Like many of you, I was stunned by what happened on November 5th. It’s going to take me some time to reckon with what this all says about the values of a large portion of this country. As part of that reckoning—and for some much-needed relief—I’ve opted to spend less time with media in general for a bit.
But on the morning after I couldn’t ignore an email I got from today’s guest, New York magazine editor-in-chief David Haskell.
What struck me most about his note—which was sent to the magazine’s million-and-a-half subscribers—was what it didn’t say. There were no recriminations. Nothing about how Kamala Harris had failed to “read the room.” Not a word about Joe Biden’s unwillingness to step aside when he should have. No calls to “resist.” In fact, the hometown president-elect’s name went unspoken (as it is here).
What Haskell did say that left a mark on me was this:
I consider our jobs as magazine journalists a privilege at times like this.
I was an editor at Clay Felker’s New York magazine, the editor-in-chief of Boston magazine, and I led the creative team at Inc. magazine. And it was there, at Inc., that I had a similar experience. It was 9/11.
I wrote my monthly column in the haze that immediately followed the attacks, though it wouldn’t appear in print until the December issue. It was titled, “Think Small. No, Smaller.” In it, I urged our community of company builders to focus their attention on the things we can control. This is how it ended:
What we can say for certain is that the arena over which any of us has control has, for now, grown smaller. In these smaller arenas, the challenge is to build, or rebuild, in ourselves and our organizations the quiet confidence that we still have the ability to get the right things done.
For all the attention that gets paid to EICs, most of the work you do is done through the members of your team: writers, and editors, and designers, and so many others.
My friend, Dan Okrent, the former Life magazine editor and Print Is Dead guest, once said, “Magazines bring us together into real communities.”
Moments like this demand something different—something direct and personal from an editor to that community. Something that offers a challenge, but also an opportunity, to answer the question in a clear and credible way: So what do we do now?
Read the full episode transcript here.
Print Is Dead (Long Live Print!) is a podcast about magazines and the people who made (and make) them. Magazines that combined thought-provoking attitudes and values with a distinctive look and feel, and cast a long and powerful shadow on American culture and public discourse. Hear stories and learn lessons from legendary designers, editors, writers, publishers, photographers, illustrators, photo editors, and more—stories and lessons that capture a magical history of innovation and inspiration, and that point the way forward. We’ll go deep into the lives and careers of this astonishingly talented group of creators, and tease out what these giants—past and present—have to teach the next generation of creators.
If you’re in the magazine business—if you’re in any business focused on content creation—this podcast is for you.
This episode is a special collaboration with The Spread and is made possible by PIDLLP sponsors Commercial Type, Mountain Gazette, and Freeport Press.
The team behind Print is Dead (Long Live Print!) also produces The Full Bleed, a podcast about the future of magazines and the magazines of the future.