March 28, 2020
The Best
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No. 37
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In This Week’s Issue
SWANKY PANKY

Stuart Heritage explains why Davos, Alpine clubhouse of the rich and powerful, is sexual-harassment central …

NATURE CALLS

His new documentary is alarming, but David Attenborough still holds out some hope for planet Earth …

BRIDESHEAD RESUMED

School (with a Predilection) for Scandal: Joseph Bullmore studies the trouble at Oxford these days …

ALONE TOGETHER

You meme so much to me: Cazzie David on being single in the Digital Age …

PLAGUE 2.0

That screen alert—whether it’s coronavirus- or Kardashian-related—could have been sent from the 14th century. John Kelly explains …

LET’S BE REAL

Collectors of eerily lifelike baby dolls can spend upwards of $20,000 for each make-believe newborn …

But First …
Issue No. 37

The View from Here

By Graydon Carter

You could almost imagine the earth taking a great, deep breath these past weeks…

Read On
The Pandemic

“What’s His Story?” An infectious-disease specialist treats his first coronavirus patient

By John Froude
Read On
Modern Times

Davos Satyricon A new investigation reveals that the high-powered World Economic Forum is a sexist toga party in the Swiss Alps

By Stuart Heritage
Read On
Small Talk
“I’ve never been afraid to speak power to truth.”
“I’ve never been afraid to speak power to truth.”
Modern Times

Sex and the Single Meme How did getting rejected become the key to social acceptance?

By Cazzie David
Read On
The Planet

Father Nature Sir David Attenborough’s new film shows humanity’s impact on Earth—and what we must do to save it

By Nick Rufford
Read On
Crimes and Misdemeanors

Varsity Blues Inside the annus horribilis of Christ Church—Oxford’s grandest (and most scandalous) college

By Joseph Bullmore
Read On
Small Talk
“O.K., let’s maybe take a break from the scary nonfiction stories.”
“O.K., let’s maybe take a break from the scary nonfiction stories.”
Inside Story

Some Things Never Change The author of a book on the Black Death reflects on how little human nature has evolved since that crisis

By John Kelly
Read On
Style
Stroll Pierre Pants Welcome to shoulder season, that time of the year when no one can figure out how to dress. For cold weather ? Or warm?… Suit Up Entireworld Sweats Entireworld—the new brand of basics with the slogan “The stuff you live in”—has probably been all over… Mask Off Dr. Barbara Sturm Most of us won’t be enjoying a facial or cosmetic procedure anytime soon, so spending some quality time… Invest La Perla Bra There are so many depressing things dominating our worldview these days; the contents of your lingerie… Stroll Pierre Pants Welcome to shoulder season, that time of the year when no one can figure out how to dress. For cold weather ? Or warm?… Suit Up Entireworld Sweats Entireworld—the new brand of basics with the slogan “The stuff you live in”—has probably been all over… Mask Off Dr. Barbara Sturm Most of us won’t be enjoying a facial or cosmetic procedure anytime soon, so spending some quality time… Invest La Perla Bra There are so many depressing things dominating our worldview these days; the contents of your lingerie…
Film and Television

Drawn and Quartered On the 40th anniversary of Yes Minister, the wickedly great caricaturist looks back on the creation of those iconic opening credits

By Gerald Scarfe
Read On

Click here to visit

Virtual Must-Sees
Amsterdam

All Day and All of The Night Watch: the Rijksmuseum’s extraordinary collection (“164,511 items”) at your fingertips …

Washington, D.C.

Ladies first: from Martha W. to Michelle O., portraits of women in a very particular spotlight …

Athens

It’s Cycladic to us: a vase of a hedgehog holding a bowl and (as if more enticement were necessary) some 11,000 other antiquities …

Florence

It’s spring! And it’s a contest: take a look at Primavera and then try to out-Botticelli Botticelli …

Instagram

Stirring emotions: the actor-filmmaker Paul Feig shows how to make his perfect martini …

Modern Times

Infantilized Why are women paying $20,000 for what’s in the back seat? (Hint: it’s not the bag)

By Kelli Korducki
Read On
Modern Times

Nu in Town Eli Rosen, Hollywood’s Yiddish consultant, on the set of Unorthodox in Berlin

By Alexandra Marshall
Read On
Small Talk
Close-up

Field Kallop Math, science, and the mysteries of the cosmos all feature into the mesmerizing work of this emerging New York artist

By Elena Clavarino
Read On
Open Book

A Journey to the Center of the Earth A book showcasing exquisite drawings both ancient and modern captures our evergreen relationship with mapping the world

7
Top, a British card deck from the mid–19th century that could be used either as normal playing cards or in the Court Game of Geography, where each suit represented a continent. Above, a late-17th-century world map by Dutch cartographer Gerard van Schagen reflects the Netherlands’s time as the first global maritime power.
A mid-19th-century British game in the vein of Snakes and Ladders, Wallis’s New Game of Wanderers in the Wilderness was one in a series dedicated to different continents.
Top, an early example of an isothermal map, used to link places with similar climates, from 1823. Above, a mid-19th-century map of Paris comprises 20 arrondissements in the city’s now iconic spiral design.
The artwork for Saul Steinberg’s March 1976 New Yorker cover, View of the World from 9th Avenue, reveals as much by what it leaves out as by what it includes.
A 16th-century map of the Nile is oriented with South at the top and the Mediterranean at the bottom. The ancient Egyptians used cartography to plot landownership and field boundaries after the annual flooding of the river.
Top, a 16th-century map by Heinrich Bünting made during the struggle between Catholicism and Protestantism. Jerusalem is at the center of this cloverleaf model, while England, Scandinavia, and America don’t make the cut. Above, Daniel K. Wallingford exaggerates the legendary provincialism of 1930s Americans in the urban Northeast to comic effect. This map is often believed to have inspired Steinberg’s View of the World from 9th Avenue.
Oronce Finé’s 1536 cordiform projection—from the Latin for heart, cor, and deriving from the work of Ptolemy—is an equal-area map, showing each landform in correct proportion to the others. The map projects a concordia mundi—a world in harmony.
Read On
Books
Max McGuinness On

“Promise Me You’ll Shoot Yourself”: The Mass Suicide of Ordinary Germans in 1945

by Florian Huber
Read On
Cullen Murphy On

Heaven and Hell: A History of the Afterlife

by Bart D. Ehrman
Read On

Murder, They Wrote

by Lisa Henricksson
Read On
Best
Work from Home Milligram I used to fantasize about a home work space, one that would be elegantly stocked with notebooks… Watch 9 to 5 Maybe it was a subconscious choice. A reaction to missing (!) office life. But the other night my wife and I… Soak Pursoma’s Digital Detox Now that the newest iPhones are water-resistant, work, social media, and the news can follow us… Listen The Missing Cryptoqueen Proving the adage that truth is stranger than fiction, The Missing Cryptoqueen, a podcast series… Work from Home Milligram I used to fantasize about a home work space, one that would be elegantly stocked with notebooks… Watch 9 to 5 Maybe it was a subconscious choice. A reaction to missing (!) office life. But the other night my wife and I… Soak Pursoma’s Digital Detox Now that the newest iPhones are water-resistant, work, social media, and the news can follow us… Listen The Missing Cryptoqueen Proving the adage that truth is stranger than fiction, The Missing Cryptoqueen, a podcast series…
Great Lives

Albert Uderzo Illustrator and co-creator of the walrus-moustached Asterix the Gaul, who represented “the revenge of the little guy”

Read On
Air Play
View on Spotify
Small Talk
“Want to join our fantasy-income league?”
“Want to join our fantasy-income league?”
The Perfect Ending

Inès de la Fressange

The multi-talented designer answers 21 of life’s most pressing questions
Read On
Michael Lindsay-Hogg’s Sketchbook
“That nightmare I had.”
Is Edited By

Graydon Carter and Alessandra Stanley

Deputy Editors

Chris Garrett Michael Hainey George Kalogerakis Nathan King

Design Director

Angela Panichi

Chief Technology Officer

John Tornow

Books Editor

Jim Kelly

Arts Intel Report Editor

Laura Jacobs

Style Editor

Ashley Baker

Articles Editor

Ash Carter

Senior Editor

Julia Vitale

Columnists

Cazzie David Emma Freud Walter Isaacson
Pico Iyer John Lahr James Wolcott

Writers at Large

Stuart Heritage Alexandra Marshall

Photo Director

Ann Schneider

Cartoon Editor

Bob Mankoff

Music Supervisor

Randall Poster

Assistant Editors

Elena Clavarino Clementine Ford Alex Oliveira

International Editor

Isabelle Harvie-Watt

London Editor

Bridget Arsenault

Copy Editor

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Research & Legal Editor

Matt Kapp

Photo Editor

Emine Gozde Sevim

Production Editor

H. Scott Jolley

Associate Editor

Elinor Schneider

Chief Operating Officer

Bill Keenan

Chief Marketing Officer

Emily Davis

Brand Partnerships

Anjali Lewis

Financial & Business Operations

Marc Leyer

Integrated Marketing Manager

Madeline Spates

Issue No. 37
March 28, 2020
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Issue No. 37
March 28, 2020
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