An Upsetting Magazine Cover

I was shocked! Shocked! When I received my copy of the December 29, 2025 & January 5, 2026 issue of The New Yorker (see illustration). For as long as I can remember, New Yorker covers sported a narrow rectangle that served as the left border of the cover illustration. That rectangle was usually a solid color, though, on rare occasions, it included some sort of design.

I don’t know why that border exists, but I have always appreciated it. New Yorker covers are always attractive and interesting, and the border insures that the full cover illustration can be enjoyed by readers. In college, I took advantage of this fact to create a large collage of New Yorker covers from which I had excised the colored borders. I was upset when the magazine began pasting mailing labels on the cover, labels not easily removed and that detracted from the value of the cover as a decorative artifact.

I wrote to the magazine that another subscription of mine, Trains, mailed magazines using removable labels. I suggested that The New Yorker do the same. Only years later did the magazine begin employing such labels. My letter likely was not responsible for the change.

On the cover of the December 29, 2025 & January 5, 2026 issue, the illustration impinges on that ever-present border. Lorenzo Mattotti’s graphic “Goodbye to All That” would be damaged by cutting off the border. Rarely, and never recently—certainly not in my memory anyway—has the cover illustration impinged on that sacred border as it does on the cover of the current issue. For the benefit of future collage-makers in dorm rooms, I hope the current cover is an aberration. On the other hand, we live in a disorienting era, and one more innovation can contribute but a little to our already disturbed mental state.