“Interestingly, I’ve found The Rumpus a lot more compelling lately than the New York Times. I oscillate between really worrying about old, venerable print pubs and feeling like I don’t want to be part of attacking them and making them seem less relevant–I don’t genuinely want them to be utterly obsolete–and then just being really disgusted at the snark and laziness like what you illustrate above re: the attack on Saunders . . . I feel in some ways as though they’ve started doing exactly what people often accused online pubs of doing in terms of not really holding themselves to a more rigorous “gate-keeping” standard, and that by contrast many forums like The Rumpus, where people are writing so out of passion and dedication (not for money or for prestige or posturing), the intellectual (and more so, emotional/psychological) standards seem to actually be higher.”
— Gina Frangello is really really really nice to us in the comments section of Steve Almond’s reaction to the NYTBR’s review of his book.
What do you think? Are we really that awesome? Is Steve Almond right about the state of book reviews? Are print pubs weakening their standards to the point that online pubs are better? Take a moment and chime in.
