California’s Recall Is a Blow to Democratic Change

Plus: an interview with Martin Short, Virginia Woolf’s art of character-reading, and “Broken Meat.” View in browser | Update your preferences Sunday, August 29, 2021 Comment California’s Recall Is a Blow to Democratic Change The challenge to Governor Gavin Newsom strains election norms and institutions that are already dangerously frayed. By Nathan Heller Second Read Virginia Woolf’s Art of Character-Reading Woolf believed that characters were a novelist’s greatest tool, a way to bridge life and fiction. In “Mrs. Dalloway,” she put her theory to the test. By Merve Emre Double Take Sunday Reading: Remote Living From the magazine’s archive: a selection of pieces on the effects of our increasingly atomized existence. By The New Yorker The New Yorker Interview Martin Short Plays Bit by Bit The seventy-one-year-old comedian on his early ambitions to be a singer, his circle of funny people, and the wisdom he’s gleaned from the likes of Joni Mitchell and Neil Simon. By Rachel Syme Culture and More The Front Row “Broken Meat,” an Astonishing Portrait of a Poet and His City In Pola Rapaport’s documentary from 1991, a frustrated artist delivers his life to the camera with liberating energy. By Richard Brody The Pictures The Standup Who Doubles as a Digital Emily Post Jaboukie Young-White stars in “Dating & New York,” an old-school rom-com refreshed for the swipe-right era. By Andrew Marantz Poems “The Gate of Horn & the Gate of Ivory” “Somewhere I read that music was invented to confirm human loneliness.” By Bessie Golding Poems “Monday” “Doesn’t it bother you sometimes / what living is, what the day has turned into?” By Alex Dimitrov Humor and Puzzles Sketchbook 15 Must-Haves for Baby A comically tiny and insufficient excerpt from “9,000 Must-Haves for Baby.” By Liana Finck Cryptic Crossword The Cryptic Puzzle Quickly leave South Carolina atop farm animal: five letters. By Neville Fogarty You’re receiving this e-mail because you signed up for The Daily from The New Yorker. Was this e-mail forwarded to you? Sign up. Unsubscribe | Manage your e-mail preferences | Send newsletter feedback | View our Privacy Policy Copyright © Condé Nast 2021. One World Trade Center, New York, NY 10007. All rights reserved.