They rolled out the re-jiggered New York Times Magazine today. Many readers - those of us who don't automatically and immediately just use it to line our compost pails - breathlessly hoped it might resemble something we wanted to read, as opposed to the weekly numbing disappointment we’ve come to expect. I’m not sure yet if it’s an improvement, but the new version is snappier, splashier, and quicker. New editor Hugo Lindgren writes in an oddly apologetic introductory letter that, “Our aim is to make everything sharper, clearer, more alive and dynamic,” but to remain committed to publishing “long-form narrative journalism.”
In general, the whole enterprise resembles the Academy Awards’ attempt to be hip and youthful, and I’m here to tell you Anne Hathaway and James Franco in drag were so not hip and youthful, and I’m not even going to talk about that dreadful iPhone gag. But back to the Magazine section, in the order in which it was consumed.
The Letters to the Editor now include tweets, and emails (I assume) from readers identified as “DRDUCK,” or “WORRIED.” Is it just me, or is this a devolution of responsibility?
Times Executive Editor Bill Keller’s column, First, this week offers an interesting if somewhat self-aggrandizing look at failed and failing regimes. But just as an idea, doesn’t giving him a column seem sort of suck-uppy?
They renamed Questions for. It’s now called Talk. My question is: where is Deborah Solomon? And why is the newly hired Andrew Goldman letting Nikki Haley get away with pretending her son’s devotion to basketball is the reason she didn’t meet with Sarah Palin? I’m asking Abby Joseph Cohen one more time: where is Deborah Solomon?
The Ethicist remains neither seriously ethical (insofar as it doesn’t seriously address serious ethical questions), nor is it particularly enlightening, and it is still only mildly entertaining. On the facing page is a new feature called “Last Month on the Internet.” Huh? Why do I need to go to a (dying) print medium to see what’s on the Internet? I don’t even know what words to use to describe this page. Maybe: random delusional old-person idea cooked up in an editorial meeting by a consortium of senior citizens in Uggs and porkpie hats.
The first story story, Death Takes a Rain Check, by Frank Bruni, about some old guy’s live-forever diet, is about as appealing as some old guy’s live-forever diet. Sorry Frank. Ditto Broke Town, U.S.A., although I’ll probably read it or at least drop it into the bathtub by accident. Then there’s Jennifer Egan’s piece, The Liberation of Lori Berenson, which I read, and which is okay, I guess, but nothing we kind of didn’t already know. B-Girl Bouillabaisse made me grab for my phone to see the video of this “former ballerina” who has become an Internet dance sensation. I know I always sound like a dance crank but she’s seriously not all that. At all. Skating on Thick Ice is a cool pretty cool photo, what more can you say?
Mark Bittman: I love you. And Hugo Lindgren, thank you for eliminating all the stupid quote journalism that surrounded the last-generation Magazine’s recipes like pools of stagnating water. I mean the gimmick of resuscitating ancient recipes was clever, I guess, but it was a little like repainting an AMC Gremlin and driving it to Upper Canada. Why, on all counts?
The Riff column will be fascinating, I’m sure, unless I drop it in the bathtub. And why are the pages blue, exactly? As far as leaving the Crossword alone, thanks, but it’s still significantly dumbed-down
Final Verdict: I’m not issuing a final verdict, but I think dumbing-down might be a theme here. Also, they're still running these ads. Do we need to see this on a page?
