We have to hand it to the (mostly) boys over at n+1: They're possessed of a self-assuredness the likes of which is all too rare in this self-deprecating age. Indeed, upon reading their press release for their forthcoming issue, we are incredibly grateful that they have granted us the privilege of reading their magazine. In fact, they must know how excited we are for the magazine, because they've invited us, the press, to help them unload the truck of magazines that will be arriving at their office tomorrow evening! We must admit to being flattered, and honored, at being allowed to touch the magazines as they descend from the truck, to be the first to caress the cover of issue 5 (theme: "Decivilizing Process") and perhaps even thumb through its pages. We've reprinted the entire press release after the jump, should you care to share in this touching ritual.

From: "Keith Gessen"
Subject: n+1 issue 5 trucking, shipping, unloading

Dear friends in the media and near-media,

I'm proud to announce that n+1 Issue 5 is finally coming. And it's heavy. We're driving to our printer in Pennsylvania on Thursday and coming back with an enormous truck-load of n+1s. If you are a particularly fit and strong media friend, please come by the office—195 Chrystie St, just below Stanton—any time between around 9:30 and 11 pm, to pick up your press copy and also help us unload the truck. Or you can just watch, I guess. Call me at [redacted] if you have questions. (Failing that, [redacted]—that's the office phone.) If you've ever wanted to see boxes of an intellectual magazine thrown off the back of a truck as if they were stolen tv sets—well, this is it.

The official launch is February 24th—by then we'll have gotten it out to bookstores, and we'll throw a big party. More on that when we have a party space.

As for the issue itself, it's a strong issue. The Intellectual Situation is back, and it's the most generally accessible one to date—that is, it's less about literary culture and more about day-to-day life and technology (in other words, email, cell phones, blogs, and porn). It kind of opens out from those things into a general condemnation of everything on the planet. I think people will like it. Following that, a pretty great story about nuclear proliferation in North Korea; a very moving memoir about Kashmir, the militancy, and torture by a young man named Basharat Peer, who's in New York this year on a journalism fellowship—he's also the first-ever Kashmiri memoirist, and a very interesting person. There's an essay by a Tufts philosophy professor on pornography, a short story by Benjamin Kunkel on man's being a spider to man, a great piece about watching television in Milwaukee by Eli Evans (also an interesting person), and Mark Greif with the second installment of "The Meaning of Life." Also a piece on American torture of terror suspects, and Meghan Falvey on post-feminism, so-called, Carla Blumenkranz's fiction chronicle (ouch), and Dan Albert, our car expert, on flying cars.

The name of the issue is Decivilizing Process. That's where we're at.

Media copies—I'll try to send these out in a timely fashion but if you didn't get an issue 4, and want an issue 5, please write me here and I'll make sure they get into the mailing. This means folks won't get them until pretty late next week, or even the Monday after that—so, really, Thursday is the day.

Also, while I'm at it, may I recommend this?
www.nplusonemag.com/payless.html [Why yes, you may.—Ed.]

Heh-heh.

Best,
Keith

Earlier: n+1 Makes Us Nostalgic For College, Caring About Stuff