosoms, and Matt Diffee’s pigeons, among others. How about you?
“First Priest in White House” Encounters Prickly Troublemaker
Martin Schneider writes:
Obama takes Wisconsin, with Hawaii results to come.
In late 2006 a New Yorker podcast of David Remnick interviewing Barack Obama did a fair amount to convince me that Obama was my kind of candidate. There’s nothing like 45 minutes of sustained discourse (at that time, hard to come by) to clarify one’s impression of a person. I’ve supported Obama ever since.
Today, it’s a curio, but perhaps all the more interesting for being more than a year old. Here’s the file itself; here’s a transcript. Terms from the headline are derived from the interview (natch). Enjoy.
MSNBC’s Brian Williams Calls Ryan Lizza “Required Reading”
Martin Schneider writes:
It’s not every day that a major news network dedicates important programming time (Wisconsin and Hawaii today!) to a discussion of in exactly what ways a recent New Yorker article is so awesome, as happened just a few minutes ago (a little before 2 p.m. Eastern). The article in question was Lizza’s look at John McCain in the most recent issue. They even showed a screenshot of the New Yorker website.
Update: They kept Lizza on after the 2 p.m. jump—he’s rather telegenic! I hope to see more of him.