Editors
Peter Carlson has a fine article today on the improvement in the Atlantic Monthly since Michael Kelly took over as editor. Carlson makes a lot of good points. I've been a subscriber to the Atlantic for a while now, and the editorial selection really has become much more interesting and relevant under Kelly's leadership (whereas in the past it had a tendency to pander to the fiction crowd, and an artsy liberal readership). And he's done it without turning the publication into an overtly conservative rag, which would have alienated a fair number of readers. He's probably the best example going of the impact a good editor can have -- and as I wrote back in February, Slate would do well to approach the opening created by the departure of Michael Kinsley (himself an excellent editor, but only a good writer by comparison) with the Kelly example in mind.
On the other hand, a bad editor can really hurt a publication. The American Prospect suffers from that a bit (understatement?). Slate certainly is suffering from it right now. And it's not just true of political magazines. Several months ago, Backpacker magazine promoted one of its editors to the head job. I've never liked the guy's writing, but as I pointed out in February, that has very little to do with editorial direction, so I was curious what he would do with a magazine that was already in pretty good shape. It's been disastrous. His feature selection is terrible, he has pushed a far-left environmental agenda (okay, it was already far-left, but he's gone further), and he even mucked around with the design of Gear Guide issue -- the one issue that every serious backpacker buys every year -- and turned it into a mess.
All of that's bad. But I started reading the current issue today, and decided the magazine has become essentially worthless to me. The editor's comment, which in the past has been about particular adventures or the spirit of backpacking or other such safe, if cliched, stuff, was instead about how the editor and his companions, annoyed that a helicopter kept flying by their pristine area of wilderness, decided to strip off their clothes and flash the helicopter. And readers are treated to a photo feature full rear nudity. I'm not a prude, but this is not why I buy the magazine. Nor do I buy it for this month's feature article on how men can secure their genitalia with a bandana if they find that hiking is chafing them. I'm not making this up.
Once upon a time, I found the magazine useful: it talked a lot about technique, places, and equipment -- with the occasional leftist activism that one might expect. Now it's just worthless, thanks to the selection of a terrible editor. And now I'm off to their website to cancel my subscription. It's sad when Bob Kuttner's rag is more appealing than Backpacker!
[Posted at 22:13 CST on 04/23/02] [Link]
