Welcome to Question Everything

Who? What? When? Where? Why?

Illustration by Gary Lieb

Welcome to Question Everything, the Substack newsletter. In this first post, I’d like to explain the origins and intention of this project, and maybe answer the question, Why is this guy who’s supposed to be quietly and anonymously editing other people’s work publishing a Substack newsletter?

First, a disclaimer: Question Everything is a personal work space, and is not in any way associated with my employer, The New York Times. I’ve undertaken it as part of a book leave that will extend into 2024. It also shares the title of the recent book of philosophical essays I co-edited with the philosopher Simon Critchley, but is not a promotional site for the book. It is a space unto itself that will feature new and original content, written or curated by yours truly.

Here are a few practical details: I’ll be posting at least once a week, and hopefully more. Yes, I think more. Also, subscription to Question Everything is free. Like most people, I like money, but my goal here is to first establish a space for writing and connecting with readers and I’d like to let it evolve organically. If you subscribe, you will have an opportunity to “pledge” — in Substack-speak that means you can express your willingness to support this project financially if I decide to accept payment in the future. For now, Question Everything will remain part of the “gift economy,” and I hope benefits will accrue to all involved. 

I am not famous, not even Substack-famous, but some people do know me as an editor at The New York Times, where I have worked for the past 25 years, and in particular as the founding editor of several Opinion projects, including the Times’ philosophy series The Stone, and Disability, a platform devoted to the work of authors with disabilities. Both of these projects resulted in robust essay collections published by Liveright. There were a lot of other series, too: Anxiety, Menagerie, Home Fires, The Score, and many, many splendid and wildly talented writers: Margaret Renkl, Simon Critchley, John Kaag, Tim Kreider, Oliver Sacks, Pico Iyer, Elliot Ackerman, E.O. Wilson, Phil Klay, Brian Turner, Lydia Millet, Bill Hayes, Arthur Danto, László Krasznahorkai (oh my, I can’t believe my good fortune, even now) and so many others from whom I’ve learned so much. If you are or were a reader of these series, or these writers, or otherwise familiar with my work as an editor, I can assure you that I’ll approach whatever I write or share here in the same spirit, and I hope to engage with some of the terrific and gifted authors in conversations or other formats.

My primary goal as an editor at The Times has been to nurture and promote personal accounts and literary and philosophical perspectives as part of the general diet of Opinion journalism, and more broadly to expand the boundaries of commentary beyond the traditional op-ed. Perhaps because of my temperament, or my beginnings as a fiction writer and poet, I wanted to make journalism that was literature. I leave the assessment of the success or failure of that work to others. What I can say with confidence is that my experience at the Times has been formative, rewarding and fulfilling beyond any expectation, and ultimately crucial to my personal, professional and even spiritual growth.

I frame my editing experience in these terms because, while work is in one sense business, it can also be vocation, and many of the writers I’ve edited have over time become not only creative collaborators, but friends. My life has become infinitely richer because of it. I know that I’ve been beyond fortunate to have such an opportunity, and that it could have only evolved this way at The Times, the paper that was born in the city I was born in, and that has been a part of my life in one way or another from the very beginning.

My association with the paper, and newspapers in general, goes back beyond that quarter century (My grandfather and father drove newspaper delivery trucks in New York City in the 1960s, and I was slinging copies of The NY Daily News at doorsteps in my Staten Island neighborhood in 1976). But journalism in the traditional sense has never been what has driven me out into the world. It has always, forever and ever — since my first Beatles’ 45 and my first Dr. Seuss book — been music, stories, poetry, paintings, photographs, films, all things beautiful, whether fixed or ephemeral, that have given my life joy purpose, excitement and meaning.

This year, I decided to take a temporary leave from my work as an editor to work on a book, but also to turn my attention to these foundational things, to pursue the beginnings of my own work as an author and public thinker apart from The Times. And I’m going to do at least some part of it here. I expect that the process of disengaging from the infinitely demanding precincts of the news media — and especially from the “paper of record,” with its looming importance and authority — to be messy and challenging. I am basically going out to play and relearning how to inhabit the space of my own curiosity without the standards, reputation and authoritative force of The Times behind me, and without any sort of map.

When I began my leave The Times this month I found that certain artistic, creative, aesthetic, social, spiritual and political impulses that I’d left unattended or held partly in check in order to do my work as an editor began to seek expression. My mind began unspooling. It began pouring out new thoughts, insights and inspirations faster than I could record them. Some were mundane or solipsistic, but some were promising and seemed to hold some value or meaning. Margaret Renkl, a contributing writer at The Times, who I’ve been working with for more than five years, predicted this phenomenon accurately when she assured me that “the mind is an iceberg” — an immense, mostly frozen thing that holds far more than we can fathom and that, given rest, freedom and time, will inevitably warm, loosen and flow. At least that’s what I think she meant.

Ultimately, I do believe that editing and writing, however seemingly split between individual parties and processes, exist on a single continuum, and I hope that this challenge — of writing, conversing and curating Question Everything — and the excitement and promise I feel in undertaking it with you will be part of the fun. 

Here’s some of what I plan to offer in Question Everything (with room for improvisation and revision):

± My own writing. Typically, reflections originating from my notebooks and journals. Rarely, if ever, will these be finished essays. Think Pensées or Minima Moralia, but less profound and more quotidian and conversational. I welcome comment or conversation in response. I may document the cultural, artistic, social and philosophical fertilization of my life and work: I tend to do this in brief responses to music, writing and art. Or I may share a nascent language experiment of my own, a few sentence I like, a draft of a poem, a photograph, perhaps even a touching artifact from my wayward youth.

± What I’m reading. This might be a confusing prospect. I tend to “read” like a raccoon going through a restaurant dumpster at night. I want everything in my brain at once, own too many books, am interested in too many publications and that has led to some erratic reading habits. Somehow, though, I do read, and what it is I am reading will almost always be reflected in my posts. I am unlikely to keep a list. I hope it will be apparent but if you have questions about this for me, please ask.

± Interviews or conversations with writers, artists and others who interest me. Part of what has made my work so rich and satisfying is the connection to hundreds of writers, artists, musicians, and others I’ve met, studied with or worked with. I’ll occasionally talk with them and share their insights about life and work, with their permission.

± Ask me things. I don’t consider myself an expert in anything, but I understand that my life and professional experience are unique and may be of interest to others. I invite questions about editing and writing or any associated topic, and will choose some to pursue. If I can provide a coherent answer I will. If not I’ll try to find someone who can and invite them in.

There may be more or less. This is a work in progress. The wild grasses have just begun to grow.