A Difficult, Beautiful Christmas in the Arctic Circle

Plus: poetry in times of crisis, the year of the cardboard sports fan, and Leonora Carrington. View in browser | Update your preferences Personal History A Difficult, Beautiful Christmas in the Arctic Circle Santa is tired, the children’s toes may be falling off inside their boots, and the sled dogs are pooping. By Rachel Louise Snyder Personal History Some Notes on Funniness Lessons in humor, from grade school to Johnny Carson. By Calvin Trillin Page-Turner What Do We Want from Poetry in Times of Crisis? Anthologies, with their diverse voices but convergent ideas, envision a public sphere in which solidarity doesn’t require uniformity. By Clare Bucknell 2020 in Review The Year of the Cardboard Sports Fan Finding hope in cutouts and carefulness. By Louisa Thomas Culture and More Books How Leonora Carrington Feminized Surrealism Each time the work of the British-Mexican artist and writer is reborn, it seems more prescient. By Merve Emre 2020 in Review My Year in Takeout Orders At the very beginning of 2020, on one of my last trips out of Texas, I landed in New York and met colleagues for an early dinner. By Bryan Washington On Television “Big Mouth” Is Still Changing—For the Better In its fourth season, the Netflix cartoon doubles down on the idea that identity cannot be neatly defined, and confronts criticisms of the show’s racial politics by turning them into plot points. By Naomi Fry Sketchbook The Museum of Purgatory The perpetual limbo we’re living in may not be anything new. By Ali Fitzgerald Humor from The New Yorker Daily Shouts Home for the Holidays Video-chat crosstalk, virtual babysitting, out-of-focus Webcams: a remotely celebrated holiday comes with its own challenges. By Maya Henderson Daily Cartoon Tuesday, December 22nd By Yasin Osman This e-mail was sent to you by The New Yorker. To insure delivery, we recommend adding newyorker@newsletters.newyorker.com, to your contacts, while noting that it is a no-reply address. Please send all newsletter feedback to tnyinbox@newyorker.com. For more from The New Yorker, sign up for our newsletters, shop the store, and sign in to newyorker.com, where subscribers always have unlimited access. Contact us with questions. View our Privacy Policy Unsubscribe Copyright © Condé Nast 2020. One World Trade Center, New York, NY 10007. All rights reserved.