The cover of the new book about Holiday, which I found under our tree yesterday morning, mimics the old covers of the magazine in both size and appearance with the exception of a subtitle that never appeared (though it could have): “The best travel magazine that ever was.”
On the last Sunday before Christmas the New York Times Book Review ran on its cover a review of a collection by the French writer Emmanuel Carrère which includes a story, reviewer Robert Gottlieb told us before the jump, about a man who “one day cracked open his sleeping wife’s head with a rolling pin, shot and killed their two children” and then drove “40 miles to his parents’ home and murdered them as well.”
Over in the Review section, an essay appeared in the last page entitled, “Is Anyone Happy Anymore?”
Not at the Book Review, I thought.
If you’re one of the 900 some people who purportedly follow me on Twitter you know that I use the site judiciously, posting only when I have something to say that I think is interesting, or to show off a recent publication or photo (which I also hope are interesting). This explains why it took me a decade to get to 1,000 tweets. I gave the milestone tweet – which appears today – even more thought than I gave the 999 that preceded it, and came up with a pastiche that speaks for all of them.
Once again, The New York Times Magazine’s “The Voyages Issue” contained no travel writing. The five subjects – Namibia, Virginia, Borneo, Norway, Singapore – were all presented through photographs and a short introductory text. It seems less a testament to the power of images than a rejection of the beauty and the importance of language.
National Geographic Traveler magazine is ceasing publication, leaving only Conde Nast Traveler and Travel + Leisure in the world of travel glossies. In its near-three-decade run, I wrote two things for Traveler: an essay shortly after it debuted on trans-Atlantic crossings, and a story about Warsaw in 2013. This second assignment stands out as the single worst freelancing experience of my career. In fact, it was so dispiriting that I kept a journal during the editing and rewriting process, which lasted over a year. The subject was a city I had lived in and grown to love, so the story was understandably favorable, but – because it was realistic – it lacked the “excitement” and “romance” Traveler editors demanded.
“Like those at the other glossy travel magazines,” I wrote in my journal, “they are in the business (truly the mot juste) of promoting travel, not explaining the world. Their ‘concern for readers’ is nothing more than an obsession with advertisers (especially in these days of economic downturn). Just as they employ people to sell ad space, they hire writers to sell destinations – why else was I urged to be more enthusiastic? – so that the former can bring in more ads. It is why they refuse to allow, even in a predominantly upbeat story, anything that might disturb or sadden or dissuade potential travelers. It is why the quotes from locals are so benign. It is why the articles are so boring.
“I realize that this is the reality of magazine publishing (which paradoxically demands, in the travel division, a denial of reality). What maddens me is the charade put on by editors, the hypocrisy of pretending – or perhaps it’s a collective delusion – that they are all about “real stories,” that they value writing over salesmanship. It creates misunderstandings that lead to wasted labors in a process that verges on psychological cruelty.”