Last Week's New Yorker Review: November 6, 2023
Last Week’s New Yorker, week of November 6
Must-Read:
“Through the Smoke” - Carolyn Kormann assesses the damage to Maui after massive wildfires. An unassuming triumph which demonstrates that a deep historical analysis of place can be embedded in a present-day narrative with no more than a few paragraphs of debriefing, and that climate coverage can be clear-eyed, gripping, and still provide realistic hope.
The contemporary impulse in disaster reporting is to focus primarily on the first-person narratives of survivors, and Kormann presents a few of those stories, but keeps them spare — the focus here is really on disaster recovery; both the way Hawaiians felt under-served by the systems in place, and their focus on equity in rebuilding. Kormann’s history of Hawaiian water exploitation is quick but punchy, and helped by a horrific, incriminating quote from a land-resource manager, which shows without having to tell us just how much of the colonialist mindset still proliferates. The coverage of official failure avoids the weeds of minutiae, but includes two whoppers of callous politician-speak from the mayor (“There are probably a lot of reasons you can apply to why we do what we do as human beings,”1) and the police chief (“There was always a way out, if people were willing to go that way.”) Kormann provides a number of miniature one-section profiles of the lost and their affected families, which give the story scope — the downside could be a lack of depth, but well-picked details, like a child who “loved mixed martial arts” or a local who lived “‘on mangoes, basically, like a friggin’ fruitarian,” give us a snapshot without dwelling in bathos.
The real highlight of this story, though, are the last two sections, which show how climate catastrophe can provide a chance for community organization and rebuilding that does away with the most harmful and colonialist vestiges of the past. Kormann doesn’t overstate the case — this isn’t Annals of Activism — but the final image is beguiling. It will stick with me.
“In the Cities of Killing” - David Remnick goes to Israel. The piece the moment demands, with all that implies: There’s no experimentation with form, just a line of notable figures from around the country to give their thoughts on the horrors inflicted by Hamas and the inhumanity of Israel’s air strikes. Remnick gives the former more space than the latter (probably just as a result of deadlines and the incredible difficulty of reporting from Gaza in this moment), but never more consequence: His recurring theme is how intertwined the Israeli radical right is with Hamas’ extremists; he breaks from reportorial neutrality at one point to declare Netanyahu’s tactic of bolstering Hamas “a litany of bad faith, deception, and delusion, with disastrous consequences.” The final few sections each land with brutal, weary beats; the situation is still too new to have found even a sliver of hope. Remnick is clear-eyed and articulate in dismantling the rationale for air strikes, and he selects some hugely powerful quotes: Sari Nusseibeh says Hamas is “part of the national tapestry… you cannot eliminate it entirely. It will stay as a way of thinking, as an idea, so long as there is a Palestinian-Israeli conflict.” And perhaps most powerfully, Roni Stahl Lupo, who “knew nearly everyone who had died” at one kibbutz, says: “Morally, socially, this is not my Israel. I’m left-wing, Ashkenazi, a kibbutznik, and secular, and this is not the identity of Israel any longer. My contract with this country is over. It’s broken… I keep thinking that these operations will happen because of me, someone will be killed because of me… and I cannot live with that.”
Window-Shop:
“On the Line” - Dan Kaufman strikes with United Auto Workers. Intelligent and nuanced labor reporting. Its zero-to-sixty time isn’t the fastest; there’s lots of stage-setting before Kaufman gets to deeper historical analysis. For that, see the unmissable section on Walter Reuther, a fascinating character; Kaufman elegantly seeds his biography with notes on race’s relation to labor (I’d never heard of “hate strikes”) and union corruption. In the present day, the stories Kaufman gets are more predictable, which doesn’t mean they’re less important — it’s easy to overindulge in political analysis in a piece like this, but Kaufman mostly stays focused on more visceral narratives, and convincingly explains why many workers view electoral politics “with distance and cynicism,” and are “more animated by the visceral, immediate politics of the strike.”
“A Dangerous Man” - Isaac Chotiner dissects the history of Patrice Lumumba and the Congo. Thoughtful and detailed, exploring an especially gruesome chapter in colonial history with care but an appropriate amount of ire, too. Not exactly light entertainment, but sometimes it’s worth eating your vegetables. Chotiner clearly articulates the ways in which America and the U.N. deposed and destabilized countries out of an allegiance to principles of anti-Communism that went beyond the point of common sense, and that “helped enable colonial maneuvering to continue into the post-independence era” in the Congo and elsewhere. There are a ton of characters, and while some rereading is needed, they’re balanced well, and each is given shading: The U.N. leader is “cool and cerebral and difficult to read,” Moïse Tshombe was “known for his foreign suits and foreign bank account.” Lumumba himself initially gets the tag “slim and enigmatic,” and the final section is devoted mostly to unpacking that; an odd structural choice (the central character remains a cypher until the end) which still basically works — Lumumba is mostly deprived of agency, anyway, so it’s only retroactively interesting to consider him as a man.
“Loose Lips” - Inkoo Kang sees Fellow Travelers, “one of the year’s best dramas.” Probably my favorite thing Kang’s written for the magazine: A straightforwardly convincing review that makes a strong case for a fascinating-sounding show. I might tune in — and I hardly watch any scripted TV. Kang brings her descriptive A-game, too, regarding “the milk-sipping, charmingly priggish Tim Laughlin… with his willowy frame, floppy hair, and bespectacled visage, he has the makings of a modern martyr.” Not sure about the last line, though, which asks for an identificatory leap I’m not prepared to make.
“Step Right Up” (Talk of the Town) - Dana Goodyear re-melts paint flakes with the art restorer charged with an artist-made amusement park. Is art restoration the most metaphorically loaded profession? Rosa Lowinger makes a case for it, with some incredible quotes: Apparently, “it helps to have the psyche of a fleeing exile, or someone whose parent can flash like a wildfire.” Quite wonderful, beat for beat, managing both a portrait of Lowinger (“petite and rubia”) and a description of her current project, which is surreal in a few dimensions (“Dalí’s contribution… was a geodesic dome made of mirrors and plastic panels with fried eggs painted on them.”)
“The Brunch Bunch” - Helen Shaw sees Sondheim’s last jots. Hard to disentangle Shaw’s piece, predictably excellent, from the horrid sinking feeling I got while reading it, as I realized that this project was not just minor or unfinished but, perversity of perversities, an apolitical Buñuel adaptation. As a registered Buñuelhead, this upsets me immeasurably. Shaw maybe over-emphasizes the unfinished nature of the show as its flaw — I’d take scraps with bite any day. But eventually she gets around to hammering the nail: The show is “bougified… to the point that the only clearly villainous character is one of the servants,” “the central metaphor moves from patrician complicity with totalitarianism to, seemingly… COVID isolation.” Fl… flames… on the side of my face…
“Thanksgiving Rider” (Shouts & Murmurs) - Simon Rich (“Writer”) serves the pie. As ever with this column, things are a bit forced, but the build-up is given proper space and the ending lands well. We’ll be thankful for that.
“Boxed Out” - Michael Schulman wonders why Peak TV passed. Spare me the endless rehashing of HBO dramas’ dramas. But I’m here for the argument Schulman derives from reading Peter Biskind’s trilogy exploring creatively fertile micro-periods; namely, that “the industry’s default setting is for crap. Occasionally, the incentives change just enough to allow a cascade of innovation, but those incentives inevitably shift back to the norm.” That’s depressing enough to ring true, and Schulman maybe does Maureen Ryan’s book on workplace toxicity and complicity a disservice by framing its argument as opposed to Biskind’s — clearly, her position that the industry is beginning to “‘shift to better models’” is not the core of her book, and perhaps not as fully baked as the message that things used to be quite bad. But as the latest HBO drama has revealed, a toxic, petty workplace doesn’t heal easily. Perhaps a more revolutionary approach is needed, one that builds systems which don’t default to work that is, as some might say, “safe and scared.”
Skip Without Guilt:
“The Believer” - Michael Luo rings doorbells with Mitt Romney. Apparently this is the editors’ takeover issue, between this and Remnick’s offering. (Luo edits the magazine’s “dot com” bits.) Best early on, when it’s capturing Romney the flip-floppy freak, but Romney’s later crisis of conscience is so obviously bizarre it demands deflating, and neither Coppins’ book nor Luo’s treatment gape enough at his dumbfounding logic, under which injustice is fine as long as it’s not accompanied by a Trumpian lack of decorum. Connecting that leap to Mormonism’s smile-and-wave sociopathy feels necessary, and Luo doesn’t quite get there.
“Mastering” - Anthony Lane sees two new flicks made by known quantities. Overstuffed: Each of these clearly has enough going on to warrant a full review of its own. Without enough space, Lane is quick to jettison any real formal analysis, while keeping references to such obscurities as “The Breakfast Club” and “The Bourne Identity.” I’ve probably complained too much about Lane’s references tending to ‘40s Film Forum favorites, because this is way worse.
“Last Watch” - Dorothy Wickenden shines a light on the last lighthouse keeper. Those readers hoping for my generally wide-ranging interest in any and every subject to hit its limit, rejoice: While Wickenden’s writing is perfectly fine, I found this entire discussion of lighthouses, past and present, thoroughly benumbing. Wickenden’s protagonist seems to possess one personality trait, enthusiasm for lighthouses, and their history, excepting a few morbid flourishes, is mostly made up of lines like “the reflectors used with early oil lamps focussed the light, but didn’t do much to help it project.” Maybe to some it will be obvious why we should care about such things. I’m not above being fascinated by the details of, say, subway cars, so my problem isn’t engineering in general, it seems to be something about lighthouses in particular. In any case, turn that light off, I’m going to bed.
Letters:
Regular correspondent Michael brought my attention to some fascinating “X” critiques of Evan Osnos’ China piece, which are well worth reading: Steven Sun Zhao says “it extrapolates the views of a few elites and people in Beijing to the entirety of China. …the middle class youth’s economic frustration stems not from suppression of the private sector, but rather its grotesque power! …it doesn’t make sense to treat the urban middle class and the business elite as the same group, because their interests are diametrically opposed. The former was struggling from the machinations of the old system, while the latter thrived.” Caiwei Chen says “the mood is easily homogenized… a significant portion remains indifferent or “unfeeling”… People who are willing to speak to a western journalist in China already undergo significant self-selection. …I think the key here isn't if there is a general malaise in Chinese society and how widespread it is, it's why Chinese people are so uncomfortable with this kind of westernized representation of their sentiments.”
What did you think of this week’s issue? Quite a weighty one, but with some really excellent journalism.
Sir, the question was, is this your handwriting?