N+1

I discovered I live in a parallel universe from the author, having heard nothing about anything this article references.

> n+1 is a New York–based American literary magazine that publishes social criticism, political commentary, essays, art, poetry, book reviews, and short fiction. It is published in print three times annually with regular articles being published online. Each print issue averages around 200 pages in length.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N%2B1

** unless you are into cycling/guitars/keyboards/hotrods/whatever then "N+1" is the ideal number of bikes/guitars/keyboards/cars/whatever to own where N is the number you currently have.

Naomi is an awesome writer and she's been doing many of these deep dives into literary journals. She's also reviewed entire historic genres (like old westerns), IIRC. She has a really unique ability to plainly grasp what's special about a group of related writing.

A particular highlight of n+1 for me was issue 11, which contained a retrospective review of the site Pitchfork[1], an essay chronicling the author's experience at their first Gathering of the Juggalos[2], and an excerpt of Helen DeWitt's excellent novel Lightning Rods[3].

Issue 24's The Intellectual Situation[4] has a phrase I still think about frequently:

> "you have to choose your irrationality or it will choose you."

I have not been a consistent reader, but reading it is a constant delight.

[1] https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-12/reviews/pitchfork/

[2] https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-12/essays/american-juggalo...

[3] https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-12/fiction-drama/lightning...

[4] https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-24/the-intellectual-situat...

Issue 4 is incredible, I bought a damaged copy for a buck and it was the best literary dollar I have ever spent!

You can cultivate an aristocratic attitude even if you never had that much money by USian standards. I mean, as much as we complain about medicine as a kafkaesque nightmare and nexus of inequality [1] it is a miracle not least vaccines, antibiotics, statin drugs, dental implants were never available to the richest people in the Ancien Regime. A character in a 18th century novel might spirit his lover away to Paris from the backwaters of France, now for the rest of us there is Ryanair.

It's quite a healthy way to deal with elite overproduction.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mM5kKqUETbE&list=RDmM5kKqUET...