The Booker Prize long-list last week included Rita Bullwinkel’s novel Headshot, about a group of eight teenage female boxers. In the Guardian’s report, it described Bullwinkel as “the editor of hip US literary magazine McSweeney’s”. I don’t know Rita Bullwinkel, and I haven’t read her novel yet, although I have bought it, but I gave three cheers anyway: if I have ever been a member of a literary team, it is McSweeney’s.
My little book of essays Songbook - 31 Songs in the UK - was published (beautifully) by McSweeney’s in the US. I have written a column for the Believer, a McSweeney’s magazine, since 2003; I contributed a short story to McSweeney’s Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales, edited by Michael Chabon. Eli Horowitz and I edited a book of short fiction first printed in the magazine, The United States of McSweeney’s.
(Mine came complete with printed coffee-mug stain, illustrations by Marcel Dzarma and a CD.)
And for reasons I no longer recall, I was asked to write a letter to the quarterly magazine addressed to anyone, on any subject. I chose to congratulate Arsene Wenger on his decision to convert Kolo Toure into a centre-back, a switch that was triumphantly justified by an unbeaten season. I have no idea what they made of it, but they printed it anyway.
What struck me about that Guardian quote is its reference to hipness. Has any brand, if McSweeney’s is a brand, remained hip for over a quarter of a century? It’s hard to think of one. That’s not how hipness works. People can stay cool forever, but success, almost by definition, takes the shine off labels. It’s hard to attain the level of exclusion required when everyone is included. And anyway, the word doesn’t describe my experience of the whole idea of McSweeney’s.