Book Review: “World Without Mind”
T he 2014 party celebrating the hundredth anniversary of the New Republic might well be described as the day that progressive East Coast intellectuals and the new Silicon Valley elite officially broke up.
Before the party, the magazine was living proof that, despite their differences, the two got along on some deeper level. Just two years earlier, Chris Hughes — a Facebook founder, but one with a reassuringly old-school disposition — had used some fraction of his billions to buy the magazine. He was running it the old way, under its traditionalist editor Franklin Foer ’96CC and its even more traditionalist literary editor Leon Wieseltier ’74CC. The union of Facebook money and New Republic values seemed the deliverance of a kind of utopia: the wild success of the tech industry would keep our cultural boats afloat, leaving us a world with the convenience of Amazon Prime and the edification of our cherished magazines, newspapers, and books.
For a slightly floundering magazine, long unprofitable, the event was surprisingly sumptuous. Held in downtown Washington in a massive marble hall adorned with Corinthian columns and red-velvet curtains, it was almost like a state dinner. Notables of the press and the political elite came to pay their homage, including Bill Clinton, the keynote speaker.
