Rumaan Alam – Delusions of Whiteness
New York magazine|September 14 - 27, 2020
In Rumaan Alam’s new thriller, a white family staying at a Hamptons Airbnb is startled when the Black owners knock on the door.
By Lila Shapiro
Rumaan Alam – Delusions of Whiteness

LEAVE THE WORLD BEHIND is out on October 6.

A LITTLE MORE THAN two years ago, the novelist and critic Rumaan Alam landed a job as the editor of special projects at The New York Times Book Review. It was a dream job—of course it was—and he pictured himself working at that hallowed institution for the rest of his career. But a few months into his tenure, he began to feel he was failing. Was he just not good enough to make it work? A troubling thought crept into his mind, one that had dogged him throughout his years working at prestigious New York media institutions: What if the Times had hired him not because it valued his mind but because it wanted to prove it cared about diversity? He was so disturbed by this possibility that he quit the job before the year was out.

This thought had haunted his life as a novelist as well. For as long as he had been a writer, Alam imagined that certain people, including editors and publishers, expected him to write about people he outwardly resembled. They didn’t say it outright, but he sometimes felt their faces or tones betrayed that they found him interesting less because of anything he said or wrote than because of where his parents happened to be from. This perception had partly shaped his first two novels, which he’d written from the perspectives of wealthy white women, a choice that felt to him like a quiet act of rebellion. The winter he left the Times, he secluded himself from his family in Brooklyn hotel rooms and poured his existential dread into his writing.

هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة September 14 - 27, 2020 من New York magazine.

ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.

هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة September 14 - 27, 2020 من New York magazine.

ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.

المزيد من القصص من NEW YORK MAGAZINE مشاهدة الكل
Early and Often: David Freedlander - Momentum vs. Machine The Trump and Harris campaigns battle it out for every last vote.
New York magazine

Early and Often: David Freedlander - Momentum vs. Machine The Trump and Harris campaigns battle it out for every last vote.

WIth two weeks left to go, the contours of the 2024 presidential election are clear: Both campaigns need voters who usually don’t vote, and Kamala Harris needs to bring the Democratic coalition, including its Trump-curious members, back home.While the Republican side plans to spend the remaining days of the contest trying to lure low-propensity voters to the polls, the Harris team will attempt to persuade voters of color to return to its side and will try to increase numbers among white voters in previously red suburbs.

time-read
6 mins  |
October 21 - November 03, 2024
Drowning in Slop - A thriving underground economy is clogging the internet with AI garbage-and it's only going to get worse.
New York magazine

Drowning in Slop - A thriving underground economy is clogging the internet with AI garbage-and it's only going to get worse.

SLOP started seeping into Neil Clarke's life in late 2022. Something strange was happening at Clarkesworld, the magazine. Clarke had founded in 2006 and built into a pillar of the world of speculative fiction. Submissions were increasing rapidly, but “there was something off about them,” he told me recently. He summarized a typical example: “Usually, it begins with the phrase ‘In the year 2250-something’ and then it goes on to say the Earth’s environment is in collapse and there are only three scientists who can save us. Then it describes them in great detail, each one with its own paragraph. And then—they’ve solved it! You know, it skips a major plot element, and the final scene is a celebration out of the ending of Star Wars.” Clarke said he had received “dozens of this story in various incarnations.”

time-read
10+ mins  |
September 23 - October 6, 2024
The City Politic- The Other Eric Adams Scandal The NYPD shot a fare evader, a cop, and two bystanders. He defends it.
New York magazine

The City Politic- The Other Eric Adams Scandal The NYPD shot a fare evader, a cop, and two bystanders. He defends it.

On Sunday, September 15, Derell Mickles hopped a turnstile, got asked to leave by cops, then entered the subway again ten minutes later through an emergency exit. This was at the Sutter Avenue L station, out by his mother's house, five stops from the end of the line. Police said they noticed he was holding a folded knife. They followed him up the stairs to the elevated train, asking him 38 times to drop the weapon.

time-read
5 mins  |
September 23 - October 6, 2024
Can the Media Survive?
New York magazine

Can the Media Survive?

BIG TECH, Feckless Owners, CORD-CUTTERS, RESTIVE STAFF, Smaller Audiences ... and the Return of PRINT?

time-read
5 mins  |
October 21 - November 03, 2024
Status Update
New York magazine

Status Update

Hannah Gadsby's fascinatingly untidy tour through life after fame and death.

time-read
5 mins  |
October 21 - November 03, 2024
A Matter of Perspective
New York magazine

A Matter of Perspective

A Matter of Perspective Steve McQueen's worst film is still a solid WWII drama.

time-read
3 mins  |
October 21 - November 03, 2024
Creator, Destroyer
New York magazine

Creator, Destroyer

A retrospective reveals an architect's vision, optimism, and supreme arrogance.

time-read
5 mins  |
October 21 - November 03, 2024
In Praise of Bad Readers
New York magazine

In Praise of Bad Readers

In a time of war, there is a danger in surveying the world as if it were a novel.

time-read
10+ mins  |
October 21 - November 03, 2024
Trust the Kieran Culkin Process
New York magazine

Trust the Kieran Culkin Process

First, he nearly dropped out of Oscar hopeful A Real Pain. Then he convinced Jesse Eisenberg to change the way he directs.

time-read
8 mins  |
October 21 - November 03, 2024
The Funniest Vampires on TV
New York magazine

The Funniest Vampires on TV

What We Do in the Shadows is coming to an end. Its idiosyncratic brand of comedy may be too.

time-read
5 mins  |
October 21 - November 03, 2024