The New Yorker

The New Yorker is an American magazine known for its journalism, stories, and fun drawings. It started on February 21, 1925, by Harold Ross and his wife Jane Grant, along with a friend named Raoul H. Fleischmann. Their first office was in Manhattan. Harold Ross was the editor until 1951 and helped make the magazine famous for checking facts very carefully.

Even though many of its reviews were about things happening in New York City, The New Yorker became popular across the United States and around the world. It shared serious essays, long articles, great stories, and funny jokes. Famous writers like Truman Capote, Vladimir Nabokov, and Alice Munro have shared their work in the magazine.

The New Yorker comes out 47 times each year, with some issues covering two weeks. It is famous for its beautiful covers, like View of the World from 9th Avenue, and for writing about American culture, politics, and social life. The magazine also includes short stories, reviews, and single pictures called cartoons in every issue. It has won many awards, including eleven Pulitzer Prizes since 2014. Today, The New Yorker is led by editor David Remnick and continues to grow online while still printing magazines.

Overview and history

The New Yorker started on February 21, 1925, created by Harold Ross and his wife Jane Grant, who worked for the New York Times. Ross wanted a magazine with clever jokes and stories, different from other funny magazines at the time. He worked with Raoul H. Fleischmann to start the magazine, and its first office was in Manhattan.

The New Yorker became famous for its stories, articles, and fun pieces. It published works by many well-known writers and featured essays on many different topics. The magazine is also known for its special sections, like profiles of famous people and updates about events in New York City.

The magazine has kept many of its traditions over the years, such as its style and layout. It has been led by several editors, including William Shawn, Robert Gottlieb, Tina Brown, and currently David Remnick.

Influence and significance

The New Yorker inspired other magazines and helped many people enjoy modern writing. It has been praised for its unique style and way of telling stories.

United States presidential election endorsements

In 2004, the magazine endorsed a presidential candidate for the first time, supporting John Kerry over George W. Bush.

Cartoons

The New Yorker has included funny pictures, called cartoons, since it started in 1925. These pictures often tell a short joke or story with a drawing and a few words. Many famous artists have created cartoons for the magazine, adding humor and fun to its pages.

Some of these cartoons have become very well-known. One famous cartoon from 1928 shows a mother telling her daughter about broccoli, and the daughter replies with a funny answer. Another well-known cartoon shows two dogs using a computer, with one saying something funny about the internet. The magazine also holds a contest where readers can suggest funny words to add to a picture, and the best one wins.

Crosswords and puzzles

In April 2018, The New Yorker started a crossword puzzle series with a weekday crossword published every Monday. Later, it added a weekend crossword on Fridays and brought back cryptic puzzles from the late 1990s. In June 2021, new cryptics began appearing weekly. In July 2021, The New Yorker introduced Name Drop, a trivia game posted online weekdays. By March 2022, the magazine began publishing online crosswords every weekday, with puzzles getting easier from Monday to Thursday and themed puzzles on Fridays. The puzzles are created by a group of 13 different writers and often include cartoons as part of the fun. The Christmas 2019 issue had a special crossword by Patrick Berry where the answers were captions for cartoons. In December 2019, Liz Maynes-Aminzade became The New Yorker's first puzzles and games editor.

Eustace Tilley

Main article: Eustace Tilley

The first cover of the magazine showed a stylish man looking at a butterfly through a monocle. This picture was drawn by Rea Irvin, the magazine's first art editor. The man on the cover, named Eustace Tilley, was based on an old drawing of a nobleman. Corey Ford created Eustace Tilley just for The New Yorker. Eustace wore a top hat, a fancy coat, and striped pants. The character became a symbol of the magazine and often appears in its pages and promotions. Every year near February 21, the original cover picture is used again, though sometimes a new version is drawn instead.

Covers

The magazine is known for its illustrated covers, which often feature timely topics. As of 2025, only two covers have used photography.

"View of the World" cover

Main article: View of the World from 9th Avenue

Saul Steinberg created many covers for the magazine. His most famous is the cover from March 29, 1976, called "View of the World from 9th Avenue." It shows the world as seen by people in New York City. The bottom half shows Manhattan’s 9th Avenue, while the top half shows the rest of the world. The rest of the U.S. is small, shown as just a few blocks near New York, with names of cities and states scattered around. The illustration inspired many similar works.

9/11

Hired by Tina Brown in 1992, Art Spiegelman worked for The New Yorker for ten years but left after the September 11 attacks. He and Françoise Mouly created a famous cover for the issue of September 24, 2001. The cover appears completely black but, when looked at closely or tilted toward a light, shows the silhouettes of the World Trade Center towers. This powerful image reflected the feelings of many at the time.

"New Yorkistan"

Main article: New Yorkistan

In December 2001, the magazine featured a cover by Maira Kalman and Rick Meyerowitz showing a map of New York with neighborhood names changed to sound like places in the Middle East or Central Asia. This cover became popular and was often printed as a poster.

Controversial covers

Crown Heights in 1993

For the 1993 Valentine’s Day issue, a cover showed a black woman and a Jewish man kissing, referencing past tensions between the two groups. Some people from both communities criticized the cover.

2008 Obama cover satire and controversy

On July 21, 2008, a cover showed a cartoon of Barack Obama and his wife in a way that played on misunderstandings some people had about Obama. Many readers saw it as a satire of those misunderstandings, but others thought it was unfair. The magazine’s editor said it was meant to highlight and make fun of those misunderstandings.

2013 Bert and Ernie cover

On July 8, 2013, the magazine featured a cover with characters Bert and Ernie from Sesame Street watching television. Some people thought this was a comment on marriage equality, but the creators of Sesame Street said Bert and Ernie are just puppets with no romantic feelings.

2023 "Race for Office" cover

The cover from October 2, 2023, showed older politicians running for office with walkers. Some people thought this made fun of older people, while others saw it as a satire of questions about the age of politicians.

Style

The New Yorker uses a special font called Irvin for its title and headlines. This font is named after the artist who created it, Rea Irvin. The main text in all articles is written in a font called Adobe Caslon.

The magazine has some unique ways of writing. It adds special marks above repeating vowel letters, like in words such as reëlected and coöperate. It also uses a few older spellings that are not common in American English, such as fuelled and traveller.

The New Yorker also writes out numbers in words, like saying "two million three hundred thousand dollars" instead of using the symbol "$2.3 million", even for very large amounts.

Fact-checking

In 1927, The New Yorker published an article about Edna St. Vincent Millay that had several mistakes. This led the magazine to create careful fact-checking steps, which became famous by the 1940s. By 2025, around 30 people worked just on checking facts for the magazine.

The magazine has faced legal challenges over its stories. In 1983, writer Janet Malcolm wrote about Sigmund Freud, and another writer, Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson, claimed false quotes were used. After many years in court, the decision went in favor of the magazine. Later, in 2010, David Grann wrote about an art expert named Peter Paul Biro, and Biro disagreed with what was written. However, the court did not support Biro’s case.

Readership

A study from 2009 found that the average reader of The New Yorker was about 48 years old and had a household income of around $91,000. During that time, the average household income in the United States was about $59,000.

Readers of the magazine usually have liberal political views. A 2014 survey showed that 77% of The New Yorker’s readers had left-of-center political values, with 52% holding what were called “consistently liberal” views.

List of books about The New Yorker

Here is a list of books that talk about The New Yorker:

• Ross and The New Yorker by Dale Kramer (1951)
• The Years with Ross by James Thurber (1959)
• Ross, The New Yorker and Me by Jane Grant (1968)
• Here at The New Yorker by Brendan Gill (1975)
• About the New Yorker and Me by E.J. Kahn (1979)
• Onward and Upward: A Biography of Katharine S. White by Linda H. Davis (1987)
• At Seventy: More about The New Yorker and Me by E. J. Kahn (1988)
• Katharine and E. B. White: An Affectionate Memoir by Isabel Russell (1988)
• The Last Days of The New Yorker by Gigi Mahon (1989)
• The Smart Magazines: Fifty Years of Literary Revelry and High Jinks at Vanity Fair, the New Yorker, Life, Esquire, and the Smart Set by George H. Douglas (1991)
• Genius in Disguise: Harold Ross of the New Yorker by Thomas Kunkel (1997)
• Here But Not Here: My Life with William Shawn and The New Yorker by Lillian Ross (1998)
• Remembering Mr. Shawn's New Yorker: The Invisible Art of Editing by Ved Mehta (1998)
• Some Times in America: And a Life in a Year at The New Yorker by Alexander Chancellor (1999)
• The World Through a Monocle: The New Yorker at Midcentury by Mary F. Corey (1999)
• About Town: The New Yorker and the World It Made by Ben Yagoda (2000)
• Covering the New Yorker: Cutting-Edge Covers from a Literary Institution by Françoise Mouly (2000)
• Defining New Yorker Humor by Judith Yaross Lee (2000)
• Gone: The Last Days of The New Yorker, by Renata Adler (2000)
• Letters from the Editor: The New Yorker's Harold Ross edited by Thomas Kunkel (2000; letters covering the years 1917 to 1951)
• New Yorker Profiles 1925–1992: A Bibliography compiled by Gail Shivel (2000)
• NoBrow: The Culture of Marketing – the Marketing of Culture by John Seabrook (2000)
• Fierce Pajamas: An Anthology of Humor Writing from The New Yorker by David Remnick and Henry Finder (2002)
• Christmas at The New Yorker: Stories, Poems, Humor, and Art (2003)
• A Life of Privilege, Mostly by Gardner Botsford (2003)
• Maeve Brennan: Homesick at The New Yorker by Angela Bourke (2004)
• Better than Sane by Alison Rose(2004)
• Let Me Finish by Roger Angell (Harcourt, 2006)
• The Receptionist: An Education at The New Yorker by Janet Groth (2012)
• My Mistake: A Memoir by Daniel Menaker (2013)
• Between You & Me: Confessions of a Comma Queen by Mary Norris (2015)
• Cast of Characters: Wolcott Gibbs, E. B. White, James Thurber and the Golden Age of The New Yorker by Thomas Vinciguerra (2015)
• Peter Arno: The Mad, Mad World of The New Yorker's Greatest Cartoonist by Michael Maslin (2016)
• Irish Writers and The New Yorker in the Mid-Twentieth Century by Yen-Chi Wu (2026)

The New Yorker in film

The New Yorker and its history have inspired many films, and many of its stories have been turned into movies. The New Yorker also shares short films in its Screening Room series, which often try to win Academy Awards.

In the film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle, the actor Sam Robards plays Harold Ross, the founding editor of The New Yorker, trying to get support for his new magazine. The former editor, William Shawn, appears in films like Capote, Infamous, and Hannah Arendt.

A documentary from 2015 called Very Semi-Serious, made by Leah Wolchok, shows a look inside The New Yorker's cartoon world.

Some films inspired by The New Yorker include:

• Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994)
• James Thurber: The Life and Hard Times (2000)
• Joe Gould's Secret (2000)
• Top Hat and Tales: Harold Ross and the Making of the New Yorker (2001)
• Very Semi-Serious (2015)
• The New Yorker at 100 (2025), a documentary about the magazine's 100th year
• Wes Anderson's The French Dispatch (2021), which copies the style of The New Yorker.

Many famous films started as stories in The New Yorker, such as Brokeback Mountain (2005), The Hours (2002), and Adaptation (2002).