When the Going Was Good: An Editor's Adventures During the Last Golden Age of Magazines

“In those days, you didn’t announce news with a tweet. You released it in successive waves to selected press outlets. Or you released it all at once and wide to the wire services, newspapers, and television news divisions. Which is what we did with our Deep Throat story.”

Carter’s remarks on his editorial work at the time of the Deep Throat Story introduce his explorations of The Evolution of Print Journalism in the Digital Era. Although Carter has been an editor for decades, in the earlier stages of his career he was working in a more analogue world. He uses the second person point of view in this passage to affect a pedagogical tone—he is informing his reader about the journalism world in the era he was working. A passage like this one offers historical and cultural background for the events Carter is recounting.

“I played organized hockey until I was about thirteen. There were no helmets or mouthguards then—no protection at all above the collarbone. […] Everyone I knew who played in their later teens was missing at least a few teeth. And something in the back of my mind told me that, whatever I was going to be doing in life, a complete set of teeth would be part of what I needed to get ahead.”

Carter offers a humorous anecdote from his child to affect a lighthearted mood. He is describing his childhood in vivid detail, inviting the reader into the textures of his Canadian upbringing. The references to lost teeth in turn beget Carter’s remarks on his future in a more “well-to-do” world. Carter didn’t know what he wanted to be at this point in his life, but he suggests that he wanted to be in a different social tier and environment than the one he experienced during adolescence.

“It was then that I resolved, whatever I did, I was done with showering at the end of the week rather than the beginning of the day. It was time to get on with the life I envisioned for myself. I wasn’t completely sure what that was going to be. But I knew one thing: I wanted to be on the other side of that window.”

Carter identifies his time working on the Canadian Railway as a turning point in his young adult life. He depicts a vivid image of a couple sitting on a train, with him standing on the rails watching them pass. This image offers the reader insight into Carter’s point of view at the time; it also captures the life that Carter “envisioned for himself.” Such experiences, Carter holds, were fleeting but helped him conceptualize his future.

“There were no computers. Layouts were done by hand using a waxer to glue sheets of type conto layout boards. Color printing was expensive, and so aside from the cover, almost all the images inside were black and white. Nobody really knew what they were doing.”

Carter’s descriptions of his work with The Canadian Review capture the Evolution of Print Journalism in the Digital Era. When Carter first entered the world of journalism, everything from layout to printing to distribution was “done by hand.” This journalistic style starkly contrasts with contemporary journalism, which is primarily done digitally and online. Carter is thus establishing this contrast and reiterating how little he knew and how much he was learning at the start of his career.

“Writers lived in Greenwich Village and the Upper West Side, about the only places they could afford. There were bodegas and head shops on almost every block. And the city was filthy and sweltering. I can’t recall when I had ever been so happy.”

Carter’s descriptions of New York in the late 1970s and early 1980s affect a vibrant, yet melancholic mood. Carter is inviting the reader into the city during this era and remarking upon his unique connection with the place. Despite the negative aspects of city life at the time, Carter was “so happy.” His contentment reiterates Carter’s adolescent belief that New York was where he had to go to realize his dreams.

“It was like moving high schools—but going from one with a championship football team and cheerleaders to one with a volleyball squad and an AV club. In distance, my new office was a few hundred feet from my old one, but in terms of the energy and intellectual spark that had surrounded me at Time, it was a world away.”

Carter uses a metaphor to capture the culture shock he experienced when shifting from Time to Life. He compares this transition to the experience of “moving high schools,” a metaphor which evokes notions of displacement, disorientation, and confusion. Carter thus felt like an out-of-place teenager despite how close he was to his old office. the passage grants the reader access to Carter’s interiority at the time; his vulnerability humanizes him in turn.

“In late 1985, out of that sense of desperation, I rekindled an idea that I had been kicking around for a few years—a satirical monthly about New York. But this time, I believed that I had a fair grounding in the ways the city operated. I was attuned to the social and business circus acts that made regular appearances in the local gossip and business columns. And alone among my friends, I had actually edited a magazine before.”

Carter’s reflections on his work to launch Spy capture his determination and imagination. Carter hadn’t been in New York for that long in 1985, but he still valued the lessons he’d learned from city and publishing life thus far. This passage affects a confident, assured tone, which mirrors Carter’s headspace at the time. He was still new to the industry, but was able to own the experience and insight he did have.

“It was about as close to a marriage as you can get without the touching or taking out the garbage. I wish I could remember a serious disagreement—just for dramatics’ sake—but I can’t. Well, there was a heated discussion with Joanne Gruber […] over the words careered and careened. But that was about it.”

Carter uses vivid language and imagery to convey the distinct nature of the Spy team’s relationship. He likens their dynamic to that of “a marriage” to evoke notions of connection and intimacy. He also affects a retrospective stance—actively mining his memory for “a serious disagreement”—and acknowledges his writerly desire to incorporate conflict into his story for the sake of “dramatics.” However he also avoids dramatizing this particular dynamic because he wants to represent the Spy family’s relationship accurately.

“Vanity Fair was an exponentially bigger operation than Spy, and unlike Spy, I hadn’t created the magazine, and I was by myself without Kurt. Talent-wise, going from The Observer to Vanity Fair was like going from managing a boy band like One Direction to managing the Metropolitan Opera. The industry was ridiculing me. The New York establishment, so long coddled by Vanity Fair, was in something of a panic.”

Carter uses descriptive language, compare-and-contrast, and metaphors to convey his discomfort upon starting at Vanity Fair. He likens this transition to managing different musical operations (a metaphor which calls upon the zeitgeist and thus reifies his experience to the reader). He also compares Vanity Fair directly to Spy to enact The Entanglement of Success, Celebrity, and Power. Vanity Fair offered a foray into a more esteemed world, whereas Spy was Carter’s way of commenting upon this world.

“[Barry Diller] greeted me with generosity as well as a simmering layer of mistrust. I so appreciated the first part of that last sentence. And completely understood the reasoning behind the second part. In so many circles, Barry and Diane’s friendship validated me.”

Carter affects a reflective tone to capture the importance of his interpersonal relationships to his vocational success. He is underscoring the importance of the connections he made, and thus attributing much of his progress to the help of others. Diction like “generosity,” “simmering,” “so,” “completely,” and “validated” affects a sincere and appreciative tone.

“I also had to make the culture less poisonous—because poisonous it most surely was. You feel the venom in the corridors. Changing this certainly wasn’t easy, but gradually, Chris and Aimée and I tried to soften the office atmosphere.”

Carter uses descriptive language to capture the challenges he faced in transforming the Vanity Fair culture. He uses words like “poisonous” and “venom” to vivify the hostile work environment, and thus his devotion to “softening the office atmosphere.” He also alludes to his colleagues Chris and Aimée, reminding the reader that Carter owes much of his success to his relationships.

“Writing is a tough business—especially the sort of detailed, rigorous, long-form narrative journalism that Vanity Fair came to be known for. And this sort of reportage has its own unique set of demands. Vanity Fair writers were sent to the far corners of the earth to report. They would leave their families for weeks or months at a time and return home and on deadline had to assemble all the reporting and write a good tale—almost like a condensed book.”

Carter’s remarks on the difficulties of the writing process cast him in a positive, sympathetic light. While Carter was the editor-in-chief of one of the largest monthly magazines in New York, Carter didn’t fancy himself superior to the writers he employed. In this passage, he is detailing the efforts they made and the challenges of their work. Giving space to the writers in his memoir reiterates Carter’s understanding nature.

“I was a pretty wobbly steward of Vanity Fair during my early years at the magazine. But if Si had doubts about my abilities—and he had ample reason to worry—he never showed them. He instinctively knew that there is no guidebook to being an editor. It’s one of the few big jobs in the world for which there is no course instruction.”

Carter remarks on his anxiety and self-doubt to further humanize himself. Although Si Newhouse personally chose him to be the editor-in-chief of Vanity Fair, Carter constantly worried about letting Si down. In acknowledging his shortcomings, Carter is affecting humility. At the same time, he is underscoring the importance of his and Si’s relationship to his personal success.

“A monthly magazine had to carve out its corner of the culture. And Vanity Fair, like Esquire and The New Yorker, was a general-interest magazine, and so, unlike the case with special-interest titles like Field & Stream or Car and Driver, everything was, in a way, a potential subject.”

Carter’s descriptions of Vanity Fair convey The Media’s Impact on the Political and Cultural Narrative. Carter didn’t take Vanity Fair’s place in the New York magazine world lightly. Rather, he believed that the publication had more potential reach because it was a monthly and because it was “a general-interest magazine.” Over time, Carter would learn to use these classifications to expand the publication’s coverage and widen its readership.

“You’re only as good as your assistant, and to be an assistant at Vanity Fair required specific skills. Aimée Bell had changed my life at Spy. She was phenomenal and made me realize what a difference a good one can make.”

Carter uses complimentary language to underscore the importance of his and Aimée Bell’s relationship. He insists that she “changed his life” and opened his mind to the importance of assistant roles. This laudatory passage reiterates Carter’s overarching notion that personal relationships are important to the individual’s success.

“It never fails to amaze me how Hollywood so often turns its back on its own history. It took outsiders—us—to remind Hollywood of its storied history.”

Carter assumes a reflective stance amidst his descriptions of the Vanity Fair Oscars party. He set out to launch the party because he saw a need in Hollywood. In time, he and his team reminded Hollywood of its roots and brought glamour back to the industry. This work is just one example of the Media’s Impact on the Political and Cultural Narrative.

“All an editor has, really, is confidence in his or her own judgment and taste, and as I’ve said, a lot of that comes from the proprietor. Looking back now, I can see that my escape from my perceived troubles came from two suggestions—one from my longtime friend David Halberstam and the other from Si himself.”

In this reflective passage, Carter both acknowledges his successes and his mentors’ guidance. He is owning his own “confidence,” “judgment,” and “taste” while giving credit to influential figures in his life including David Halberstam and Si. By pairing these self-accolades with these personal relationships, Carter reiterates the notion that the individual must both believe in herself and ask for help if she wants to succeed.

“Many years after Trump’s appearance as our novelty guest at the White House correspondents; dinner, he returned to the Hilton […] I was at the table next to Lally’s and watched Trump seethe as he was mercilessly and cleverly ridiculed, first by the comedian for the night, Seth Meyers, and then by Obama. It was there and then, it is said, that Trump decided to extract his revenge by claiming the White House for himself.”

Carter incorporates a Donald Trump anecdote to reiterate the Media’s impact on the Political and Cultural Narrative. He is describing one of his many encounters with Trump, and identifying this encounter as a key part of Trump’s trajectory towards power and control. Carter is thus claiming that he (via Spy and Vanity Fair) played an important role in America’s understanding of Trump and Trump’s self-regard.

“I do think people got the wrong impression of me with regard to going out at night. The truth is, I delineated my life pretty firmly. Daytime was for work and nighttime was for family. Once I had gotten my feet under my desk at Vanity Fair, I generally peeled out of the office at 5: 00 or 5: 30 in the afternoon so that I could be at home with my kids.”

Carter turns his attention away from his career and onto his family to correct any misunderstandings about his personal life. He is identifying a myth about himself and reclaiming the narrative. The passage has a somewhat defensive tone, in that Carter is trying to cast himself as a traditional “family man” instead of a career bigwig who spent his time “going out at night.” (This defensiveness arises from Carter’s attention to detail—citing the exact times he would leave the office each night and describing his family routine in detail.)

“When it broadcast, 9/11 got almost Super Bowl—sized ratings. It also won a Peabody Award and an Emmy. I’m not much for awards ceremonies, so on the day of the Emmys I skipped the event […] When I returned to the hotel, the man at the front desk […] gave me a note letting me know that I had just won an Emmy.”

Carter’s reflections on his documentary work reiterate the Media’s Impact on the Political and Cultural Narrative. Carter stumbled upon documentary work but his 9/11 film quickly received attention and acclaim. The popularity of his 9/11 documentary (which detailed the September 11, 2001 al-Qaeda attacks on the Twin Towers) underscores Carter’s social, cultural, and political impact.

“Successful magazines have to be able to turn the corner when the world experiences a seismic shift. The early Vanity Fair— founded in 1913 and thereafter the monthly bible of the international smart set—failed to take the rise of fascism in Europe seriously. By the mid-1930s, it seemed hopelessly out of touch, and in 1936, Condé Nast was forced to close it.”

Carter’s reflections on his work to remake Vanity Fair capture the Evolution of Print Journalism in the Digital Era and reiterate the Media’s Impact on the Political and Cultural Narrative. Carter is arguing that Vanity Fair had to change because the culture was changing. The magazine needed to reinvent itself to correct its fraught history, and needed to “turn the corner” to keep up with technological shifts.

“Too many websites that I had looked at were visual nightmares, with ads moving along at the top and bottom and on the sides. I wanted as pure a reading experience as is possible in the digital world. And I wanted the advertising to be as beautiful as what we had in mind for Air Mail itself.”

Carter describes his thought process behind Air Mail, inviting the reader once more into his private, creative process. Carter describes his reasons for structuring the online journal in this distinct manner—reasoning which conveys his innovation and vision. The passage also underscores Carter’s ability to evolve with the publishing industry—particularly in accordance with technological and digital advancements.

“Some mornings I just wish I had properly retired, moved to Florida, become a Republican, and worked on my golf game. But then I lie down, let the moment pass, and get on with the life I have chosen and the life I love.”

Carter affects a vulnerable tone as he reflects on his long career in journalism. Although he admits that he at times regrets the path he took, he also acknowledges how much he loves the life he has created for himself. His references to Florida, being a Republican, and playing golf also affect a humorous tone as Carter anticipates closing out his memoir.