Nathan Heller
@nathanheller.bsky.social
New Yorker staff writer, hapless itinerant, reader. My concise and infrequent newsletter announces significant new publications, public appearances, and nothing else: nathanheller.substack.com/about
I've never left less than amazed by a Betye Saar exhibition—she was an artist of real rigor, range, and imagination, one of our greatest among the living. R.I.P. www.nytimes.com/2026/07/27/a...
Betye Saar, Artist Who Upended Black Stereotypes, Dies at 99
Working with dolls, family photographs, fabric scraps and other found objects, she became a leading figure in assemblage art.
nytimes.com
But, also, these are not mutually exclusive. A healthy higher-ed system has a Cal and a Stanford, a U.T. and a Rice—and lots of (ideally tuition-free) junior colleges. Many people touch more than one of these institutions over the course of their educations and work; it's all the same pipeline.
Asheesh Kapur Siddique@asheeshks.org · last mo.People will do literally anything in order to avoid funding excellent public higher education
Mark loved to be self-effacing, but he was one of the greats—an assiduous reporter and a writer who was funny and free. So many of us at the magazine grew up reading him, and kept looking to him for a sense of how it could be done. A huge loss.
Michael Schulman@michaelschulman.bsky.social · 2mo agoAnother sad loss today: the longtime New Yorker writer Mark Singer. Here's his marvelous profile of Ricky Jay, from 1993. www.newyorker.com/magazine/199...
I count my lucky stars I got to visit the huge, delicious retrospective last summer—probably the most remarkable single-artist exhibition I've seen, and a moving case for Hockney as one of the real giants, alive with restlessness and daring and uncertainty and, above all, creative generosity. R.I.P.
Los Angeles Times@latimes.com · 2mo agoDavid Hockney, the innovative and prolific British artist who arrived in Los Angeles in 1964, soon celebrating its sun-drenched life and landscapes in colorful, wildly popular paintings, died Thursday. He was 88. www.latimes.com/obituaries/s...
Raise a glass. This was, as far as I know, the first culture-discussion podcast—eighteen years!—and the template on which all the others were based. When I was a junior staffer at Slate, so many moons ago, having one's work discussed on the Gabfest was the greatest thrill. Probably still.
Carl Wilson@carlzoilus.bsky.social · 2mo agoVery sadly, it's been announced today that the @slate.com Culture Gabfest, which set the standard for arts podcasts, will end after this month. I had the honour of being one of the first regular guests to come say goodbye, with a final great conversation. carlwilson.substack.com/p/au-revoir-...
Agree. "Content" makes it easier to talk as if people are responding to business and distribution models rather than to work. No one—no one!—decides to spend hours with "content." They're either taken up with the piece in front of them, in the specific reasons it's irresistible, or they're not.
Josh Gondelman@joshgondelman.bsky.social · 2mo agoMy crankiest old man take is that referring to all art/entertainment/journalism/criticism/comedy/advertising as “content” helped pave the way for broad-ish acceptance of AI slop.
I spent some time with George Lucas and Mellody Hobson; here's the first look at the huge and unusual museum they are opening in Los Angeles this fall, after about a billion dollars of their own money and years of lost access to their dining-room table. www.vogue.com/article/luca...
Inside the Otherworldly Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles
George Lucas and Mellody Hobson on the massive new architectural icon—housing their personal collection of art and artifacts—opening in September 2026
vogue.com
Cruise ships: where every virus known to science shows up first. Book now!
I find American higher education interesting (as some NYer readers probably know) in part because it's near the center of other ripples in American society. This is a case of data echoing what one hears often in speaking with people abroad, not just in France. www.nytimes.com/2026/04/29/w...
In France, American Universities Lose Their Allure in the Trump Era
nytimes.com
Here's Fabio Bertoni, The New Yorker's own general counsel and a giant of the field, on Kash Patel's lawsuit against The Atlantic and defamation lawsuits more generally. www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...
Kash Patel’s Implausible Lawsuit Against The Atlantic
Kash Patel is suing The Atlantic. His lawyers “seem to misunderstand how the law (or logic) works,” Fabio Bertoni writes.
newyorker.com
RIP MTT. His arrival at the S.F. Symphony, in 1995, brought the most excitement for a conductor I've seen directly. He made it one of the most vaunted, proudly daring orchestras in the world. It was thrilling, for a kid, to watch someone remake his creative world. www.nytimes.com/2026/04/23/a...
Michael Tilson Thomas, Celebrated American Conductor, Dies at 81
nytimes.com
It's not just the water; societies that value art create art.
Hildur Knútsdóttir@hildur.bsky.social · 6mo agoI regularly see people wondering how it's possible that there are so many musicians and writers and film makers and artists from a tiny nation like Iceland. And the answer is really simple: State funding for art education and artists. I literally get a salary from the government to write books.
Isn't this, notoriously, the old serial-killer trick?
Tina-Desiree Berg@tinadesireeberg.com · 6mo agoCCTV footage appears to show DHS agents posing as people having car trouble in order to lure a target out of his house before arresting them. The target comes out and starts helping them before 3 vehicles surround the scene. The car "experiencing" trouble then drives off with them.
This is the best reported account of exactly what led to the DCA mid-air collision I've seen. theaircurrent.com/aviation-saf...
Special Report: The night everything at DCA finally went wrong
D.C. midair crash was the result of a complete collapse of the protections designed to keep aviation safe — and the institutions that design and maintain them
theaircurrent.com
Happy birthday to one of my favourite haters, Charles Darwin
There is nothing order-keeping, law-enforcing, or public-safety-protecting about this.
Andrew Karre@andrewkarre.bsky.social · 6mo agoThis is the aftermath of an ICE kidnapping a few blocks from my home in St. Paul—an hour ago. A quiet street full of broken glass and at least three wrecked cars. The target of the kidnapping was taken away by ambulance. He was on a stretcher and covered by a sheet, though a cop said he was alive.
My view here is: let's go. If someone's writing truly is indistinguishable from what an A.I. grinds out, by all means, step aside. It just demarcates more clearly the realm of writing that A.I. can't do—what's original, human, singular, and interesting—and makes its special value clearer.
Sarah Weinman@sarahweinman.com · 6mo ago“If I can generate a book in a day, and you need six months to write a book, who’s going to win the race?” God this is bleak
Very good @newyorker.com piece on Gavin Newsom, by @nathanheller.bsky.social. Gets way, way past the usual media shorthand about him. (I respect what Newsom has done as mayor, lt gov, and now two-term gov of America's best state.) www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
Gavin Newsom Is Playing the Long Game
California’s governor has been touted as the Democrats’ best shot in 2028. But first he’ll need to convince voters that he’s not just a slick establishment politician.
newyorker.com
Yes. Every time you disrupt, revolve, start from scratch, etc., you give yourself a fresh slate of problems and knock-on effects to notice, track, guard against, and solve. Most institutions highly imperfect, but have that behind them. They let you pick up the thread of improvement at a later point.
Alexis Madrigal@alexis-madrigal.bsky.social · 6mo agoThe longer I've gone in journalism, the more I think I underestimated how important the institutional knowledge inside newspapers really was. Newspaper reporters and editors *knew the place* and their combined knowledge is irreplaceable.
"The Governor, who has not changed his cellphone number since becoming mayor of San Francisco, in 2004, has nine thousand twenty-two personal contacts on his phone" www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
This is a great assessment, and seems nearly exact.
Josh Marshall@joshtpm.bsky.social · 6mo agoI can say without any fear of contradiction that I know as much or more than anyone in modern American journalism about the absolute, no excuses necessity of operating in the black. In many cases much more since if you’re a big player there are lots of creative ways to operate ….
When Gavin Newsom first entered public office, at the age of 28, there was a feeling that he would flourish without ascending to the top—too slick, too swank, too smug. Three decades later, the criticisms are the same, but his prospects have transformed. newyorkermag.visitlink.me/KV6N0q
Gavin Newsom Is Playing the Long Game
California’s governor has been touted as the Democrats’ best shot in 2028. But first he’ll need to convince voters that he’s not just a slick establishment politician.
newyorkermag.visitlink.me
The US immigrant population generated more in taxes than they received in benefits from all levels of government every year from 1994 to 2023. The Cato study provides the first-ever 30-year analysis of the fiscal effects of immigration on government budgets. https://ow.ly/jy8a50Y8kM3
Floored by this story. A man wrote a pollite email to a federal prosecutor objecting to the deportation of an Afghan seeking asylum. DHS responded with an administrative warrant to get the man's info from Google, then visited his home to intimidate him.
DHS Hunts Down 67-Year-Old U.S. Citizen Who Criticized Them in Email
The Department of Homeland Security is using a little-known tool to go after its critics.
newrepublic.com
"Gavin Newsom Is Playing the Long Game" by Nathan Heller (@nathanheller.bsky.social) is our pick from the February 9, 2026 issue of The New Yorker. https://newyorkerest.com/issue/2026/02/09?utm_source=bluesky&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=weekly_pick
Gavin Newsom Is Playing the Long Game
newyorkerest.com
I profiled Gavin Newsom, on whom hopes are being pinned, at length in this week's @newyorker.com. I report closely on the way he thinks, operates, builds coalitions, and on. And, yes, the hair. www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
