Yeah, I kept waiting for a turn in the article or some other revelation, but it was just nope, "this dude sucks". Which is true, but it was kind of a pointless read.
― soaring skrrrtpeggios (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, 25 January 2021 14:46 (three years ago) link
Mail delivery is so slow these days that I've been routinely getting the magazine a couple of weeks late. The last one I got was the Jan. 4-11 issue with the long Lawrence Wright feature about COVID. There were also a couple of issues in October and November that I just didn't get at all. Of course, I can read it all online, but I prefer print.
― jaymc, Monday, 25 January 2021 15:52 (three years ago) link
Lane, of all people, did, fairly recently, come up with a nuanced, even fairly deep-focus view of John Berryman's life and works---both quite the handful, but/and got me to check out some of his books (so far, so good). Somebody else provided intriguing glimpses of Martin Amis's 20th Century books (looks like he might be one who gets better the further back you go?), before cutting a path to steady, measured (devastatingly described and quoted) demolition of the latest novel.Also appealing presentations of Paul Celan and Alice Oswald. Casey Cep (whose eventually really good book about an abandoned Harper Lee project got initially carried away with tangential riches of research) came up with a multi-d profile of Marilynne Robinson that's gotten me way in the Gilead cycle, with other works to come. Good 'un on Adrienne Rich too.Really like that all of these pieces *do* deal with life *times* works, not just getting into Behind The Music drama or lecturing us and the author, with backstory as boilerplate (as Judith Thurman did in her stern takedown of Ferrante's latest, also all her post-Neapolitan Novels work---she might be right, for all I know, but seemed more like thunderous stop-the-presses flash than honest frustration with somebody whose best is well worth the time, as many of us found it to be).
― dow, Monday, 25 January 2021 17:43 (three years ago) link
People are still trying to get the public to care about a racist alcoholic and mediocre poet like Berryman? Jfc. I really want to punch most mainstream literary critics in the face.
― The return of our beloved potatoes (the table is the table), Monday, 25 January 2021 18:58 (three years ago) link
Berryman is accessible and popular -- I'm not an expert on his body of work but I like the hits, and it seems weird to say critics are "trying to get the public to care," it's like saying critics are trying to get the public to care about Frank O'Hara, these are the writers doing big friendly poems that people enjoy without training!
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Monday, 25 January 2021 20:07 (three years ago) link
Booze is def. presented as a prob here, and “The Dream Songs” is a hubbub, and some of it is spoken in blackface—or, to be accurate, in what might be described as blackvoice. It deals in unembarrassed minstrelsy, complete with a caricature of verbal tics, all too pointedly transcribed: “Now there you exaggerate, Sah. We hafta die.” To say that Berryman was airing the prejudices of his era is hardly to exonerate him; in any case, he seems to be evoking, in purposeful anachronism, an all but vanished age of vaudeville. Kevin Young, who is Black, prefaces his choice of Berryman’s poetry by arguing, “Much of the force of The Dream Songs comes from its use of race and blackface to express a (white) self unraveling.” Some readers will share Young’s generously inquiring attitude; others will veer away from Berryman and never go back.
For anyone willing to stick around, there’s a new book on the block. “The Selected Letters of John Berryman” weighs in at more than seven hundred pages... Probably too much for me, esp. given JB's range of moods etc., but from the subsequent description, can imagine getting hooked. I'll stick to the Kevin Young-chosen poems for now.
― dow, Monday, 25 January 2021 22:37 (three years ago) link
Not that I like them all, but anyway, this is the kind of unexpected opp that The New Yorker can provide these days.
― dow, Monday, 25 January 2021 22:39 (three years ago) link
I liked the Judith Thurman piece without recognizing her read at all -- Lying Lives feels totally of a piece with the Neapolitan 4 to me, while she sees it almost as a reaction against them.
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Tuesday, 26 January 2021 01:46 (three years ago) link
I appreciated the Berryman episode as someone who's struggled without any success to like him for 25 years.
― meticulously crafted, socially responsible, morally upsta (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 26 January 2021 01:52 (three years ago) link
Berryman was a great racist alcoholic poet dude
― Muswell Hillbilly Elegy (President Keyes), Thursday, 28 January 2021 00:26 (three years ago) link
Ugh
― Next Time Might Be Hammer Time (James Redd and the Blecchs), Thursday, 28 January 2021 00:41 (three years ago) link
eephus!, the issue is that Berryman has been *dead* for nearly FIFTY YEARS, and the confessional poets that he's grouped with were consciously given attention (and continue to be given attention) by the press and Official Verse Culture (tm) because they wrote uncomplicated, accessible work about personal struggle. Meanwhile, in the 60s and into the 70s, the CIA was actively fostering movements toward continuing a confessional, observational USAmerican conception of poetry while engaging in active surveillance and repression of poets of the new Left. All of this is public record at this point, and has its continuance today in who gets major book contracts, media attention, and so on.
John Berryman, Robert Lowell, Elizabeth Bishop, Sylvia Plath— all wrote some fine poems, and like most poets, all wrote a great deal of trash. But there is NO WAY that their poetry could possibly merit the amount of attention heaped upon it without a concerted campaign by Official Verse Culture and its friendlies in the US government to keep it at the top of attention— it's the abstract expressionism of poetry, and it's fucking boring, and *ISN'T THAT GOOD*. And those who would say otherwise often haven't read a book of poems written after 1980.
Sorry, I just have obvious damage from seeing miraculous and accessible work gone unheralded while the third, expanded edition of Robert Lowell's abusive letters to his lesbian friend are published to glowing reviews in the mainstream press.
― The return of our beloved potatoes (the table is the table), Thursday, 28 January 2021 17:14 (three years ago) link
And I should say: I've read all of Berryman's books, some of them upwards of ten times. I can quote parts of the Dream Songs from memory. But the insistence by publishers and Official Verse Culture to dwell in the past of the confessional poets is absolutely infuriating to me. Why not give a spread in the Times Book Review to Joanne Kyger? The paper didn't even PRINT an obit of Kenneth Irby, one of Kyger's friends and one of the best poets of his generation.
― The return of our beloved potatoes (the table is the table), Thursday, 28 January 2021 17:19 (three years ago) link
I can't penetrate Berryman -- the obscurantism is a result of an inability to generalize his experiences.
I don't classify Bishop in his group at all.
― meticulously crafted, socially responsible, morally upsta (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 28 January 2021 17:28 (three years ago) link
Finally, for the record, I don't think that poets doing wild or experimental work should necessarily be written about in major magazines. But Kyger, Irby, Eigner, and any number of others wrote and published widely and with a great deal of accessibility to their work, and it is ignored by a lot of these established magazines. Thinking about what might be the reasons behind such glaring omissions— Kyger was a woman who didn't rape her children or kill herself tragically, Irby was a mid-western bisexual communist, and Eigner was a profoundly disabled genius who made abled people uncomfortable— is worth doing, imho.
But instead we get endless articles and reviews about the same white men leading tragic lives where they hurt many people, particularly their female partners, and the same white women leading tragic lives where they were brutalized by white men and patriarchal systems. The attention paid to this stuff seems to merely reify these dynamics, and that's why I am so tired of it.
― The return of our beloved potatoes (the table is the table), Thursday, 28 January 2021 17:34 (three years ago) link
(Tbf, re: Bishop— I don't consider her part of this crowd, either, but she's often lumped in with them, most likely because of her relationship to Lowell)
― The return of our beloved potatoes (the table is the table), Thursday, 28 January 2021 17:38 (three years ago) link
I mean, she had a sense of humor -- these dudes avoided it like virgin pina coladas.
I've read a couple Irby poems over the years, and I know about his collected poems -- I can see why he belongs with Creeley, Duncan, etc. I'll check it out of the library.
― meticulously crafted, socially responsible, morally upsta (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 28 January 2021 17:40 (three years ago) link
'To Max Douglas' is my favorite of Irby's, though there is a lot to love.
Also important to remember that he was a queer leftist who insisted on settling in his home state and chosen city of Lawrence, KS, where he taught generations of poets.
― The return of our beloved potatoes (the table is the table), Thursday, 28 January 2021 21:04 (three years ago) link
speaking of queer leftists, what do you think of Thom Gunn?
― meticulously crafted, socially responsible, morally upsta (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 28 January 2021 21:10 (three years ago) link
The Man with Night Sweats is the only Gunn I've ever rated, tbh. Just not too interesting for me otherwise.
― The return of our beloved potatoes (the table is the table), Thursday, 28 January 2021 22:14 (three years ago) link
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/03/15/what-happens-when-investment-firms-acquire-trailer-parks
nothing is safe from the vampire squid
― Joe Bombin (milo z), Thursday, 11 March 2021 18:24 (three years ago) link
I swear that same piece ran somewhere like 3 years ago. am I crazy?
― Larry Elleison (rogermexico.), Friday, 12 March 2021 14:34 (three years ago) link
John Oliver / Last Week Tonight did a big feature on trailer park usury iirc
― armoured van, Holden (sic), Friday, 12 March 2021 20:18 (three years ago) link
Seattle Times ran a good series a few years ago on a separate-but-related issue, the way people get trapped by extortionary financing on mobile homes: https://www.seattletimes.com/business/real-estate/the-mobile-home-trap-how-a-warren-buffett-empire-preys-on-the-poor/. And that company is owned by Warren Buffett.
When you add to these things the entire payday-loan infrastructure, it is all a very efficient system for extracting every last dime from poor people.
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Friday, 12 March 2021 20:27 (three years ago) link
relevant to several posters' interests
How Politics Tested Ravelry and the Crafting Community
― mookieproof, Monday, 22 March 2021 21:05 (three years ago) link
Strike!
the signs, they’re good @newyorkerunion pic.twitter.com/YH3TzFSJtc— Emma Whitford (@emma_a_whitford) March 27, 2021
― but also fuck you (unperson), Saturday, 27 March 2021 17:07 (three years ago) link
The internet is so mad at the Ravelry article. I laughed that the summary on Instagram used reëlection. Never change, New Yorker!!!
― Notes on Scampo (tokyo rosemary), Saturday, 27 March 2021 18:00 (three years ago) link
“Venders” in the Tucci article what is wrong with these people
― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek), Saturday, 27 March 2021 18:37 (three years ago) link
You don’t just change the style guide when tastes change
― Canon in Deez (silby), Saturday, 27 March 2021 18:38 (three years ago) link
They will be writing “the Times” and “the Washington Post” and “the Istanbul Pennysaver” forever and I applaud their idiosyncrasy
― Canon in Deez (silby), Saturday, 27 March 2021 18:39 (three years ago) link
Joe Biden is the fourth President to try to achieve peace in the Middle East and South Asia in the 21st century. There’s a lot of debate in Washington about what he should do—and whether the U.S. should simply pack up and pull out of the region.https://t.co/fy7NB9kGz2— The New Yorker (@NewYorker) April 11, 2021
George W Bush, noted peacemaker.
― Joe Bombin (milo z), Monday, 12 April 2021 06:41 (three years ago) link
That Tweet’s mind-reading needs a fact check
― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Monday, 12 April 2021 08:50 (three years ago) link
We renewed our subscription back in November via a discount site (then-current sub was set to expire in January). Our last one was the one featuring the epic Lawrence Wright covid article, but since then ... nothing. The discount site assures us things are moving ahead but backed up, which I find plausible, but this is the longest we've gone without the New Yorker in years. Weirdly, doesn't really feel like we've missed anything!
― Josh in Chicago, Monday, 12 April 2021 13:17 (three years ago) link
Renewal is coming up here but even with discounts sites I'm not finding anything significantly under $100/year, which is way more than we've ever paid before.
― toby, Monday, 12 April 2021 13:44 (three years ago) link
"tried to achieve peace" -- these people really believe their own farts smell good don't they
― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive), Monday, 12 April 2021 14:33 (three years ago) link
I confess I have no idea how my subscription renews, where I got it from, or what it costs. It just keeps arriving, and has done so for 20 years. I'm even a little scared to find out.
Whenever anyone calls me on the phone or sends me something in the mail about it, I just ignore it. And the magazine keeps arriving.
Perhaps some day I'll get an enormous bill. Which I will, of course, ignore.
― Jurassic parkour (Ye Mad Puffin), Monday, 12 April 2021 16:24 (three years ago) link
❤️
― Canon in Deez (silby), Monday, 12 April 2021 17:58 (three years ago) link
when you're an influencer people just send you things
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Monday, 12 April 2021 18:00 (three years ago) link
i got so sick of getting it in the mail and putting it straight into the recycling that i emailed david remnick about it. it stopped coming after that.
― adam, Monday, 12 April 2021 19:30 (three years ago) link
you could have put it in a little free library, or given to a local medical waiting room, or just left them at a bus stop
― bobo honkin' slobo babe (sic), Monday, 12 April 2021 20:25 (three years ago) link
Good magazines are not allowed in hospital waiting rooms. Some old executive order issued by Reagan I think
― Zach_TBD (Karl Malone), Monday, 12 April 2021 20:28 (three years ago) link
Good chance in all four scenarios (including the straight to recycling scenario) that it doesn’t end up getting recycled
― Zach_TBD (Karl Malone), Monday, 12 April 2021 20:29 (three years ago) link
Getting read is a better outcome than getting recycled
― bobo honkin' slobo babe (sic), Monday, 12 April 2021 20:40 (three years ago) link
They both end up with dog shit all over the place
― Zach_TBD (Karl Malone), Monday, 12 April 2021 20:56 (three years ago) link
Borowitz isn't in every issue
― bobo honkin' slobo babe (sic), Monday, 12 April 2021 21:14 (three years ago) link
What the hell with the McPhee piece this week
― mom tossed in kimchee (quincie), Tuesday, 13 April 2021 13:31 (three years ago) link
I have adored McPhee for a long time but his last few things were a bit rambling, and not in a fun way.
― Jurassic parkour (Ye Mad Puffin), Tuesday, 13 April 2021 14:21 (three years ago) link
I stopped subscribing for the first time this year, as I barely have time to read enough to finish my degree with a one-year-old toddler, let alone the New Yorker.
I pulled out the articles I still wanna read from 2-3 years of archive, tossed the rest out, and now we have a nice, telephone-book-size pile of paper and staples for my daughter to play with.
― Chuck_Tatum, Tuesday, 13 April 2021 14:27 (three years ago) link
Before the pandemic I took magazines that I had read or wasn't going to read to the fitness center at my workplace. Since the fitness center closed I've been saving these magazines in anticipation of the place reopening.
― Infanta Terrible (j.lu), Tuesday, 13 April 2021 14:49 (three years ago) link
I really liked the McPhee piece, you all didn't? A real pleasure to read something not in the standard register, but that still sings. Then again, you could say the same about the short story in this issue whose strange energy appreciated but which I wasn't actually finding myself liking and haven't finished yet. I thought the piece about Native language in Maine was badly written and just kind of off, too bad because the subject is one I really wanted to read about. French tacos piece was fluff but I enjoyed it all the way through. Jack Handey v. good in the exact way he's always good, I've read enough of these for a lifetime but I endorse NYer running them because there are always new readers.
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Tuesday, 13 April 2021 14:54 (three years ago) link