Reihan Salam raved about this essay in the new n + 1 and rightly so. It's by far the best thing I've read in a good long while. I don't really want to tease it beyond that; you should go and buy a copy of the magazine, it contains other good stuff and they deserve your support.
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"The Face of Seung-Hui Cho"
10 Jan 2008 01:17 pm
Comments (19)
Could you maybe post a quote or two up? I wasn't impressed by the passage Reihan quoted.
You can get a one year subscription (two issues) for $20. See option three:
http://www.nplusonemag.com/subscribe.html
Considering each issue comes in around 200-250 pages, I don't think that's too much to ask. Also, n+1 may well be available at a bookstore near you:
http://www.nplusonemag.com/bookstores.html
Thanks for the support!
I bet you can find it at "cool" magazine stands (though I bet Borders has it too). I got mine at Smoke Signals on Polk St in S.F. Read the environmental essays, which were very good. I'm actually going to start the big about the death of Cody's bookstore, but am looking forward to this piece now.
It is not available at a bookstore near me. This is injustice. Injustice!
I live in Des Moines. We don't have "cool" magazine stands. We don't have "any" magazine stands. The nearest store that carries it is two hours away. Frown.
I read it too and it is a really superb essay. N+1 is less than a paperbook book and much better.
You can always order it direct from the website.
I have a subscription, and it's the best periodical I subscribe to (by quite a lot, I reckon). I think they reprinted their back issues, too, which are highly worthwhile. I still can't get Mark Grief's "The Concept of Experience" out of my head.
When I saw the title "N + 1", the name "Seung-Hui Cho" and the title of the piece, "The Rise of the Loser Class," and given Matt's obsession with basketball, I thought it was about ginormous Korean basketball stiff Seung-Jin Ha.
Glad I investigated further!!! And glad I live and work not too far from either City Lights or Smoke Signals.
It was a terrific essay. I also loved the chapter from Helen DeWitt's new novel. A $20/year subscription is a great value, even if you live near "cool" magazine stands.
Oh look. There's one available just 492 miles away. I'm sure I'll want to try that.
Maybe they should try posting on the internet, where most of the viable readers are. But that would make too much sense.
That "bookstores" list isn't comprehensive. They also sell the thing at every Borders/Barnes & Nobel that I've ever been in.
Dudes, we all live in (or near) Russian Hill (me, I'm in the Tendernoob). We all need to go buy N+1 and meet up at the Grubstake.
Maybe they should try posting on the internet, where most of the viable readers are. But that would make too much sense.
Translation: If I can't get it for free, I can't be bothered to read it.
"If I can't get it for free, I can't be bothered to read it."
Alternative version: If I don't know what the FUCK Matt is talking about, why should I spend money to read it?
He could have at least have indicated what the hell the essay was about.
Translation: If I can't get it for free, I can't be bothered to read it.
Don't be so harsh. Haven't you heard of Micropayments?
You don't have to do anything you don't want to do.
If you trust Matt's judgment as a reader, and if you want to read "by far the best thing he's read in a long time," then search out the issue, which is available at most Border's and Barnes and Noble.
If you don't trust his judgment, or if you don't care to read what he thinks he is good, then by all means, don't.
Matt has shared an enthusiasm with you; he is not obliged to sell you on anything you don't have the interest to do on your own. And he does not deserve to be cursed at in all caps for failing to do this thing he is not obliged to do.
You, sir, have the manners of a petulant boor. You're not worthy of the recommendation, or the essay.
Yes yes yes, n+1 is mucking amazing,* I have the whole run, read it everyone. I don't know anyone else in England who subscribes, but you must be out there, people of like discernment.
*Except I'm temperamentally opposed to their idealism, which I guess is a posh way of saying I think some of their ideas are stupid.
If I don't know what the FUCK Matt is talking about, why should I spend money to read it?
Exactly. From the little I've seen at other sites, this brilliant essay basically suggests that the murder of 32 people could have been averted if only some girl had seen the killer's vulnerability, and selflessly taken it upon herself to "cure" him.
Which seems pretty screwed up to me.
Maybe I'm getting a slanted view of the essay, but it would sure help if Matt gave us a clue what he thought was so great about it.
Comments closed January 24, 2008.
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Heads in the Sand
Maybe if you could get it online, or order a copy for less than $28. I doubt it is available anywhere around here.
Posted by Anonymous | January 10, 2008 1:31 PM