The end of a long relationship with the NYRB.

Here's the first paragraph of the great piece that appeared in The New York Review of Books when Virgina Hamilton Adair's book "Ants on the Melon" came out in 1996. (As I noted yesterday, Adair died this week.) Unless you're a NYRB subscriber, you have to pay $4.00 to get to the whole article.

Ironically, I just let my long-running subscription to the NYRB lapse. They recently sent me a letter, with a post-paid envelope and a request to re-subscribe or at least write back and explain why I'd given up on them. Really, NYRB was by far the subscription I'd kept up for the longest time--more than 20 years. I loved the surprising assemblage of brilliant essays on all sorts of subjects and the incisive pen drawings of David Levine.

The Levine drawings are still there, but they've been used over and over again to demonize President Bush and the people around him; and, while there are still varied essays, ever since 9/11, they have forefronted the pieces that perseverate against Bush and his policies. I'd meant to flip past these things and read the other essays, but I found I'd been leaving many issues unopened, so I let the subscription die. Too bad! For many years, this was my favorite periodical. I didn't write them back and give them this explanation, but here's your answer NYRB.