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magazines
The Ten Best Editors
Many great magazines. Many great editors. But who are the best? A select CJR
committee has picked the top ten and five more to watch. And CJR's
magazine columnist, Marshall Loeb, cites ten qualities
of a top-ten editor.
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ROBERT SILVERS |
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| A quarter century ago, she won the title "Most Promising Female Journalist of the Year" for covering London's social scene in Punch, The New Statesman, others. At age twenty-five: took over Tatler, one of England's oldest magazines, and boosted circulation 300 percent. But nothing prepared U.S. readers for her pyrotechnic debut as editor in chief of Vanity Fair in 1983. In an eight-year reign, circulation leaped from 400,000 to 1.2 million, and VF became the hottest magazine in the industry. She ran The New Yorker for seven years and founded Talk. She's still the most talked-about editor in the business. "Any list of the top ten would be incomplete without her name, even though inclusion mostly recognizes past efforts." | In July 1992, he quit as editor of The New York Observer and assumed the chair at Vanity Fair vacated by Tina Brown. Since then, Graydon Carter has burnished, revamped, and reimagined the magazine's successful formula: a savory salmagundi of politics, royalty, showbiz, sex, high society, crime - along with some of the best photography and graphics in the industry. Issues sometimes approach 400 pages. "He edits the best magazine in the country." Canadian Carter (he came to the U.S. in 1978) was a staff writer at Time and Life, then co-founded and co-edited Spy; his five years there saw the title's circulation rise sixfold. | You don't have to be from Texas to admire and enjoy Texas Monthly. Its elan and dash place it right up there with the best slick magazines in the land. That's partly because long-time editor Gregory Curtis has plenty of fascinating personalities to write about: Texas residents past and present like Willie Nelson, Carl Lewis, Michael Dell, Dan Rather, Farrah Fawcett, Ross Perot. "The magazine is consistently excellent; it defines its territory and its audience. Superlative." Curtis has been with the magazine from day one in 1972, first as a senior editor, writing scores of stories on politicians, artists, murderers; and, since 1981, as top editor. "One of U.S.'s best magazines." | During New York's 1963 newspaper strike, The New York Review of Books emerged to help fill the gap for news-starved New Yorkers. It's still the literati's favorite read. Silvers and Epstein were present at the creation - along with co-founders Robert Lowell, Elizabeth Hardwick, and Jason Epstein - and they remain at the helm of the most academically prestigious publication on our list. ("I spend more time on it than any other magazine I receive.") Silvers was Paris editor of The Paris Review in the 1950s, and an associate editor at Harper's. Epstein was a junior editor at Doubleday & Co. and worked on The Partisan Review. | "He does a spectacular, superb job with Fortune." His mission, when he took over in 1995, was to renew and reinvigorate a publication whose venerable history stretched back to 1930. John Huey has brought a new sparkle and reader-friendliness to Fortune, while achieving record newsstand sales. He's an Atlanta native who spent thirteen years on The Wall Street Journal as reporter, bureau chief, and editor, and was founding managing editor of The Wall Street Journal/Europe. During seven years as a Fortune senior editor, he wrote many cover stories. His co-written book Sam Walston: Made in America was a best-seller. "He's constantly willing to reinvent his magazine for readers." |
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| Time's goal, says Walter Isaacson, "is to capture the magic of what's happening in the world, from politics to arts, and to make the people who shape our times come alive." He's achieved that goal to a remarkable degree in four years as the magazine's fourteenth chief editor. Sprightlier writing, more scrupulous reporting, and a new vitality mark its pages. A twenty-two-year veteran of Time, Rhodes scholar Isaacson (after stints at The Sunday Times of London and the New Orleans Times-Picayune) rose from staff correspondent to Nation editor and assistant managing editor. He keeps his writing skills sharp: a 1997 cover story on Microsoft's Bill Gates, and an earlier (1992) biography of Henry Kissinger. | To the surprise of all in the journalism trade, Michael Kinsley decamped to Redmond, Washington, in 1996 and - with the backing of Bill Gates - established Slate, the first high-profile online magazine. It's now part of the national discourse, home to top writers, and read eagerly by media buffs, wonks, and just plain cyber-browsers. His singular career has included two terms as editor of The New Republic, one as top man at Harper's, and managing editorship of The Washington Monthly. He's a contributing writer at Time, Vanity Fair, and The Wall Street Journal. "Michael Kinsley has done great work all his life. Slate is a part of that record." | Editor, essayist, reporter, scholar, lecturer: Lewis Lapham "easily belongs in any top ten list of the nation's best editors. It's amazing how he continues to get our attention and deliver on the magazine's promises." He's had two terms as Harper's editor (1976-1981; 1983-present). His monthly essay, "Notebook," is consistently graceful and appealing. The New York Times once likened him to H.L. Mencken and Montaigne. He started out as a reporter for the San Francisco Examiner and the New York Herald Tribune, and has contributed to many magazines and penned eight books. In spare moments, he dashed off an enlightening introduction to Marshall McLuhan's seminal Understanding Media. | "A sensitive, smart, blue-pencil editor." He has transformed The New York Times Magazine since taking over as editor in April 1998 - a redesign, new features, energetic new writers, and a schedule of well-thought-out, well-researched special issues. Even the famous Sunday crossword puzzle seems more fun. Brooklyn-born Moss was founding editor of the award-winning 7 Days, which folded in 1990. Earlier: managing editor and deputy editor of Esquire, and before that, he toiled at Rolling Stone. He's been a consulting editor to the Times (1991-1993), with the task of developing and redesigning various sections of the paper. "Navigating brilliantly, despite treacherous internal politics." | In 1967, at age twenty, he dropped out of the University of California to start Rolling Stone, and thus helped change American culture. Nobody had ever treated the special interests of youth so deftly and definitively. The mix? Music coverage, yes, but investigative reports, interpretive political coverage, probing Q&As, depthy profiles, reviews of books, films, theater, television, new media. Wenner underwrote Hunter S. Thompson's gonzo journalism, and was the force behind Tom Wolfe's The Right Stuff and The Bonfire of the Vanities. It's been a rumbustious third-of-a-century for the 8.8 million-reader bi-weekly, which continues to represent Wenner's own unique sensibilities. |
| FIVE TO WATCH | ||||
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WILLIAM C. TAYLOR |
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| Teen People exploded in the industry sky just twenty-four months ago - one of Time Inc.'s most successful launches. A clone of People for the young and restless, it covers the youthquake waterfront: rockers, celebs, fashion, music, flicks, makeup, food, health, sports. Founding editor Christina Ferrari, ex boss at YM, is a veteran of Redbook, McCall's, Self, and Parenting. | At forty-six-year-old I.D., editor Pearlman keeps a keen eye on how well - or poorly - the artifacts we see around us every day are designed: sneakers, diapers, furniture, wristwatches, caskets, tools, backpacks, textiles, food packaging. "The twentieth century could be called design's Big Bang," says Pearlman, who's been a firm hand at I.D.'s helm for seven years. | Time Out New York - the best and brightest weekly guide to Gotham: dining, cabaret, the bar scene, shopping, Broadway, kids' entertainment, and a special section for gay and lesbian events. Cyndi Stivers is the first and only editor in chief of the five-year-old TONY. She's a veteran of Life, US, Vanity Fair, Conde Nast Traveler, and Premiere. | Their Boston-based Fast Company ("The Ultimate Guide to Change") has the heft of a Sears Roebuck catalogue, and all you'll ever need to know about succeeding in U.S. business. Webber and Taylor, both off the Harvard Business Review, launched in November 1995, and success came fast. "It reinvented the category. An extraordinary achievement." | In just twenty-one months, The Industry Standard has become the Baedeker of the dot-com and new media cyberworld - news and analysis about Internet startups, e-commerce, IPOs, hot Web sites, big deals, and major mergers. Founding editor Jonathan Weber, former technology editor of the Los Angeles Times, was European correspondent for Electronic News and MIS Week. |
| Methodology | ||||
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The "Ten Best" magazine editors and the "Editors to Watch" were selected by a panel of nine magazine experts who met in New York City on December 6. They were: former magazine editor Kurt Andersen, co-chairman of the Internet company Powerful Media; John Mack Carter, president, Hearst Magazines Enterprises; Elizabeth Crow, editor-in-chief, Mademoiselle; Gregory Curtis, editor, Texas Monthly; Marshall Loeb, columnist; Victor Navasky, director of the George T. Delacorte Center at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, and publisher and editorial director of The Nation; Daniel Okrent, editor-at-large, Time, Inc.; Rochelle Udell, senior vice president, brand development, The Limited, and former editor-in-chief of Self; and David Laventhol, publisher and editorial director, CJR. Panelist Margaret Talbot, senior fellow at the New America Foundation and former executive editor of The New Republic, could not attend; she submitted choices that were counted in the first round of balloting. Prior to the meeting, the jury had received more than a hundred names submitted by a larger nominating group representing a cross-section of the magazine business. The jury added several more names, followed by a discussion of all the potential candidates, before a vote was taken. Gregory Curtis left the room when his nomination was debated. The jury agreed that those selected should be the top editors at their publications. They also agreed that some consideration should be given to previous accomplishments at other magazines, but that current performance was the most important. Laventhol commented that "we were doing the millennium thing" and that it wasn't "a perfect process." But he said that by identifying peer judgments, we are providing useful benchmarks for the magazine business and for those who aspire to be the best. The quotations in the biographies are from comments made at the meeting. |
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