Jezebel and the Question of Women’s Anger

Plus: David Remnick on why despair is not an option in the Middle East, and Hannah Goldfield's Top Twenty restaurant picks. View in browser | Update your preferences Saturday, November 4, 2023 In today’s newsletter, The Weekend Essay, and then: • In the Middle East, despair is not an option • Donald Trump’s sons on the witness stand • A New Yorker critic lists her twenty top restaurants The Weekend Essay Jezebel and the Question of Women’s Anger When the feminist Web site launched, in 2007, it quickly became known for its contentious readership. What have we learned about online outrage since? By Anna Holmes From the News Desk Comment In the Middle East, Despair Is Not an Option A source of inspiration is that era of history, not so distant, when leaders and movements, for all their flaws and failures, agreed to agree. By David Remnick Q. & A. Why Antisemitism Led a DeSantis Ally to Jump to Trump A Florida Republican on how, if Trump were President, the war in Israel “wouldn’t have happened.” By Isaac Chotiner The Political Scene Podcast Clarence Thomas’s R.V. Loan and Supreme Court Scrutiny The Court’s system of self-policing is in question as revelations about Thomas’s gifts lead the Senate to escalate its investigation into Supreme Court ethics. John Cassidy Trump’s Sons Get Challenged on the Witness Stand Source photograph by Hiroko Masuike / NYT / AP “Given that bad things tend to happen to virtually anyone who comes into Donald Trump’s orbit, it was only a matter of time before his own family members got dragged into the mire,” John Cassidy writes in his latest column, which evaluates the testimony of Trump’s eldest sons, Donald, Jr., and Eric, who appeared this week as defendants in the civil fraud trial brought by the office of the New York attorney general. Offering a close reading of the trial, Cassidy explains why both sons “repeatedly had their credibility impeached on the stand.” Read more » Culture Dept. Fiction “The Ghosts of Gloria Lara” Truth is, I never could decide if my mother liked Mr. Wilson or not. I’m not sure she knew herself, not at that point. So what was it between them? By Junot Díaz This Week in Fiction Junot Díaz on Writing as an Act of Faith The author discusses his story from the latest issue of the magazine. By Cressida Leyshon My Favorite Restaurants in New York City A New Yorker food critic’s twenty top restaurants, in no particular order. By Hannah Goldfield Illustration by Tamara Shopsin You could write dozens of obituaries a year for beloved New York restaurants that have shuttered their doors. One of the things I love most about this city is how regenerative it is, against all odds. We’re living at a moment when it’s harder than ever to keep a restaurant running, let alone open a new one, yet there are always, improbably, new places to eat—global pandemics and floodwaters be damned. In the past few years, as I ate my way through the boroughs, chronicling meals for Tables for Two, the delights seemed inexhaustible. I recently transitioned to a new role, which means I’m no longer writing the column every week (though I will still be writing regularly about food for the magazine). As a parting gift to readers, I decided to make a list of my favorite places that I’ve reviewed. It’s hard to pick, but I’ve found a few thrills to be especially electric. An ancient Jewish lunch counter in the Flatiron district, brought lovingly back to life by new owners and made somehow more essentially itself. A palace of traditional Turkish food in a former pancake house on Staten Island, worth a trip across the Verrazzano Bridge in standstill traffic. A tiny noodle stall buried deep inside a food hall in Koreatown, run by a devoted daughter and her mother, who has a hand in making every plate of food. The best cocktails I’ve ever had—laced with orange-blossom water and dried lime—at a Persian restaurant in Bushwick. Here are twenty New York restaurants, among thousands, that I recommend without reservation. See the list Books We Recommend This Week Reviews of notable new fiction and nonfiction. Some People Need Killing, by Patricia Evangelista (Random House). In 2016, Rodrigo Duterte was elected President of the Philippines after campaigning on the promise of slaughtering three million drug addicts. In this unflinching account of the ensuing violence, a Filipina trauma journalist narrates six years of the country’s drug war, during which she spent her evenings “in the mechanical absorption of organized killing.” Buy now on Amazon or Bookshop. The Boy from Kyiv, by Marina Harss (Farrar, Straus & Giroux). This deft, intimate biography traces the career of Alexei Ratmansky—arguably the preëminent ballet choreographer of our time, currently in residence at New York City Ballet—and examines the tensions between traditionalism and innovation within his field. Buy now on Amazon or Bookshop. Wound, by Oksana Vasyakina, translated from the Russian by Elina Alter (Catapult). In this affecting début novel, a narrator who resembles the author grapples with the death of her mother and with her mother’s disapproval of her lesbianism. She makes a pilgrimage through Russia, carrying her mother’s ashes in an urn to be buried in their home town, in Siberia, but her grief is continually punctured by the bureaucracy of dealing with death. Buy now on Amazon or Bookshop. This Is Salvaged, by Vauhini Vara (Norton). The narrator of the title story in this collection is an unappreciated artist who beholds a warming planet and wishes to express that the precariousness of life is, among other things, darkly funny. This thesis propels the stories that follow. Buy now on Amazon or Bookshop. The best books of 2023 so far What are you reading this week? Reply to let us know. Fun & Games Dept. Daily Shouts How to Save the Bees You could plant bee-friendly flowers, eliminate productivity quotas, or hire a teeny-tiny therapist. By Sólveig Eva Magnúsdóttir and Jennie Egerdie Shouts & Murmurs Thanksgiving Rider This document acknowledges that Lauren (“Talent”) has agreed to appear for THREE ( 3) days and TWO (2) nights at the residence of her mother (“Venue”). By Simon Rich Name Drop: Can you guess the identity of a notable person—contemporary or historical—in six clues? Play our trivia game » Thanks for reading. Let us know your thoughts about today’s edition. 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