4/8/2023 0 Comments The village returns its voicey![]() ![]() That’s not what they hired me for, but it was such a non-hierarchical place that no one ever said no. I never assumed that I was going to be writing. Hilton Als, Staffer and writer, 1984 to 1992 Right: Jeff Weinstein photographed by Sylvia Plachy. Left: Hilton Als and Gary Indiana photographed by Catherine McGann. How did The Village Voice achieve, and then maintain, such relevance? What kind of place cultivates such a strong and diverse stable of talent? Here, some legendary voices from the Voice reflect on its decades of prominence. It was the last interview he gave before he died. “We really did something for America,” he said. Mailer, in a 2007 interview with the Times Literary Supplement, had called the paper “an important organ” and “perfect” for this country. “ The Village Voice, a New York Icon, Closes,” read the Times headline. The response was profound, with countless media eulogies decrying the loss, from the socialist-leaning The Nation to Fortune. In 1996, it became free in order to increase circulation, which many supporters felt lowered its intellectual clout. When the Voice shut down for good, in 2018, it wasn’t much of a surprise-even in New York, the biggest media town in America. And for those who needed a massage or escort, the back pages offered that, too. Legends like feminist Susan Brownmiller, literary darling Vivian Gornick, hip-hop arbiter Touré, and cartoonists Jules Feiffer and Lynda Barry walked their wits weekly in the paper, which for years was thick with ads. Political author Michael Tomasky went on to write for New York, The Daily Beast, and The Guardian. Editor Bill Bastone left the paper after starting the muckraking website Smoking Gun. Legendary director Jonas Mekas was its first film critic. Peter Schjeldahl, the New Yorker art critic, and Guy Trebay, the heady New York Times style reporter, gained momentum there, as did Times art critic Roberta Smith and Jerry Saltz, the jester critic of New York magazine (and another Pulitzer winner). Pulitzer Prize winners Hilton Als and Colson Whitehead wrote for the Voice, as did Pulitzer nominee Nat Hentoff. Its publishers, including Clay Felker, Rupert Murdoch, and Carter Burden, had clout, and its readers had attitude. It created the Obie Awards for off-Broadway theater, covered marginalized cultures, and nabbed interviews with Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr., and Che Guevara. ![]() And if you wanted a takedown of the powerful, including landlords, city officials, and Donald Trump, you could trust the Voice to do so with precision and panache.Ĭo-founded in 1955 by Norman Mailer-who quit writing his abrasive column because an editor made a proofreading error, mistaking “nuisance” for “nuance”-the Voice was one of the nation’s first alternative weeklies and was considered the most successful for decades. Suburban and city kids used the tabloid paper with the blue logo for music reviews and underground concert listings, while serious theater, film, and book lovers depended on Voice critics to read between the lines and apply both cynicism and semiotic theory. ![]() They relied on the fierce alternative weekly’s listings for apartment shares and quirky personals ads. Once upon a time in New York City, before Craigslist and Grindr, readers would wait at newspaper stands on Wednesdays for The Village Voice to arrive. Writer Bob Morris reflects on the alternative weekly golden era with Hilton Als, Lynn Yaeger, Michael Musto, and Vince Aletti. ![]()
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