Harold Bloom died today. Would highly recommend Larissa MacFarquhar's 2002 profile—the best thing that's ever been written on him, and probably the funniest thing that's ever been published in this magazine:
So incredibly thrilled. A big thank you to Susan Morrison and Daniel Zalewski, and to all of my colleagues
@NewYorker
, who I learn so much from every day.
In honor of the Gossip Girl reboot, here's Janet Malcolm's piece on the original book series. I remember reading this piece in middle school and thinking, for the first time, "this magazine rocks"
On April 15th,
@NewYorker
sent fifty writers and photographers to document the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic in NYC. I spoke with Josiah Charles, a woman with only 73 cents in her bank account, who stayed up all night waiting for her stimulus check.
His response: "Of course I have not read the Mueller report. I taught King Lear yesterday and will teach Robert Frost’s 'Directive' tomorrow. In the name of some amiable sanity, can we cease playing these jokes?"
Roger Stone’s student-council playbook? Girls in miniskirts! Free candy! A homophobic whispering campaign! And a peculiar diversion called “Slave Day.”
horrifying piece by
@bentaub91
on Mohamedou Salahi, the military's "highest-value detainee," who was wrongfully held in Guantánamo Bay for more than fourteen years
Later, I listened to the editors of the New York Daily News discuss "the wood"—their front-page headline. (They went with "NO MASKS, NO GLOVES, NO SERVICE.")
I wrote about Lewis Berman, the veterinarian for the Trump family, who retired and built a house in the Hamptons. A few years later, Paul Manafort moved next door.
"They recede into the warm glow of the garage on rainy evenings and laugh under the eaves in better weather. In summer, they blow kisses from the driveway. In winter, they wear scarves and stand behind snowbanks. Inevitably, they age."
A frequent patron of Freds, Michael Cohen’s favorite lunch spot, told me he ran into Cohen during Trump’s campaign: “I said, ‘Well, Michael, what are you looking for out of this?’ And he said, ‘Oh, I’m going to be chief of staff if Donald wins.’”
Trump learned to tweet by reading
@nypost
headlines. He uses words like "flunky" but hasn't realized that when the Post puts quotation marks around a word, they're quoting someone, not adding emphasis
Lightweight Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, a total flunky for Chuck Schumer and someone who would come to my office “begging” for campaign contributions not so long ago (and would do anything for them), is now in the ring fighting against Trump. Very disloyal to Bill & Crooked-USED!
The worst thing about winter is the BULK. I just reached up to scratch my nose on the subway and it set off a chain reaction that culminated in the trampling of a small child two cars over
.
@newyorker
now has a food department!
@hels
joining as roving food correspondent;
@hannahgoldfield
becoming our food critic. Welcome to both. Stand by for plenty of delicious writing.
1/
@serenawilliams
nearly died after giving birth to her daughter Olympia. She identified her own symptoms of potentially deadly complications and told the doctors what she needed before it was too late.
Joan Acocella on the New York City Ballet, which was recently slapped with a 40-page lawsuit and subsequently lost three principal dancers who had been accused of sexual harassment and abuse.
"The Islamic State has been mostly destroyed on the battlefield, but the war is far from over. Air strikes cannot kill an idea, and so it has fallen to Iraq’s fractured security, intelligence, and justice systems to try to finish the task."
The most important story you’ll read today:
@ericlach
on the feud between 95-year-old press agent Sy Presten and 89-year-old gossip columnist Cindy Adams. It’d be in the NY Post if Adams didn’t work there.
"Often, skilled Quiz Bowlers are irked even after they get a question right because they wish they had buzzed in sooner. That’s what makes them good."
@_jacobsweet
on the "The Game" no one at
@Yale
is talking about
But, in all seriousness, the only thing worse than self-quarantining with your significant other is being forced to quarantine without them. I was heartbroken by this story:
Polk Award for Magazine Reporting; Ben Taub of The New Yorker for “Iraq’s Post-ISIS Campaign of Revenge,” a firsthand account of widespread detention and dubious execution.
#iraq
"When it comes down to it,
#MeToo
itself constitutes an evidentiary claim of sorts: what you say happened to you happened to me, too, and so it is more likely that we are both telling the truth."
“I don’t see anything about President Trump! I don’t know why the democrats are so happy with this book and making a big deal out of this!” one Amazon user said.