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1

"It creates an inconsistency in the magazine."

Oh tough up, guppie! You can dig it if you try.

Posted by Emma Leigh | March 8, 2008 9:50 PM
2

photographs run the gamut from non-fiction to fiction just as writing does. though a camera takes real world inputs to create a photograph, (in the same way that a writer does real world research, even for a fictional piece) its output is no more 'real' by necessity than the story it is attached to.

But maybe I'm thinking too hard about it.

Posted by dbell | March 8, 2008 10:09 PM
3

Josh, that's such a First World White Male problem.

Posted by Jubilation T. Cornball | March 8, 2008 10:14 PM
4

Yeah the consistency in the Stranger is respectable and not the least bit busy.

Posted by pencil riot | March 8, 2008 10:32 PM
5

you mean actors arent the real people in movies?
please josh, let charles tackle these non issues.

Posted by Bellevue Ave | March 8, 2008 10:57 PM
6

I know! Totally annoying! And just the other day my biscotti was stale -- life so SO HARD.

Posted by mattymatt | March 8, 2008 11:06 PM
7

Josh, the picture is identified in the sideways photocredit caption as 'New Orleans, 2007.' If you look closely at the picture, you can see the flood line on the house - it's the lower half of the house, where it's a darker blue.

The story is set in New Orleans, oh, now-ish, and is about two homes and families and how the flood has changed their circumstances, literally wrecked the homes. The pic is the mind-setting for the story, a backdrop or something. I've noticed that this is often the case for the graphics they lead with.

I haven't gotten to the Kunzru thing yet. If I get a read on the pic I'll try to check in.

Posted by mike | March 8, 2008 11:13 PM
8

One other thing - in 'Down By Law' Jarmusch uses real New Orleans settings in-camera to tell his small-scale slacker story. In 'King Creole' we see a made-up version of Elvis played by Elvis in actual New Orleans locales. Does the use of location shots affect your consumption of the fictions in these cases?

Posted by mike | March 8, 2008 11:17 PM
9

I agee, Josh, but that's the least of the New Yorker's problems. More annoying elements of its fall from grace include much less depth in its non-fiction, exchanging quality for "diversity" in its fiction, and a much more partisan editoral voice. But it is, alas, much more profitable than it was 15 years ago.

Posted by David Wright | March 8, 2008 11:29 PM
10

Not sure If I concur on 'diversity' David, since there seems to be a predictable stable of fiction contributors, including Kunzru.

Anyway, I think I have the key to the pic:

Halfway into the first complete paragraph on p 110:

"I was seated next to Thanh, who'd cut her hair into a fringe. She looked like a Vietnamese Nico."

Also, the pic is by longtime rock video director and photographer Stephane Sednaoui. I think it's, again, a photo illustration - mmmmaybbe the model is REALLY a loft-dwelling Manhattan scenester, but I don't care. She provides the mask that Thanh will wear while I skip over the parts of the story I find boring, as I will.

Posted by mike | March 9, 2008 12:14 AM
11

I have always had this same problem with their fiction, and I'm not a white guy! The accompanying photo (not related to the story) has *always* thrown me. I think this is one reason why I read the fiction last, if I do at all.

And I have to say that I really like the writing of the New Yorker when Tina Brown was editor. Now, not so much.

Posted by sheila | March 9, 2008 5:05 AM
12

Thankfully, The New Yorker (voice of so many of the worst tendencies of post-war American fiction and "journalism") will be with us only a few more years until it is completely eviscerated by the blogosphere.

Posted by thegayrecluse | March 9, 2008 6:47 AM
13



For a site/news-source that likes to tell us, endlessly, about what new art is hanging around Seattle it seems some of the staff are clueless concerning the use of visual images to enhance the written word.

Or you're just really, really high and had what you THOUGHT was an epiphany.

As to TGR @12 - I hope not, I enjoy The New Yorker, its the only magazine I subscribe to.

Posted by Daniel | March 9, 2008 7:31 AM
14

There is about 85 years of photography theory on this... To which dbell alludes.

Posted by assiniboia | March 9, 2008 7:38 AM
15

I love it when you're drunk.

Posted by SeattleBrad | March 9, 2008 9:38 AM
16

I miss illustrations. Magazines used to do neat illustrations on fiction stories. Doesn't anybody know how to draw anymore?

Posted by catalina Vel-DuRay | March 9, 2008 9:46 AM
17

You type too much like C.Mudede now.

Posted by arandomdude | March 9, 2008 10:02 AM
18

How do you know that picture isn't fictionn as well? Perhaps it's a Photoshopped composite of several different people?

Posted by Lou | March 9, 2008 10:49 AM
19

Oh, that reminds me, Josh is an idiot.

Posted by blah | March 9, 2008 12:04 PM
20

I totally get what you are saying Josh!

Posted by mj | March 9, 2008 1:53 PM
21

Josh is onto something.

Who is this woman? Who cares! She's just a prop to look at, not a real person. Minorities and women are often used in 'arty' photos. Imagine if it was a white guy instead of an Asian woman. Everyone would wonder who the guy is. Is he an artist? A new billionaire? Does he work for Google? Did he design a building? Or does he make important chairs? So may questions.

But I bet you are the first person to wonder, who the hell is this woman? There should be an answer by the New Yorker to this question, but there's not. It's just an object, this woman. Pretty! Carry on...

Posted by me | March 9, 2008 9:29 PM
22

I agree, photography is inappropriate. Fiction should only be accompanied by illustration.

Posted by Dougsf | March 10, 2008 1:48 PM
23


Photography IS illustration, btw.

It's a picture that suggests, refers to and/or alludes to something else. Kinda like words do.

Posted by come again? | March 10, 2008 2:11 PM

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