Spring 2025 Issue

In this issue, Bryan Burrough remembers the gilded age of Vanity Fair under Graydon Carter's reign—when the magazine was flush with cash and writers were paid unimaginable salaries. 

The great playwright Adrienne Kennedy reconstructs her girlhood rituals—and her mother’s quiet authority. Jonathan Lethem writes, for “Objects of Desire,” about the strange emotional weight of an inherited ashtray, and for “The Moment,” Isabella Hammad rereads Etel Adnan in the face of unspeakable tragedy.

A special folio on the state of reality brings together Sheila Heti, Jesse Damiani, Mona Oraby, Joanna Radin, and Abou Farman as they explore the limits of power, illusion, and the stories we tell ourselves.

Our criticism section features both Tiana Reid on what we demand from our literary icons and Jonathan Griffin on photorealism’s illusion of truth.

Elsewhere, Audrey Wollen asks: Is the handbag the key to understanding human evolution? And in a new short story written by Guadalupe Nettel and translated by Rosalind Harvey, the protagonist is haunted by the life they nearly lived.

Plus: Sasha Rudensky captures a Los Angeles in flux through a selection of photographs from her series Channel.

Last but not least: you'll find new poems by Zoey Brookshire, Dalia Taha (translated by Sara Elkamel), and Sam Bailey, along with much more.

Cover: Francesca Gabbiani, Mutation L, 2023. Courtesy the artist and Wilding Cran Gallery, Los Angeles.