¶ Late to the party
In the grad student lounge, here on the fourth floor of Denney Hall, someone leaves their old copies of The New Yorker around for folks to read. I usually flip through and read the cartoons (because the cartoons are always, invariably, the best part of TNY) and sometimes skim through an article. Since I really only go into the lounge to use the microwave, or to snatch a bagel on Free Bagel Tuesdays, I rarely have time to read much more than a snippet or two. However, on some days — and today was one of those days — my microwaved leftovers are too hot to carry comfortably and TNY makes for a handy trivet or pot holder. Today, I carried the October 15, 2007 copy to my desk to look at while I ate.
Happily, there was an article I was interested in: Cynthia Zarin’s run down of a brouhaha surrounding two possible portraits of Lady Jane Grey. It’s a good article with a nice balance of history and reportage, not to heavy on either, and happily well written as I expect from TNY.
Here’s the thing: reading an article in a popular, weekly magazine three months after it was published kinda removes you from the discussion. I’ve missed my chance to mouth off about what an idiot David Starkey is1. He’s a sell-out and a blow-hard and has barely more credibility than Katie Couric (ooooh! burn!). But where do I rant about it? Who will listen to me?
“I just read this three-month-old New Yorker story about Tudor portraiture and, dang, isn’t that David Starkey a real knucklehead?”
Who cares anymore? The moment has passed, and I’m stuck composing a response in my head. Sure, I could blog about it (more coherently and comprehensively than I’m doing now, of course), but I know you care even less than my office mates. It’s wasted effort.
But, there’s actually a secret pleasure in that. I’m late because I’m part of a special club: I rise above topicality. I’m reading political news and punditry about events that have long since ceased to matter; I read articles that have lost their social relevance; I just read a review, in the January 6, 2003 New Yorker that made me laugh out loud. Sure, it was for The Two Towers, a movie that I’ve already seen and has passed onto bargain DVD shelves at Costco, a review that had no bearing on my opinion of the film. Still, how could anyone not love this passage:
In essence, the worthy folk of Edoras, under their king Théoden (Bernard Hill), have retreated to Helm’s Deep, where they are beseiged by Orcs, Uruk-hai, and other evildoers who come bearing hard consonants. It is a close and vicious fight, but at last the long vowels of Théoden and Aragorn, aided by the soft fricatives of Gandalf, carry the wordy day.
OK, out of context like this it might be over the top. But buried in the midst of a full-page review, it tickles me mightily. It’s good stuff, even if it isn’t timely or even relevant. And that no one else is reading it — at least, not for pleasure — makes it a more personal experience. Whether it’s three months or four years, the age removes it from popular circulation and delivers it to me, alone, to enjoy on its own merits. The benefit of coming late is that I get to keep it all to myself.
——
1 I’m referring, of course, to Starkey as a historian. As a pundit, I have no opinion, since I’m not British and haven’t ever listened to him on air. But as a Tudor historian, he’s less than second-rate: he’s derivative. I find it annoying that he’s considered an expert of anything except about maximizing his own career.
4 January 2008