NY Observer > David Remnick

Keller, Close Up: The Weekend The Times Executive Editor Was Everywhere

John Koblin — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 07:37:07 -0400

It's not every Sunday that you pick up The New York Times and find Bill Keller's byline all over the paper. And, according to Mr. Keller, there might be a Sunday someday soon when there won't even be a paper for him to write in.

Stealing a page from the David Remnick playbook, Mr. Keller decided to drop his editor's cap and rewind back to the good old days when he was a senior writer pointing his critical eye to far-off places. In yesterday's Times, Mr. Keller's byline appeared on the cover of Week in Review and Book Review sections for articles about the read more »

Ancient Order of Magazine People in Not-So-Secret Celebration

Matt Haber and John Koblin — Fri, 02 May 2008 07:40:16 -0400

A little after 6 p.m. at the Frederick P. Rose Hall, Condé Nast president Richard Beckman was sharing a drink—vodka, olives—with Condé Nast CEO Chuck Townsend. The two were discussing the same thing everyone in the lobby of Jazz at Lincoln Center at the Time Warner Center was talking about: What the National Magazine Awards can do, or not do, for a magazine. read more »

Mag as Hell!

Observer Staff — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 22:51:15 -0400

Freelance Fizzle! read more »

Where Will Magazines Be Ten Years From Now?

John Koblin — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 20:07:32 -0400

In the next five years in Graydon Carter’s world, you’ll walk onto a plane, or a subway, or a soon-to-be-invented mode of transport, and you’ll tuck a little electronic book under your arm. Inside that little book, which will be very expensive at first but soon will cost $150, there’ll be a series of mylar “pages,” and there will be small buttons off to the side, and once you hit one of them, whoooosh, words and photos from Vanity Fair will suddenly appear. read more »

Kelefa Sanneh, Ariel Levy Join New Yorker

John Koblin — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 07:35:02 -0500

New York Times music critic Kelefa Sanneh is leaving the newspaper to become a staff writer at The New Yorker, according to an internal memo distributed yesterday. (Radar had reported a rumor to this effect.)

Also heading over to 4 Times Square is New York Magazine contributing editor and writer Ariel Levy, who has already posted the news to her personal web site.

David Remnick wrote in an email to Media Mob that they are both expected to "write reported pieces." read more »

Spitzer Pits Remnick Against Carter in Conde Nast Duel

John Koblin — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 00:02:27 -0500

Back in August, New Yorker editor David Remnick assigned writer Nick Paumgarten a profile on Eliot Spitzer’s rocky first year as governor. In late September, Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter assigned writer David Margolick a profile on Eliot Spitzer’s rocky first year as governor.

Mr. Paumgarten had his first conversation with Mr. Spitzer two weeks after Labor Day—the first of six conversations they’d have by around the time Mr. Margolick first approached the Spitzer camp. In the end, Mr. Margolick would meet with Mr. read more »

Tina Brown's Advice for David Remnick

Zachary Roth — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 17:40:59 -0500

Speaking of New Yorker editors, it sounds like Tina Brown has some suggestions for her sucessor at the magazine. She recently told an Indian paper: "I would probably redesign it again. I might make a shorter front of the book section."

We're sure David Remnick appreciates the advice.

And on that note: Happy Thanksgiving! read more »

Memo Got Remnick New Yorker Job, He Says

John Koblin — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 12:40:26 -0500

The way David Remnick became editor of The New Yorker is well-documented. A few weeks after Tina Brown had unexpectedly quit, S.I. Newhouse offered Michael Kinsley the job, then quickly withdrew his offer and gave it to Mr. Remnick.

Recently, Mr. Remnick gave a speech at Princeton and offered a tiny anecdote about how he won perhaps the most coveted job in magazine journalsim. The Daily Princetonian reports:

Recalling his rise to his current post, Remnick said he was "anointed by mistake." One weekend, he volunteered to write a memo on how to improve the magazine, and since the editor-in-chief position was empty at the time, his suggestions launched him into the job.

Maybe S.I. Newhouse saw the memo a day after he offered Mr. Kinsley the job?

Hollywood Babel On!

Observer Staff — Sun, 25 Feb 2007 19:00:00 -0500

Little Miss Sunshine read more »

Tony Judt on the Collapse of the Liberals

Observer Staff — Wed, 13 Sep 2006 10:41:51 -0400

The brilliant 'n bold Tony Judt has again put it all together. In the latest London Review of Books, he demonstrates how the liberal intelligentsia have provided crucial support and cover for Bush's misadventures in Iraq and the "war on terror."

In today's America, neo-conservatives generate brutish policies for which liberals provide the ethical fig-leaf. There really is no other difference between them.

Judt traces the malady in part to its obvious source, a liberal "blind spot" about Israel.

Historically, liberals have been unsympathetic to 'wars of choice' when undertaken or proposed by their own government. War, in the liberal imagination (and not only the liberal one), is a last resort, not a first option. But the United States now has an Israeli-style foreign policy and America's liberal intellectuals overwhelmingly support it.

Apart from Judt's intellectual leadership, the piece seems to me remarkable on two points. First, it lists New Yorker editor David Remnick in the ranks of those Judt calls "useful idiots." Which is very gutsy for a writer to do. Second, he describes all of Israel's wars with the exception of the Yom Kippur war as wars "of choice." '67? That, too. Even gutsier.