TLDR: It’s Giving Tuesday and I’m asking for your help.
Every dollar funds new writers, new ideas, and work commercial publishers won’t touch. Help us keep completely independent, intellectually rigorous art and criticism alive.
To make a completely deductible donation to the Mars Review of Books Foundation, click the button below.
I’m also opening up a for-profit arts production corporation, The Aleph. If you’re an accredited investor or investment team and want to get in touch about that, just reply to this message.
Overview
When I began the Mars Review, my aim was to smash together the most interesting writing from online outsiders with the most stylish criticism from legacy magazine writers seeking out higher ground as publications seemed increasingly intent on scraping the bottom of the barrel in order to increase ad revenue and satisfy the new requirements of the clickbait economy. My thesis was that with the Mars Review I could create a new prestige magazine that could function like the New York Review of Books, but with a tech-forward sensibility and an openminded political persuasion that reflected the pandemic-era lack of trust in supposedly official sources of truth.
I’ve said the above statements so often I have by now pretty much memorized them. It’s a great pitch, a beautiful dream, and a worthy endeavor.
In important ways, the thesis was 100% wrong. The good news was that in trying to prove it right, I created something somewhat different from what I had intended, which turned out to be valuable indeed. Let’s talk about what happened.
The Past
I was a little naïve when I started the Review. I thought that, in general, quality of writing was the factor that determined either approbation or disapprobation from cultural gatekeepers. I found out early on after launching the Review that thousands of readers were excited about the idea of publishing outsider writing in elegant, careful prose; what I did not anticipate is that the majority of tastemakers were not.
It turns out that what is granted prestige is granted prestige largely for political reasons. (If you want to know the political reason, simply look at the nearly uniform political opinions of our major universities, biggest newspapers and magazines, and elite policy makers.) Quality may enter into the calculations when it comes to prestige—no one wants to admit a complete schlemiel to the cocktail party, after all—but it is hardly the major factor.
I can confidently say of good writing: “that and $7.75 will get you an oat mil iced latte.” If you have not only good writing, but also a real diversity of independent viewpoints, your oat milk iced latte becomes more expensive. What can I say? The heart wants what it wants, and so does the market.
So, the Mars Review never became an insider magazine. I would not have made a very good insider anyway.
What about the outsiders? The thing is, the outsiders are inclined to resist attempts to lump them in with writers who do play politics. They have their own pressures not to support anyone with any connections to an opposing camp. Even outsiders can be cliquey, although in general they’re much less likely to grind their gears over being near an opponent’s byline.
So ultimately the Mars Review didn’t become a consummate outsider magazine either. It was never primarily a political organ, and it’s hard to be a consummate outsider without being consummately political.
We’re neither insiders nor outsiders. What about being a solid book review? Well, the thing is, publishing just isn’t the industry it used to be. I don’t believe any review will take the place that the NYRB once had—because reviewing books simply isn’t as important for the culture as it was in the 1960s, and because the ease with which anyone can share a review decreases the importance of gatekeepers—a fact felt in all creative industries. I succeeded in making the MRB a great product; but it could never have been successful in the way I imagined. I was pattern-matching to an era that simply can’t be recreated.
The Present
I’ve seen a few different entities pop up that seem to have followed very close in the Mars Review’s footsteps. (And of course MRB was explicitly following very close in the NYRB’s footsteps). This has been, in some ways, heartening to see. It’s cool that other people care. It’s cool that there are still people who love books, and people who are excited to write and read. But this seems like a case where, to quote an eminent investor and theologian, competition is for losers. All of us are fighting for scraps of a pie that is getting smaller and smaller. And, although I respect many of the people doing so, it’s getting depressing to watch.
Part of what makes it depressing is that ultimately criticism, which should be the most dispassionate and objective of endeavors, becomes, in an arena of outsiders where the only judge of quality is likes and shares, a kind of clout-acquisitions game. A true intellectual is someone who can say what he or she pleases. Legacy publications suppress true intellectuals with a top-down approach. Outsider sometimes suppress the true intellectual tendency from the ground up: Popularity becomes the diktat.
And then there’s the attendant, especially stomach-churning game of people hiding their political beliefs to be prestige, or having just spicy enough beliefs to get attention but not spicy enough to alienate the prestige world. Meanwhile, a largely pseudonymous intelligentsia on X.com continues to hold the most water when it comes to accurately and fearlessly describing the things of the world—but the incentive structure on X is so mangled that the need for ever hotter takes, ad hominem attacks, and constant vigilance over the news cycle degrades all but the steeliest minds. I should make it clear that I am not absolved from any of the faults mentioned above; I’m just trying to give an accurate rendering of the landscape.
The Future
So we found it’s not possible to repeat the past. What can be done? I think that quality cultural productions in the future will necessarily have to be small and insular. I also think that criticism alone isn’t going to do the job. I’m becoming more and more convinced that art really is the transcendently important thing in the modern world. This was once a matter of faith among the aesthetically minded, although of late it has become something many find risible. In any case, the Mars Review will lean into the production of art, while continuing reviewing, podcasting, and the like. We have a great review of If Anyone Builds it, Everyone Dies coming up, as well as the new episode of the Mars Review podcast, with
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I don’t want to reproduce any mainstream outlet, but to provide a lifeboat for myself and others who don’t want to live in the land of slop. The for-profit wing of this project will be The Aleph—more on this soon. If you’re an accredited investor and wish to be in touch about that, please shoot over an email.
We’re doing great as is. But really, for this project to work, we need generous people who care deeply, and that’s why I’m asking to you to give on this Giving Tuesday. As with the monasteries of yore, a handful of enlightened and generous individuals is all take takes to preserve items of limitless value, and I happen to believe such individuals exist.
And thank you to all readers and to everyone who has contributed to the MRB along the way!