The New Yorker - 10.08.2026.pdf

价格 $10.99 2026年8月10日 # 《纽约客》

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# 《纽约客》 2026年8月10日 4 活动指南 7 城市谈资 Amy Davidson Sorkin 评安东尼·福奇的听证会；昨日新闻；丹·萨利文之赛；顺其自然；埃里克·韦尔海姆的怪异植物。 我们的远方通讯员 Alexis Okeowo 12 为了赎金 揭秘尼日利亚的绑架危机。 喧嚣与低语 Larry Doyle 17 头条 愚蠢 洋葱编辑 被拒 美国日志 Paige Williams 18 砰！ 对于格鲁奇家族来说，烟花是家族事业。 北京来信 埃文·奥斯诺斯 26 中国制造的未来 美国是否正在输掉这场创新竞赛？ 美国纪事 Kai Bird 38 导师 与 Susan Goldmark 探讨罗伊·科恩教会了唐纳德·特朗普什么。 小说 Rachel Yoder 48 “承诺” 评论 书籍 Anthony Lane 54 Kate McLoughlin 的《沉默：一部文学史》。 57 简评 Katy Waldman 59 雅克琳·哈普曼意想不到的死后世界。 艺术界 Zachary Fine 62 费尔菲尔德·波特的情感调色盘。 电视评论 Inkoo Kang 64 Elizabeth Meriwether 的《愤怒》。 当代电影 Richard Brody 66 《迷雾营地的青少年、性与死亡》。 诗歌 Jan Wagner 32 “黄蜂” Megan Fernandes 50 “跨行” 封面 Eric Drooker “外部艺术” 插画 Bruce Eric Kaplan, P. C. Vey, Sam Gross, David McCaw, Matilda Borgström, Juan Astasio, David Rey, Drew Dernavich, Ellis Rosen, Guy Richards Smit, Will McPhail, Roz Chast, Jon Adams, Jared Nangle, Hilary Fitzgerald Campbell 专栏 Matt Willey --- # 《纽约客》 活动指南时事通讯

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撰稿人

Kai Bird（《导师》，第 38 页）是《美国恶棍：罗伊·科恩从乔·麦卡锡到唐纳德·特朗普的黑暗旅程》的合著者，以及 J·罗伯特·奥本海默传记《美国普罗米修斯》的合著者。Alexis Okeowo（《为了赎金》，第 12 页）是一位特约撰稿人，报道冲突、人权和文化。她最近的一本书是《祝福与灾难：一个关于阿拉巴马州的故事》。Rachel Yoder（小说，第 48 页）是小说《Nightbitch》的作者。Larry Doyle（喧嚣与低语，第 17 页）是《我爱你，贝丝·库珀》的作者，该书获得了瑟伯美国幽默奖。Eric Drooker（封面）是一位图形小说家，其作品包括《洪水！》和最近被美国国会图书馆收藏的《裸城》。Anthony Lane（书籍，第 54 页）是一位职员撰稿人，是《没人是完美的：《纽约客》文集》的作者。埃文·奥斯诺斯（《中国制造的未来》，第 26 页）是一位报道政治和外交事务的职员撰稿人。他的著作包括获得美国国家图书奖的《野心时代：在新中国追逐财富、真理与信仰》。Susan Goldmark（《导师》，第 38 页）是一位研究员，也是《美国恶棍》的合著者。Paige Williams（《砰！》，第 18 页）是一位职员撰稿人，是《恐龙艺术家》的作者，并获得了国家杂志奖的特写写作奖。Jon Allsop（城市谈资，第 9 页）是本杂志的特约撰稿人，以及《新闻业是为了什么？》的作者。Megan Fernandes（诗歌，第 50 页）最近出版了诗集《我听从所有指令》和《好男孩》。Inkoo Kang（电视评论，第 64 页）是一位职员撰稿人，自 2022 年起担任《纽约客》的电视评论员。

《纽约客》访谈

安东尼奥·班德拉斯谈艺术、衰老与教皇 作者：Helen Rosner

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活动指南

2026年8月5日 – 11日

本周我们关注、聆听和参与的活动。

在百老汇首演近三十年后，温迪·瓦瑟斯坦的《一个美国女儿》由 La Femme Theatre Productions 剧团重新搬上舞台。这部剧部分灵感来自 1993 年佐伊·贝尔德和金巴·伍德被提名司法部长但最终失败的事件——讲述了一位出身名门的公共卫生专家（Jean Lichty 饰），在她的丈夫在电视上随口承认她从未响应过陪审团传唤后，她的卫生部长提名被搅黄，从而引发了一场关于她是否适合公民生活的全国性公投。早在社交媒体加速公众围攻之前，瓦瑟斯坦就意识到，一个成就卓著的女性的履历是如何迅速被重新定义为一份对其人格的起诉书的。——Rhoda Feng（佩尔辛广场签名中心；目前处于预演阶段，8月11日正式开演。）

城市动态

电影 / 埃布拉希姆·戈莱斯坦（Ebrahim Golestan）1965年的戏剧作品《砖与镜》（Brick and Mirror）被广泛认为是伊朗新浪潮的首部故事片。该片将一个局部问题——一名德黑兰出租车司机在后座发现一名被遗弃的婴儿——转化为一幅繁杂的城市生活全景图。司机将婴儿带到在夜总会聚会的友人们那里；他的困境在警察局引发了存在主义辩论，展现了法院官僚主义的疯狂景象，以及对一家孤儿院令人心碎的纪录片式呈现。这些动荡的事件被一段大胆的半小时长镜头串联起来，讲述了司机与他生活放荡的女友在夜晚的色情重逢，而女友想要收养这个孩子。戈莱斯坦将残酷的现实主义与视觉想象力相结合，即便在今天看来依然令人震惊。——理查德·布罗迪（Richard Brody）（在 Criterion Channel 平台播出。）

舞蹈 / 芭蕾舞者米斯蒂·科普兰（Misty Copeland）为在芭蕾舞中传统上代表性不足的黑人舞者而战，加上她自身崛起过程中所展现的决心与优雅，可以说已经超越了艺术本身。如今，科普兰已从舞台退休，转而担任导师和制作人。在乔伊斯剧院（Joyce Theatre）为期两周的芭蕾舞节上，科普兰聚集了包括哈莱姆舞蹈剧场（Dance Theatre of Harlem）的亚历山德拉·哈钦森（Alexandra Hutchinson）和巴黎歌剧院芭蕾舞团（Paris Opera Ballet）的纪尧姆·迪奥普（Guillaume Diop，一位真正的明星）在内的舞者。两场节目包括约翰·塔拉斯（John Taras）的《火鸟》独舞、何塞·利蒙（José Limón）的《大提琴二重奏奏鸣曲》以及一段鲍勃·福斯（Bob Fosse）的独舞——这是一场对舞蹈多样性本身的庆典。——玛丽娜·哈斯（Marina Hars）（乔伊斯剧院；8月4-16日。）

艺术 / Throckmorton 画廊一场精彩展览的标题《墨西哥抽象：一个世纪的摄影》（Mexican Abstraction: Over a Century of Photography）有点误导性。这些图像大多是静物、风景和自然研究，但它们绝不仅仅是写实的。如果说少数几幅作品——如蒂娜·莫多蒂（Tina Modotti）的电线杆、曼努埃尔·阿尔瓦雷斯·布拉沃（Manuel Álvarez Bravo）的眼镜店招牌——已经定义了墨西哥现代主义，那么这场展览则探索了该风格的完整范围和深度，且经常使用极佳的古董印相。莫多蒂那幅著名的、采用柔和朦胧棕褐色印相的工人集结俯拍图，具有一种异常微妙的力量。一些最令人难忘的照片将我们带入了一种诡谲的氛围。格拉西埃拉·伊图尔比德（Graciela Iturbide）捕捉到了一个被鸟群遮蔽得如此阴暗的天空，以至于我们几乎能听到它们的鸣叫。布拉沃则放大了一只骨瘦如柴的手——像噩梦一般，但又奇异地精致，指上戴着一枚荆棘戒指。——文斯·阿莱蒂（Vince Aletti）（展至9月26日。）

外百老汇 / 在《救赎者》（The Saviors）中，两名祭坛男孩——在信仰中挣扎的保罗（Paul，朱利叶斯·林泽 Julius Rinzel 饰）和在性取向中挣扎的迈克尔（Michael，伊万·豪 Ivan Howe 饰）——发现他们的友谊因朱利安（Julian，斯坦利·西蒙斯 Stanley Simons 饰）的到来而变得不稳定。朱利安是一个长发流浪汉，似乎已经摆脱了家庭、教会和普通人类关系的束缚，却最终被自己毁灭性的欲望所困。剧作家布巴·韦勒（Bubba Weiler）曾谈到自己是在一个“相当保守的天主教氛围”中长大的，他触及了一个天主教无神论者的双重意识。保罗和迈克尔可能是一个怀疑者之人的两个侧面，而故事背景——一座中西部的天主教教堂——既是各种少年焦虑的熔炉，又由于其音乐总监朱迪（Judy，克里斯托·芬 Crystal Finn 饰）那舒适（gemütlich）的存在，在许多意义上成为了一个避风港。——罗达·冯（Rhoda Feng）（大西洋剧团 Atlantic Theatre Company；展至8月15日。）

嘻哈 / 2016年，一位从开放麦诗人转型为说唱歌手、艺名仅为 Noname 的艺术家发行了混音带《Telefone》，兑现了当时红极一时的 Chance the Rapper 对她的早期认可。该作品中粗犷而精辟的诗意，使她被誉为嘻哈领域下一位伟大的理论家。此后，她成为了过去十年中最才华横溢的词作者和公正的评论家之一，并成长为一名社会活动家以及通俗文学和革命性黑人文学的倡导者。她于2018年独立发行的首张专辑《Room 25》将单纯的修辞胜利提升到了精湛与纯熟的境界；而2023年的续作《Sundial》则是她的巅峰之作，在构思丰富的同时，其锋芒与聚焦同样精准。在《Telefone》发行十周年之际，这位说唱歌手回到了那个她证明了“出名并不需要一个名字”的时刻。——谢尔顿·皮尔斯（Sony Hall；8月5日。）

电影 / 格鲁吉亚电影制作人奥塔·约塞里亚尼（Otar Iosseliani）长期以来一直是那些怀旧的后苏联电影爱好者的指路明灯。Metrograph 的“奥塔·约塞里亚尼：现代生活寓言”系列展将为纽约人提供一个难得的机会，去探索他那些经过 4K 精心修复的格鲁吉亚和法国电影作品。这位作者的早期作品尤为出彩。约塞里亚尼对苏联边缘生活的诗意描绘，涵盖了从集体农庄的新现实主义记录到第比利斯俏皮的快照，其轻盈的触感让人想起法国新浪潮。其中，《曾经有一只唱歌的黑鸟》（There Once Was a Singing Blackbird）尤其不容错过：一名极具魅力的年轻定音鼓手，利用演出中场休息的90分钟空档，离开管弦乐团在第比利斯四处诱惑时髦女性，并在终曲开始前及时赶回，制造了一场混乱。——玛德琳·沃尔法特（8月8-16日。）

4 《纽约客》，2026年8月10日 插画：埃莱妮·卡洛里科蒂（ELENI KALORIKOTI）

双人餐桌

Sanwits 149 First Ave.

我一直有点担心 Unapologetic Foods 变得温吞了。在过去的十年左右时间里，这个餐饮集团凭借 Adda、Dhamaka 和 Semma 几乎引爆了纽约的餐饮界，它们对印度料理纯粹的诠释给这座城市沉闷的南亚烹饪版图带来了一次冲击。但近年来出现了一些微妙的变化——也许是对美国主流口味做出了一些小小的妥协。最令人沮丧的是，该集团降低了其快餐炸鸡店 Rowdy Rooster 的辣度等级，以至于现在的最高等级大约只提供电热垫般的温热感。原先位于东村的一家狭小店面 Rowdy Rooster 已于今年早些时候关闭。取而代之的是 Sanwits，这是 Unapologetic 的最新力作，一家由 Eric Valdez 监管的三明治店，Valdez 也是该集团另一家非印度餐厅——菲律宾餐厅 Naks 的主厨合伙人。Sanwits 同样主打菲律宾风味——这个名字是“sandwich”（三明治）的塔加洛语变体——尽管正如 Valdez 告诉我的那样，在他长大的菲律宾，其实并没有所谓的三明治文化。

这毫无疑问地令人兴奋：因为没有需要继承或背叛的既定形式，Valdez 有空间随心所欲，菜单成了可辨识的美国三明治轮廓与坦率、不加掩饰的菲律宾食材的华丽融合。这些三明治凌乱、渗汁、浓稠且强势；它们在结构完整性上的缺失，由足以让大脑爆炸的风味弥补。一款对法式蘸三明治（French dip）的改编基于 lechón（烤乳猪），并抹上了“维也纳香肠蛋黄酱”。一款对芝士牛排三明治的诠释则借鉴了 calderata（一种菲律宾炖牛肉），并配以极其融化的 Eden 芝士（一种菲律宾特有的类 Velveeta 奶酪产品）。Rowdy Rooster 的影子在炸鸡三明治中得以幸存，其裹粉炸鸡腿肉与前一家店油锅里炸出的口感一样酥脆。但菜单上最令人兴奋的是一款用蛋液裹面、自制的“午餐肉”三明治，堆在烤白面包上，配以切碎的生菜和用菲律宾香蕉番茄酱制成的秘密酱汁。结果尝起来非常令人愉悦，像是一个喝醉了的 Big Mac。

开业以来，Sanwits 删减了几款三明治，包括炸鲭鱼和一款极其鲜美的蘑菇 adobo。我怀念那些消失的单品——尤其是我从未有机会尝试的鲭鱼——但这正是任何具有冒险精神的餐厅往往会发生的情况：它开业，挥舞旗帜，然后开始安定下来。Naks 已经从品鉴菜单风格的 kamayan 演变为一家更随意的小酒馆，而且这种转变让那里变得更好了。也许 Sanwits 也会走同样的路线，远离具有挑战性的选择，转而迎合大众，也许这最终会对 Valdez——以及我们所有人——都恰到好处。不过现在，我就喜欢它现在的样子。（三明治 $14–$18。）——Helen Rosner

在大道之上与大道之外

肠道检查

像许多在纽约拥有智能手机且有购物强迫症的女性一样，我对鞋子情有独钟，我的 Instagram 算法也随之进行了调整。整天下来，我的动态推送中出现了一场漂亮的厚底鞋和柔软凉鞋的巡演，诱惑着我花掉积蓄。我现在（基本）知道如何避开这些诱惑，但几周前，Instagram 向我推送了一双我无法移开视线的鞋——相反，我不断地回到手机前盯着它们，欣赏它们那庸俗而艳丽的全部风采。我想，这一定是个玩笑——或者是个艺术项目？但事实并非如此，它们是真实的，且可以购买，价格仅为 $69：米色厚底凉鞋，高度约 10 英寸，旨在仅在一种极其私密的活动期间穿着。它们被简单地称为“排便鞋”（Sht Shoes），来自一家名为 Let Loose 的公司。这是一家肠道健康品牌，由 Alexandra Houx Grounds 在 2024 年创立。这位身材纤细的金发女性长期遭受胃肠不适之苦，希望将能够以幽默感解决女性腹部问题的产品推向市场。Grounds 的首批产品是补充剂——消化酶、缓解便秘的柠檬水混合粉——但正是这款“排便鞋”（本质上是将一个分体式的蹲便辅助器变得时尚了一点）让公司走红。得益于 TikTok 爱好者的推动（至少部分原因），首批产品已经售罄；现在仅支持预订。这些鞋子可能只是个噱头，但它们是一个更大趋势的一部分，即人们开始公开讨论（并购买相关产品以增强）其肠道微生物组。合生素、纤维棒、初乳粉，Trisha Pasricha 撰写的新畅销书《你一直以来排便的方式都错了》（You've Been Pooping All Wrong）——以及现在的排便鞋。现在是信任你直觉（肠道）的最佳时机。——Rachel Syme*

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5 摄影：JESSICA PETTWAY 为《纽约客》拍摄（上）。插画：HOLCHAN（下）

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《纽约客》节

10月23-25日，纽约市

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Parker Posey 扫描购买门票。 Lorna Simpson Gloria Steinem

官方赞助商 Marguerite Casey Foundation

Cole Escola 由 Daniel Rampulla 拍摄；Chris Fleming 由 Julia Johnson 拍摄；King Princess 由 Conor Cunningham 拍摄；Wynton Marsalis 由 Piper Ferguson 拍摄；Atsuko Okatsuka 由 Lee Jameson 拍摄；Parker Posey 由 Ruven Afanador 拍摄；Lorna Simpson 由 Grace Ahlbom 拍摄；Gloria Steinem 由 Gia McKenna 拍摄

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城市谈资 (THE TALK OF THE TOWN)

评论见证

上周，在安东尼·福奇博士出席参议院委员会听证会约一小时后，来自威斯康星州的共和党参议员罗恩·约翰逊（Ron Johnson）对福奇个人日记中关于冠状病毒大流行早期的一个片段表示怀疑。“你真的在自己的日记里撒谎了吗？”约翰逊问道。有一瞬间，福奇似乎快要笑出来，人们瞥见了他曾在疫情期间以亲切且能干的形象赢得全国大部分民众好感的公共卫生官员模样。但那一刻转瞬即逝。“基于法律顾问的建议，根据宪法第五修正案赋予我的权利，我礼貌地拒绝回答，”他说。在三个小时的听证过程中，他重复了这句话数十次，看起来更加忧郁、内敛，而且——在八十五岁的高龄——明显比六年半前世界首次接触 SARS-CoV-2 病毒时要老得多。

福奇决定行使第五修正案权利是可以理解的。这场听证会是由参议员兰德·保罗（Rand Paul）策划的，保罗指责这位医生在新冠肺炎（COVID-19）起源问题上撒谎，以掩盖他所谓的罪责和不端行为。福奇在简短的开场白中表示，这位参议员对他有着“歇斯底里的痴迷”，并发表了“诽谤性的言论”。正是保罗的办公室公布了福奇的日记——其中包含一千多页的笔记、文章和网络迷因——这些内容显然是应小罗伯特·F·肯尼迪（Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.）的要求从政府电脑中检索出来的，肯尼迪目前负责监管国家过敏和传染病研究所（NIAID），而福奇在该机构工作直到 2022. 年。保罗处理方式的一个缩影就是他给这些日记条目起的标题：“托尼的日记！”（Tony’s Diary!），采用了芭比粉色的手写体，字母“i”的点是一个心形。

福奇领导 NIAID 三十八年，在对抗 H.I.V. / AIDS 和 COVID-19 方面发挥了值得赞赏且拯救生命的作用，但自退休以来，他不仅不得不面对嘲讽——特朗普总统称他为“白痴”、“骗子”和“糟糕的运动员”——还面临着死亡威胁。2025, 年 1 月，拜登总统预先赦免了福奇在过去 11 年公共服务期间涉及的所有联邦罪行，理由是可能出现“不公正且具有政治动机的起诉”。但这项赦免无法保护他免受州级起诉，也无法免于因他现在的证词而被捏造的任何伪证指控。无论如何，保罗表示他将尝试指控福奇藐视美国国会。

然而，福奇的沉默是一种损失。保罗在处理此事时可能带有戏剧色彩和恶意，但他的一些问题在最基本的形式上是值得探讨的，因为关于新型冠状病毒来源的争论仍在继续，且具有分歧性和重要性。一种福奇所倾向的情景是，病毒从蝙蝠自然跳跃到人类身上，可能通过其他物种作为媒介；另一种假设是实验室泄漏，最有可能来自中国 COVID-19 首次出现的城市——武汉的武汉病毒研究所。该实验室的部分工作涉及开发冠状病毒的新变异株。（在福奇与保罗的冲突中，潜藏着一场关于所谓“功能增强”研究的定义及其风险的真实争端。）该研究所还通过一家非营利组织的子拨款获得了 NIAID 的资金。然而，根据 NIAID 的说法，该拨款研究的冠状病毒与导致大流行的病毒并无密切关系。

福奇在开场白中提到，在他漫长的职业生涯中，他曾就包括 COVID-19 及其起源在内的问题向美国国会作证或汇报“两百多次”。在 2021 年的一次听证会上，当保罗质问他时，福奇曾毫不示弱地予以反击。他可能觉得没什么好说的了——问过且答过了。但在一次至今仍被感受和评估的创伤性集体经历中，他扮演了独特的角色。想听到更多细节的人并不只有保罗一个。

毕竟，从一开始，福奇就是政府

照片插图：CRISTIAN COUCERO；照片来源：GETTY 7 --- 应对疫情的一个具有影响力的声音，并在某些方面充当了其定海神针。早期的许多方面在现在看来似乎很超现实：纽约市的移动停尸房，每天敲锅打盆的喧闹，以及唐纳德·特朗普将福奇视为其聪明助手的那段时期。随着总统对疫情失去耐心并要求福奇提供政治化的鼓劲之词，这段关系不可避免地恶化了。如果日记条目能说明什么的话，福奇在疫情期间也沉溺于媒体对他个人的报道和推崇。文中过多地提到了朱莉娅·罗伯茨以及福奇的摇头娃娃。在听证会上，密苏里州共和党参议员乔什·霍利指责福奇陷入了自恋的“权力欲”中（而这种旅程似乎正是霍利本人所享受的）。为福奇辩护的话，偶像崇拜是集体行为。数以千计的美国人在购买那些摇头娃娃，而且必须有人去发表那些让他读起来心旷神怡的谄媚文章。特别是在与特朗普决裂之后，福奇在某种程度上变成了一个政治化的图腾，无论好坏。尽管疫苗在2020, 12月问世这一近乎奇迹的进展，但在蓝色州和红色州，疫情应对措施中仍有许多远非完美之处。例如，为什么没有一项全政府的努力来让学校更早、更一致地重新开放？关于感染以及对教师和脆弱家庭成员影响的担忧是合理的。尽管如此，随着时间的推移，这些关闭措施带来的代价变得越来越清晰。在听证会上，密歇根州民主党参议员加里·彼得斯观察到，在两届政府中“数百名官员”对此负责的危机中，“很容易将一个人变成替罪羊”。保罗及其共和党同事没有抵制这种诱惑。保罗驱逐了福奇的一名律师。俄亥俄州参议员伯尼·莫雷诺讲述了一个关于一名女性的故事，他说该女性因在几乎空无一人的看台上不戴口罩观看一场初中足球赛而被捕，并以质问福奇而结束：“你他妈以为你是谁，竟然那样做？”看着坐着倾听的福奇，人们会被提醒，在2020年时人们实际上知道得多么少。世界上大多数人都在摸索且心怀恐惧，而福奇似乎对该怎么做有所想法。但是，即使是基于当时可获得的最佳证据，并且怀揣最好的意图，他也一定有过猜测的时刻。意识到这个事实，不仅是未来更好地做好准备的途径，也是一种更广泛的宽容。如果福奇对疫情有遗憾，他绝非孤身一人。——艾米·戴维森·索金

陈年旧闻部。号外！号外！

《时报》已经出版了六万零九百六十多期，那么今天的报纸恰好是你真正想读的那一期的概率是多少？“新闻其实没那么大变化，”一名有抱负的企业家亚伦·赖斯（Aaron Reiss）在最近的一个早晨说道。“一份报纸大约四加元，它是世界上过期最快的产品。甚至牛奶都比它耐放。所以我想，如果我卖旧新闻怎么样？对我来说那是免费的，而且依然有用。”赖斯当时站在第三十四街和第九大道的街角，就在 B&H Photo 照相馆外面，他在那里刚开了一家名为“旧闻报摊”（Old News Newsstand）的小亭子。“我想出了一个让我非常自豪的口号：‘旧新闻：依然糟糕，但更便宜，且更可预测’，”他说。他给一份旧的《时报》定价三加元——大约打了七五折。那是周五的早晨（“尽管各国强调和平，伊朗与美国仍升级袭击”），赖斯卷起金属格栅，摆出了当天的“新闻”——虽然不是当天的，但本可以成为当天的。他有一堆从垃圾桶里捡回来的六月份的《时报》。6月13日：“在非和平非战争的灰色地带”。6月18日：“特朗普猛烈抨击协议批评者”。6月21日：“海峡关闭”。“完全是同样的一套狗屁，”赖斯说。赖斯穿着一件解开扣子的纽扣衬衫，里面套着一件白色背心，他的职业经历像极了那些受过高等教育的流浪阶层。他曾是一家设计机构的研究员、耶鲁大学的讲师（城市研究 3307：用地图讲述故事）、一名记者、一名陶瓷艺术家，以及一名热巧克力销售员。“我曾在西沃德公园（Seward Park）附近用手推车卖我的陶瓷杯，”他说。“我卖两加元，非常便宜，然后我会说，‘如果你喜欢这个杯子，花二十加元把它买走’。”开报摊的想法是为了扩展他的陶瓷业务。起初，卖旧新闻在一定程度上是为了规避监管：全市所有的路边报摊必须销售期刊。但最终，这变成了一种组织原则。“现在我们卖一些与报摊相关的古怪东西，”赖斯说。这里有陶瓷和艺术品，还有独立杂志（《我曾短暂爱过的几把椅子，第三卷》；《美国人画美国》）以及不寻常的零食——约旦口香糖、伊拉克可口可乐、台湾罐装卡布奇诺。这里还设有纽约公共图书馆图片收藏馆照片的轮展。赖斯五岁的儿子迈洛（Milo）贡献了一些艺术作品，上面写着“免费 0¢”。“错了，”赖斯说。“我收一加元。”他还有旧杂志。“我真的很想卖色情刊物，”他说。“所以我们有旧的《花花公子》。”大多数顾客想要香烟或彩票，但他不卖这些。“那些东西会毁掉人们的生活，”他说。“而且，我会把所有的烟都抽光。”相反，一位朋友正在开发一种刮刮卡形式的独立杂志概念，另一位朋友则在写“单支烟”诗集，像香烟一样卷起来。他与艺术家们分成收入。赖斯开始营业。销售情况缓慢。那天是他三十九岁的生日，早期的客流大多是朋友。他的妻子利齐·富尔顿（Lizzie Fulton）与一位名叫马克斯·格拉瑟（Max Glaser）的艺术家朋友同时到达，后者带来了一箱旧的裸体杂志。“瞧这个，”赖斯说。“一大箱淫秽物品！”他跳了一小段舞。他和合伙人西尔瓦·王（Sylva Wong）一直在从色情书籍中剪下图片，将它们捆绑成“复古迷你色情集”，售价五加元。“就像有人用镐头劈山，把大石头变成小钻石一样，我们对色情物品也这么干，”赖斯 8 --- 说道。前一天是他目前为止销售最好的一天。“我需要大约七十加元才能回本，”他说。“我想今天能做到。”格拉瑟看起来心存怀疑。“你觉得我的账目全搞砸了，”赖斯说。“确实糟透了，”格拉瑟说。

Reiss 打开了一本账本，其实就是笔记本的一页，在项目旁边列着计数符号。“他不会告诉任何人他买这个摊位花了多少钱，”富尔顿说。“而我的反应是，‘这实际上影响到了我’。”生意好转了。Reiss 大声叫道：“我们有给怪人的怪东西！”一个正前往 B&H 的男人问：“有 Zyns（尼古丁袋）吗？”“我们有 zines（独立杂志），” 说。那个男人花十美元买了一个彩绘陶瓷蘑菇。 “这就是他妈的怎么把他妈的东西卖出去，” 说。旧报纸很快就卖完了。游客们很喜欢它们。“他们正准备离开这座城市，想要一件纪念品，” 说。 有他的熟客。他为 B&H 的员工储备犹太洁食零食。第六大道上的一位报摊贩员曾向他提供指导。“我告诉他我一美元卖一瓶水，” 说。“他的反应是，‘你是个白痴’。但他按成本价卖给我了几箱水。”到一天结束时， 赚了 182 美元。“我盈利了！”他说。他的朋友们认为他的报摊是行为艺术。“这是一个实实在在的商店，”他说。“这是一次资本主义尝试。”那天晚上回到家， 重新计算了数字，发现了一个错误：他忘了支付艺术家的费用。“我目前的现金头寸是负 26 美元 16 美分，”他报告说。“会计是一门情感实践。” ——扎克·赫尔法德（Zach Helfand）

命名部：身份政治

丹·萨利文不希望丹·萨利文成为阿拉斯加州的参议员。丹·萨利文已经是阿拉斯加州的参议员，并且希望维持现状。他认为丹·萨利文正试图通过某种计谋，诱导选民认为他就是丹·萨利文，从而将丹·萨利文赶下台。

为了方便区分，加上一些首字母缩写：今年5月，阿拉斯加州彼得斯堡的一位退休教师丹·J·萨利文（Dan J. Sullivan）申请以共和党身份参选，竞争对手是共和党现任参议员丹·S·萨利文（Dan S. Sullivan）。民主党认为这场参议院选举是一个极具前景的夺权机会；该党备受瞩目的候选人玛丽·佩尔托拉（Mary Peltola）此前曾赢得阿拉斯加州众议员席位。（在8月18日举行的初选中，无论党派，前四名候选人都将晋级。）

丹·S及其盟友声称丹·J是一个被安插的棋子。理由包括，丹·J过去曾向佩尔托拉捐过款（金额很小），且最初申请在选票上显示为“丹·S·萨利文”（丹·J称这是一个笔误）。察觉到异样后，官员们取消了丹·J的资格。但法院很快推翻了这一决定。

丹·J坚称自己是出于诚意参选。他的律师辩称，即便他不是，那些怀揣“不符合美国价值观且令人反感”目标的候选人也一直试图竞选公职。当然，候选人之前确实出现过与同名者竞争的情况，并引发过作弊的指责。1946年，当J.F.K.首次竞选国会议员时，据称他的竞选团队诱导一名叫乔·鲁索（Joe Russo）的波士顿清洁工参选，而当时的候选人中已经有一位名为乔·鲁索的受欢迎的市议员。

最近，曾出现过三个鲍勃·弗格森（Bob Ferguson）、两个鲍勃·贝克（Bob Baker）和两个杰里·加西亚（Jerry Garcia，两人都不是已故的感恩而死乐队主唱）。有时，名字冲突显然是巧合。2014年丹·S·萨利文首次竞选参议员时，他与安克雷奇市市长丹·A·萨利文（Dan A. Sullivan）出现在同一张选票上，后者当时在竞选副州长。

7月，一名记者通过Zoom联系到了丹·J·萨利文。丹·J戴着眼镜，顶着一顶磨损的棒球帽，穿着一件轻便夹克。他身后的墙上挂着两把班卓琴和一把八度曼陀林。（他会演奏这两种乐器，以及吉他和小提琴。）当时是早上7点，丹·J接下来有一整天忙碌的行程。他的侄子在城里，他们计划去钓鳟鱼。

丹·J是家族中第三代丹·萨利文，也是家里的7个“丹”之一。他们使用绰号来区分彼此（丹·J不愿透露自己的绰号）。看来，现在一些选民也需要这样的辅助手段：当丹·J在网上发布他接受当地公共广播电台采访的消息时，一名评论者误以为他是那位在参议院投票支持削减公共媒体资金的人，并对他进行了指责。

但至少，他引起了关注。“我知道我的名字知名度会让我立即获得9 --- 关注度，”他说，“这比我最狂野的希望还要成功。”

为了进一步了解在拥挤的竞争环境中脱颖而出的重要性，记者写信给丹·T·萨利文（Dan T. Sullivan）。他是一名常驻印第安纳州的营销顾问，专门从事搜索引擎优化——一种帮助企业在谷歌上获得曝光的神奇艺术。丹·T几乎立即回复道，记者找到了“正确的那个丹·萨利文”。

在电话中，丹·T表示他经常收到发给其他各种丹·萨利文的电子邮件：害虫防治报告（俄亥俄州）、酒店收据（佛罗里达州）、法拉利赛道体验详情（英国）。丹·T说，通常在商业领域，“你希望通过名字让自己与众不同”。而在他自己的行业中，他很容易被误认为是那位指导创业者的丹·萨利文，或者是在谷歌工作的丹尼·萨利文（Danny Sullivan）。

“一个和我同名的儿子是我的代表，而且他正在做出我认为未必能推动我们州前进的决定，也许这件事对我来说比对其他人更难以释怀。”最近，Dan J. 的注意力被吸引到了 1886 年田纳西州的州长竞选，当时两兄弟 Alf Taylor 和 Bob Taylor 互为对手。当时的一幅漫画将他们并排画在舞台上，“在拉小提琴争取选票”。“这真的让我觉得很有趣，”Dan J. 说，“如果我和 Dan Sullivan 一对一较量，我敢肯定我在小提琴比赛中能赢他。” ——Jon Allsop

影像：三次经过同一条河

1978年，一个名叫罗布·莫斯（Robb Moss）的加利福尼亚人，当时二十八岁，与一群同样热爱河流的伙伴一起在格兰峡谷（Grand Canyon）进行了一次为期五周的漂流之旅。作为一名有抱负的电影制作人，莫斯带了两台摄像机（一台同步录音手持机，以及一台固定在他绑在小船船尾三脚架上的 Bolex 摄像机），随后将拍摄的素材——其中大部分是他的朋友们在沙石上赤裸的身影——剪辑成一部名为《河狗》（Riverdogs）的短纪录片。他的想法是纪念一个正在消失的伊甸园，以及他五年来在河流上工作、无需支付房租的流浪生活的终结。这次旅行是一次最后的狂欢。“我把这部电影看作像洞穴壁画一样，”他最近说道，“我在纪念我们的生活，我们的行为，就像在记录一次狩猎。”

莫斯正沿着另一条水道行走，那是中央公园北端深谷（the Ravine）中的洛克溪（the Loch）。他刚刚在西奈山医院（Mount Sinai Hospital）花了一天时间进行勘景，准备拍摄一部关于该院神经外科的纪录片，在晚餐前，他正贪婪地呼吸着绿意。如今，七十六岁的他是一名电影教授，曾任哈佛大学系主任；距离那个在“大沟”（Big Ditch）中不穿裤子的不安探索者，已经过去了半个世纪（期间拍摄了十多部电影）。尽管如此，他神情安详，人们可能会猜测这是那段漫无目的的青春在成熟，或者是他在随后的电影中习得的关于青春消逝的感悟。

在《河狗》拍摄二十年后，他制作了《同一条河两次》（The Same River Twice），这是一部长篇更新之作，将大量 1978 年的素材与新拍摄的影像相结合，追踪其中五名“河狗”如何应对中年生活的平庸与屈辱。这部电影吸引了一批忠实的粉丝。过去与现在的并置——身体、境遇、态度，甚至胶片材质的对比——构成了一首关于时间流逝的狡黠而凄美的颂歌（或挽歌）。这些生活拥有层级，就像峡谷岩壁上的地质地层一样。

八年前，莫斯第三次回到那些水域。他的新电影《河之弯》（The Bend in the River）再次重新利用了旧素材，并加入了新素材，记录同一群朋友如今已步入暮年。岁月并非全然残酷。《河之弯》本月正在 Film Forum 放映。莫斯希望这三部曲能一起展映。“每部电影都是关于‘在那时’看到的景象，而那时的景象就是‘在此刻’看到的景象，”他说。（他不会按时间顺序播放；他会先放《同一条河两次》，然后是《河狗》，最后是《河之弯》。）

这个夜晚的深谷，就像数亿年前的格兰峡谷一样郁郁葱葱，当时的峡谷由沿海低地和沼泽组成。莫斯提到他拍摄的另一部名为《封存》（Containment）的电影。“那是关于在超出任何人想象的时间跨度内封存核材料的困难，”他说。在他拍摄期间，福岛事故发生了，两年后，他前往日本。“所有东西都被这种核尘埃覆盖，一层铯和锶。它没有改变植被的颜色，但让那种极致的美变得更加凄美。这就是这种绿色让我想起的事情。”

莫斯十七岁时，在洛杉矶的帕利塞德高中（Palisades High School）就读，他的哥哥被征召入伍被派往越南。莫斯提前毕业并开始旅行，最远到达了阿富汗，随后放弃了一个前往越南寻找哥哥的模糊计划。相反，他进入了大学，就读于加州大学伯克利分校。那是 1968 年。“毕业后，我觉得我的职责就是去对抗我在前二十二年里积累的任何野心，”莫斯说，“野心就是那个

丹·J·萨利文和丹·S·萨利文

如果这两个来自阿拉斯加的丹·萨利文（Dan Sullivan）中有一个是他的客户，丹·T. 会建议他们强调自己在选票上出现的名字顺序，以确保选民能分清谁是谁。在更深层的哲学层面，他说他会提醒他们，“没有人是单一的。你远比你的名字所代表的要丰富得多。”而丹·J.·萨利文则表示，他认为“无论好坏，你的名字就是你的身份”。他承认这一点影响了他与丹·S. 竞争的决定，但这并非出于某种卑劣的手段。“你与一个同名的人之间存在着一种本能的联系，”他说。“随着这种—— 10 JOÃO FAZENDA 绘图 --- 现状的侍女。”就这样，那个无拘无束的 era, 时代开始了，而他在《河狗》（Riverdogs）中庆祝了该时代的终结。他与一位旧时的夏令营好友巴里·瓦瑟曼（Barry Wasserman）一起，从南向北搭便车横跨撒哈拉沙漠，随后访问了巴黎，并在那里拍摄了他的第一部电影，一部关于日常生活的小片。“那是某种日记式的冲动，一种拍摄周围事物的欲望。你如何知道自己身在何处？”当时他的很多朋友都在担任河流向导。在亚利桑那州搭便车时，他看到一张船只撞击巨浪的照片，这激励他参加了由科罗拉多河伟大的河流专家马丁·利顿（Martin Litton）带领的漂流之旅。“我想做那个，”莫斯（Moss）想。于是他在接下来的五年里在墨西哥、加利福尼亚州、犹他州、俄勒冈州、爱达荷州、不列颠哥伦比亚省以及大峡谷从事这项活动。“然后，这不再能带来足够的满足感了，”他说。“我没有学到任何新东西。”研究生院。婚姻。事业。房租。在洛赫（Loch）注入哈莱姆湖（Harlem Meer）附近，一个长发孩子在没有成年人陪同的情况下，拿着一根飞钓竿沿着河岸蹦跳。“我刚钓到一条很棒的大口黑鲈！”孩子说道。莫斯停下来观看，此时一朵橡树花序飘落，落在他的头发里。——尼克·保姆加滕（Nick Paumgarten）

洛杉矶明信片：植物人

一棵昆士兰瓶树（Brachychiton rupestris）通常不会出现在南加州的查帕拉尔灌丛中。这种粗壮得近乎漫画般的树木在苏斯博士的书里会显得很自然，但它原产于澳大利亚的灌木丛。即便如此，就在最近的一个早晨，一辆平板拖车沿着 I-5 高速公路行驶，车斗里固定着两棵巨大的瓶树，随后停在了 Serpentine 门前——这是一个位于洛杉矶博伊尔高地（Boyle Heights）社区的植物设计工作室（也就是说，一家高端苗圃），由喜剧演员兼电影制作人埃里克·韦尔海姆（Eric Wareheim）所有。

韦尔海姆身高六英尺以上，蓄着整洁的胡须，戴着方框眼镜，他快步跑出门迎接这次交付。“噢，哇！”看到这些树时他喊道。每棵树都超过 20 英尺高，球状树干的直径接近 9 英尺。“这对我来说绝对是圣杯。”

韦尔海姆对植物的痴迷始于 2024 年离婚后的业余爱好。“园艺真的非常有疗愈作用，”他说。在他制作电影和电视节目的正职（《蒂姆和埃里克的十亿美元电影》、《无主》）以及一个名为 Las Jaras 的葡萄酒品牌副业之间，他开始收集植物。很快，植物就占满了他的房子。“我不得不开始卖掉一些植物，因为没地方放了，”他说。

于是，他与工作室经理亚历克西斯·弗洛里奥（Alexis Florio）一起租了一间阁楼，他们开始将沙漠植物栽种在从世界各地搜集来的古董容器中。他们还通过修剪，或者让植物背离阳光使其向光扭曲，将植物塑造成戏剧性的形态。最终，他们原有的空间不够用了，于是将商品移到了阁楼的停车场——一棵纤细的 15 英尺高龙血树（$8,500），像一名正处于跳跃中的芭蕾舞演员；一棵 floss-silk 树（$7,500），五根树干从一个 Willy Guhl 浅盘中升起，像一只巨大的僵尸之手从地底破土而出。

这些古怪植物的消息传开了，订单接踵而至——玛莎·斯图尔特（Martha Stewart）、凯利·韦斯特勒（Kelly Wearstler）、Flamingo Estate。 “买家将它们视为艺术品，而不仅仅是一些绿植，”韦尔海姆说。

平板车上的瓶树将成为庆祝 Serpentine 成功的中心装饰品。望着它们，韦尔海姆说：“它们通常只出现在博物馆、体育场和动物园里——仅此而已。”当被问到每棵树价值多少时，他回答道：“我不知道。我花两年时间去结交一个人需要多少钱？”

这就是他寻找这两棵树所花的时间，他搜遍了圣地亚哥县所有的苗圃。“整个游戏的重点就是寻找那种形状，”他说。他在邦索尔（Bonsall）的一家名为 Hula Tropicals 的鸡蛋花苗圃车道上发现了这对树。但老板不想卖。就像好莱坞一样，植物界也讲究关系，因此韦尔海姆花了数月时间反复拜访，购买规模越来越大的植物，以赢得老板的信任。最终，交易达成，瓶树被挖掘出来。

在 Serpentine 卸货期间出现了一个小问题：韦尔海姆想将这些瓶树展示在两个巨大的石灰岩浅盘中，结果发现盘子太浅。方案 B 是两个水泥盆，但它们太窄。“所以方案 C 是用箱子，对吧？”韦尔海姆指着一个看起来像林肯木屋（Lincoln Logs）材质的容器问他的团队。“我们将箱子稍微切掉一点，让它在今晚看起来更美观。”

一台叉车起重机轰鸣着启动，吊起了一棵重达两吨的瓶树。

埃里克·韦尔海姆

“这是我见过最伟大的东西！”韦尔海姆看着树像费里尼电影中飞越罗马的耶稣一样在空中滑行，惊叹道。“看看那玩意儿！”他走近起重机操作员说：“我来开。”

操作员露出了微笑。

“伙计们都讨厌我，”韦尔海姆说。“我的幽默感太蠢了。”

起重机将树操纵到指定位置。在树被放下时，团队成员迅速修剪其根部，以便将其放入容器中。如果修剪过度，他们可能会面临让树受到惊吓——甚至导致树死亡的风险。“我没法看，”瓦雷海姆说。将第一棵树放入箱中几乎花了一个小时。当客人（内森·菲尔德，蒂姆·海德克）到达时，瓶树已被谨慎地安置在苗圃中数十种其他古怪植物之间。“主流理论是，你必须在进门时就展示你的大件。但实际上，得体的方式是不那样做，”瓦雷海姆说。“你得费点功夫才能找到这些。这才是酷的做法。”他将每棵树的价格定为5万美元。——奥伦·佩莱格 1 --- 我们的远方通讯员

为了赎金

数千人被尼日利亚土匪绑架。一名男子被绑架了两次。 作者：亚历克西斯·奥克沃 (ALEXIS OKEOWO)

伊祖楚库·安扬武 (Izuchukwu Anyanwu) 是尼日利亚阿布贾的一名大学讲师。一天傍晚，他回到家中，准备度过一个安静的夜晚。那是 2023 年 9 月，他下午在任教的维里塔斯大学 (Veritas University) 校园里和朋友们踢了球。他感到很累且发烧，于是洗了个澡，喝了些茶，吃了点面包；他还服用了治疗疟疾的药物，以防自己感染。他的妻子伊玛库拉塔 (Immaculata) 安抚婴儿女儿入睡后，自己也上床休息了。

大约午夜时分，安扬武正在电视上观看一个政治新闻节目，这时他听到走廊外门传来异响。听起来像是有人试图闯入。那天晚上停电了，他正使用太阳能系统运行电视。他打开窗户，但看不清外面是谁。

“我很害怕，”他最近告诉我，“我开始大喊：‘是谁？是谁？’”

三十八岁的安扬武身材苗条，蓄着胡须，面相年轻。他在该国东南部的一个小镇长大，随后进入天主教大学维里塔斯大学攻读政治理论硕士学位。他最终获得了一份教学工作，并在大学门外的 Zuma II 社区租了房子，那里住着许多教职员工。该社区位于城市的北郊，处于附近几座山的岩石山麓地带。

“我觉得很安全，”他说，“我的希望是提升自己的学术地位，最终在这里拥有自己的房子。”他的女儿将在二月满一岁，全家计划举行一次盛大的庆祝活动。

随着噪音越来越大，安扬武尝试拨打社区治安小组的电话，然后拨给一些朋友，但电话都无法接通。他的妻子醒了，两人对着窗外大声呼救。随后，入侵者破开了锁。

“就在那时，我知道一切都完了，”他说。

十七名男子进入了他的家，有些人穿着迷彩服，携带 AK-47 步枪、火箭推进榴弹发射器和机关枪。

“他们的武装程度就像要去打仗一样，”他回忆道。

他们强迫安扬武和与该家庭同住并帮忙做家务的二十岁青年桑代·乌贾 (Sunday Ujah) 趴在客厅的地板上，然后要求伊玛库拉塔向他们展示贵重物品的存放地点。安扬武抗议道，告诉他们自己不是政治人物，没有钱。

由于没有什么值钱的东西，那些人拿走了大米、花生、软饮料和奶粉。其中几个人喝完了安扬武剩下的茶，吃掉了面包。这些人拿走了安扬武和乌贾的手机，并将两人带到邻居家绑架了一名当地商人。随后，他们全部徒步向山区出发。

被绑架者携带被盗的食物。安扬武当时还穿着家居服：短裤、一件 Polo 衫和拖鞋。

他们在森林中行走了好几个小时。该地区荒芜且无人居住，但土匪们行动自如，显得驾轻就熟。

“有些人走在我们前面，然后给我们信号让我们继续前进，”安扬武说。

绑架者全部是富拉尼人 (Fulani)，这是一个穆斯林占多数的族群，成员主要居住在该国北部。考虑到他们先进的武器，他怀疑他们是否与伊斯兰激进组织博科圣地 (Boko Haram) 有关联，但那些人没有透露其组织名称，也没有宣称任何特定的意识形态。

他们在一个名为 Tunga Maje 的村庄附近的森林里扎营。安扬武知道他们的位置，因为他在绑架者买的一袋面包包装上看到了当地制造商的地址。他和其他两名人质被关在一个洞穴里。当时正值雨季，他不得不往潮湿的地面上铺叶子。

绑架事件已成为美国右翼一个离奇的标志性议题。

12 摄影：埃蒂诺萨·伊冯娜 (ETINOSA YVONNE)

睡觉。他能听到森林中某个看不见的地方有另一组人质在说话。“他们把他们和我们分开，”他说。那些人询问每位人质的职业。“他们试图通过画像来了解能开出多少赎金，”安扬武（Anyanwu）说。他试图淡化自己在大学中的职位，但对方开出了1.5亿奈拉（约20万加元）的赎金，才愿意释放他以及乌贾（Ujah）。“我告诉他们，‘如果我有这么多钱，你们根本没机会接触到我，’”他说，“你们见过我住的房子。”他们最终同意将金额降低到大约一半。他们把手机还给他，让他给家人打电话，但他不记得妻子的新电话号码了。他给他的叔叔打了电话，然后给了他的牧师打电话。在接下来的几天里，他又给其他亲戚打电话。在他通话时，绑架者用砍刀、电线和枪托殴打他，好让他的家人知道他处于危险之中。每次通话前，他都会因为能听到熟悉的声音而感到兴奋，随后又会想起即将到来的残酷殴打。几周后，当匪徒们发现他无法筹到钱时，他们让步了，将赎金定为约6000加元，由他的姐姐送到一个交接点。但过了好几天，他们仍然没有释放他以及乌贾。匪徒们最终告诉安扬武，他们认为他的家人支付的钱不够。第二天，其中一个人将他带到oga（他们的头目）面前，头目说要砍掉他的一条腿作为惩罚。oga让他选择失去哪条腿。安扬武开始哭泣并请求宽恕，说他会因失血过多而死。“但oga坚持要这么做，”他说。他选择了左腿。

绑架现在在尼日利亚如此猖獗，以至于似乎每个人都认识某个被绑架的人。人们在州际公路上开车时、在教堂礼拜时，甚至在家里睡觉时被绑架。小说家奇玛曼达·恩戈齐·阿迪契（Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie）已故的父亲是一位教授，他曾在家乡与居住的大学城之间的道路上被绑架；在家人支付赎金后，他于三天后被释放。前财政部长恩戈齐·奥孔乔-伊韦阿拉（Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala）的母亲被绑架了；一名圣公会大主教及其妻子也被绑架。根据研究公司 S.B.M. Intelligence 的数据，在2024年7月至2025年6月期间，至少有4700名尼日利亚人被绑架，其中700多人被杀害。在此期间，受害者的家属和朋友共向绑架者支付了超过25亿奈拉（约150万加元），这一数字是前一年的两倍。这项研究依赖于媒体报道的案例，这意味着实际总数几乎肯定更高。

赎金绑架产业已成为该国最赚钱的产业之一。这场危机始于90年代的尼日尔河三角洲。当地形成了武装团体，以反对壳牌（Shell）等外国石油公司对其社区的剥削和污染，他们开始绑架石油工人并向公司索要赎金，将其作为一种抗议形式。在2000年代，东南部的犯罪团伙开始效仿这种做法——但其目的是为了赚钱，而非反抗行为。他们经常在繁忙的道路上将人们从车辆中强行掳走。“人们在圣诞节期间无法回家，”一个名为民主发展研究与培训中心（Centre for Democratic Development Research and Training）的尼日利亚智库主任阿布巴卡尔·西迪克·穆罕默德（Abubakar Siddique Mohammed）告诉我。这些团伙会向尼日利亚北部广袤且缺乏管辖的森林中的牧牛人付费，让他们看管人质直到赎金到账。“这就是其中一些人实际上被引入绑架行业的方式，”穆罕默德说。

2009年，总部位于该国东北部的博科圣地（Boko Haram）开始发起一场游击战和自杀式爆炸行动，试图在该地区建立一个哈里发国。该组织宣布反对西方风格的教育，并开始从学校绑架儿童，强迫他们皈依伊斯兰教。武装分子强奸女孩并违背其意愿将其娶为妻子。2014年，博科圣地从奇博克（Chibok）的一所中学绑架了近三百名女孩；其中约九十人的下落至今不明。去年11月，据信该组织从一所天主教学校绑架了约三百名学生，其中一些年仅五岁。

在西北部，这种行径通过较少具有意识形态色彩的冲突而传播。该地区豪萨族（Hausa）农民与富拉尼（Fulani）牧民之间一直存在关于放牧地使用权的争端。社区之间的袭击导致数千人流离失所。一些年轻的牧民转向有组织犯罪。“起初，他们会前往村庄，发动袭击，并从当地名流那里榨取钱财，”穆罕默德说。“然后他们转向封锁当地公路，抢夺车辆中的一切。接着他们开始绑架人们。”

根据美国国际宗教自由委员会的一份报告，目前有约三万名武装富拉尼民兵在尼日利亚活动。有些小组仅由十几个人组成；有些则有数百人。这些小组通常以其领导者的名字命名。其中最残暴的小组之一由贝洛·图尔吉（Bello Turji）领导，他是一名据信三十出头的富拉尼男子。图尔吉使用富拉尼解放的语言；他告诉一份名为《每日信托》（Daily Trust）的尼日利亚报纸，由于“针对富拉尼人的种族灭绝”，他“被迫沦为土匪”，并称一群农民从他的家族那里偷走了一千头牛并杀害了他的几名亲属。他的组织现在在农业社区进行绑架、敲诈和驱逐。几年前，一名匿名的音乐家发布了一首将图尔吉称为英雄的歌曲，这激怒了许多尼日利亚人。

由一名叫阿多·阿莱鲁（Ado Aleru）的男子领导的小组在去年11月绑架了二十五名女学生，该小组承诺，如果政府为其追随者提供替代生计，以及更好的学校、医院和清洁饮用水，他们将停止其行动。（图尔吉和阿莱鲁未回应置评请求。）“当我们开始工作时，他们有委屈，并且渴望讨论这些问题，”穆罕默德在谈到这些武装组织时说。但他在今天看到的那些人“非常危险，因为他们纯粹是罪犯”。

年轻的土匪在TikTok上吹嘘他们的绑架行为。一个男人的账户截图显示，他穿着传统的富拉尼长袍和头巾，戴着深色太阳镜和闪亮的戒指；他一只手拿着一叠现金，嘴里还叼着另一叠——像一个兼职做说唱歌手的游牧牧民。由一名叫卡查拉·马蒂（Kachalla Mati）的男子领导的绑架组织还通过 13 --- 扎姆法拉州（Zamfara）的非法金矿开采赚钱，并已开始强迫附近居民在矿井中工作。

“这个国家现在出现了禁区，”穆罕默德说。“那些地方已被土匪占领，没有人敢经过那里。”

政府缓解危机的努力一直毫无成效。国家国内情报机构——国家安全局（Department of State Services）的前局长迈克·埃吉奥福尔（Mike Ejiofor）告诉我，警察和军队没有资源来处理这种情况。“资金不足，”他说。2010年，尼日利亚将一项价值4.7亿加元的合同授予一家中国公司，用于在阿布贾周围安装闭路电视（CCTV）摄像头；但至今仍没有一个摄像头能正常工作，且这笔资金去向不明。一项名为“安全学校倡议”（Safe Schools Initiative）的政府计划在2014年获得了3000万加元，用于为学校提供警卫、制定安全计划，并与政府合作开发针对袭击的快速反应系统。这些工作似乎一项都没有完成。该计划执行情况的调查人员发现，自该计划启动以来，已有1600多名儿童被绑架。（一名政府发言人表示，该倡议正在进行中，但当地的执行情况尚不明确。）在尼日利亚，支付赎金在技术上是违法的，根据该国的《反恐预防与禁止法》，这项罪行最低可判处15年监禁。然而在现实中，这往往是让人们活着回来唯一的方法。甚至政府也被指控在一些引起国际新闻关注的案件中秘密支付赎金。一名前情报官员告诉我，国家安全顾问办公室在至少几起备受关注的绑架案中支付了赎金。（尼日利亚政府的一名发言人坚称其不支付赎金。）款项大多以现金形式支付，资金通过多个中间人转手。“没有哪个政府会公开承认向罪犯支付赎金，”这位前情报官员说，“那会给罪犯提供激励。”尽管如此，这种循环仍在继续。2022年，恐怖分子在阿布贾和卡杜纳之间的一列火车上绑架了数十人，报业出版商图库尔·马穆（Tukur Mamu）协商促成了他们的释放。政府目前正在起诉马穆，指控他与博科圣地（Boko Haram）勾结，向家属索要赎金并从中抽成。（马穆否认该指控，并称是家属们自己建议支付赎金的。）埃吉奥福尔告诉我，他在2017年横跨该国开车时也被绑架了。但他不承认支付了赎金。“我就那样被释放了，”他说，“作为前官员，我不鼓励支付赎金，我也不希望被视为支付了赎金的人。”在森林里，安扬武（Anyanwu）把左脚踩在一块岩石上，那个“老大”（oga）告诉其中一名男子拿一把锋利的大砍刀。但片刻之后，“老大”叫停了那个人。“他们说我的人需要尽快把钱带来，”安扬武说。不久之后，这群人听到天空中有无人机的声音，于是再次开始移动，可能是为了躲避军队的抓捕。他们跋涉了两天到达一个大营地。那里看起来像个市场，至少有300名匪徒。“他们骑着摩托车，”安扬武回忆道，“他们大喊大叫，开枪射击。最让我害怕的是我看到的年龄。你会看到十岁、十四岁的孩子。他们正忙着保养枪支、组装枪支。”在途中，匪徒又绑架了几个名人质：两名农民、一名年长的校长，以及一名为了给兄弟送赎金而与该团伙会面结果自己也被绑架的男子。绑匪开始让乌贾（Ujah）去打水、捡柴火并执行其他任务。因此，当大多数人质被锁在一起时，乌贾被允许走动。12月的一个深夜，安扬武在 4 A.M. 左右醒来，得知乌贾和那两名农民逃跑了。匪徒抓住了其中一名农民，将他绑在树上，开始殴打他。“血从他的身体里喷涌而出，”安扬武回忆道，“我们恳求他们停止。”但乌贾逃脱了。

与此同时，安扬武的妻子伊玛库拉正艰难地筹集额外的赎金。她挨家挨户地乞求捐款。到了一月，安扬武的身心在消瘦。他的拖鞋散架了，衣服破烂不堪。人质们只能吃白米饭，而且并非每天都有；他们喝的水很脏。他们一个月只在河里洗一两次澡，而且没有肥皂。“我的皮肤在脱落，”安扬武说，“绑匪们叫我‘骷髅’。他们看着我，然后开始大笑。”但就在那个月晚些时候，安扬武得到了逃跑的机会。看守人质的是一名患有癫痫的匪徒，他突然发作了。他们往他脸上泼水试图让他清醒。当他恢复意识时，他们向他要锁链的钥匙以便去小便，他出于感激而同意了。一旦获得自由，他们便向不同方向逃散。安扬武跑了一整夜，整整九个小时。最后，他躺在一棵树下睡着了。当他醒来时，他跨过一道深谷，看到地上有烟蒂和人类头骨。“我很害怕，”他说，“我不知道该怎么办。”他决心在2月4日女儿的一周岁生日前回到家中。第二天早上，他遇到了一名富拉尼牧民，对方让他用手机给妻子打电话。伊玛库拉刚刚交付了另一笔约4500美元的赎金。钱丢了，但她很高兴他自由了。挂断电话后，那名牧民打了自己的电话，很快，四个来自另一个匪帮、携带AK-47的男人抵达了现场。安扬武向他们请求帮助。匪徒们将他带到营地，给了他药物和食物，并对他长期的被囚经历表示同情。他们看起来很善良。“我以为这次他们会让我回家了，”安扬武说。但那天晚上，他们把他锁了起来，让他给妻子打电话要求再次支付赎金。他再次成为了人质。

尼日利亚的暴力事件已成为美国右翼的一个著名议题。自唐纳德·特朗普的第一任期以来，包括一个名为“援助受难教会”（Aid to the Church in Need）在内的基督教活动团体，已经 14 --- 一直游说美国政府采取行动，应对伊斯兰团体对尼日利亚基督徒的迫害。他们去年取得了进展，当时来自西弗吉尼亚州的共和党众议员赖利·摩尔（Riley Moore）提出了一项谴责在穆斯林占多数国家针对基督徒暴力的决议，而来自德克萨斯州的参议员泰德·克鲁兹（Ted Cruz）提出了一项要求制裁尼日利亚的法案。活动人士还会见了国家安全委员会成员塞巴斯蒂安·戈尔卡（Sebastian Gorka）及其他白宫官员。不久之后，特朗普宣布伊斯兰恐怖分子在尼日利亚绑架并杀害基督徒。此后，名人也加入了其中。最近政治立场转向右翼的说唱歌手妮基·米娜（Nicki Minaj）在联合国就基督徒受压迫的情况作证。电视主持人比尔·马赫（Bill Maher）称这种情况为企图进行种族灭绝。我最近在曼哈顿经过一块广告牌，上面写着“停止在尼日利亚的种族灭绝”，旁边是一幅女人在燃烧的教堂前抱着婴儿的插图。去年圣诞节，特朗普在尼日利亚总统博拉·提努布（Bola Tinubu）知情的情况下，对恐怖组织“伊斯兰国在尼日利亚分支”发动了空袭；袭击主要击中了几乎空无一人的森林营地和农田。一家尼日利亚报纸报道称，村民们前往轰炸现场收集金属碎片，然后将其卖给废品商。

在尼日利亚，这次空袭引发了混乱。“当种族灭绝的指控出现时，我们中的许多人都感到震惊，”尼日利亚总统的特别媒体顾问桑代·达雷（Sunday Dare）说道，“我们当时在想，‘种族灭绝？’”博科圣地（Boko Haram）已发动了近二十年的叛乱，导致数万名尼日利亚人丧生。但近年来，该组织已经分裂并启发了许多模仿者。其中一些组织，如伊斯兰国西非省，采取强硬的意识形态路线。另一些则更多地受金钱而非宗教驱动。大多数组织在穆斯林占多数的北部活动，且其大多数受害者同样是穆斯林，而非基督徒。卡齐纳州（Katsina State）的安全专员纳西尔·穆阿祖（Naseer Mu’azu）告诉我：“穆斯林承受的打击比任何人都要沉重。”尼日利亚北部是该国文盲率最高的地方，贫困程度是南部的两倍。由于近期取消燃料补贴引发的通货膨胀，整个国家正经历一场经济危机。绑架已成为正式经济之外的一种替代手段。匪徒的网络难以识别，部分原因是他们现在已深深植根于社区的经济生活中。“你不知道谁是线人，谁在向匪徒泄露信息，”穆阿祖说。卡齐纳州已开始培养可能提供情报的当地人，但招募工作依然困难。今年，美国派遣了两百名军事人员协助尼日利亚开展反恐工作。特朗普在该国发起了进一步的打击。但曾在政府与匪徒组织之间充当中间人的穆斯林神职人员谢赫·艾哈迈德·古米（Sheikh Ahmad Gumi）告诉我，经济发展会比炸弹更有效。“军事手段无法解决这个问题，”他说，“不分青红皂白的轰炸只会使情况恶化，因为我们会造成无辜伤亡。人们将开始团结起来反对美国。”

穆斯林在绑架以及针对绑架者的军事行动中都承受了沉重打击。自2014年以来，旨在打击匪徒组织的尼日利亚空袭已导致数百人死亡。2023年，在卡杜纳（Kaduna）的一次穆斯林宗教节日期间，一场轰炸意外导致85人死亡。今年4月，一次袭击在约贝州（Yobe State）造成100名平民死亡，其中包括几名儿童。5月，特朗普在网上发布消息称，美国和尼日利亚军队在一次“针对尼日利亚西北部ISIS恐怖分子渣滓的强力且致命的打击”中，杀死了一名名为阿布·巴克尔·阿尔-迈努基（Abu Bakr al-Mainuki）的尼日利亚伊斯兰国领导人。尼日利亚人对此感到困惑：他们的政府在两年前就宣布已经杀死了迈努基。随后，尼日利亚政府澄清，2024年的这次击杀是一起身份误认事件。

尼日利亚的绑架目标涵盖了富人和穷人，名流和不幸之人。去年12月，25岁的护理专业学生普雷斯·伊德西米（Praise Idesimi）在圣诞假期期间乘坐巴士从维里塔斯大学（Veritas University）回家。在行驶了九小时后，一群蒙面持枪男子拦住了车辆，命令乘客下车。“我当时非常害怕，”伊德西米说，“我以为我要死了。”其中一名绑架者 15 --- 将枪口对准她，指责她盯着他看。随后，该团伙释放了一些孩子，巴士司机将他们带到了主路。他再也没有回来，她当时在想，他是否一直与匪徒勾结。

绑匪让被绑架者在森林中行走近一周，每晚行进十小时。白天，他们被捆绑起来，被迫在阳光下的地面上躺着，并遭到棍棒殴打。伊德西米（Idesimi）的赎金被定在约3000美元。有一次，她和其他被绑架者试图打电话给巴士公司寻求帮助。“他们说这不关他们的事，”伊德里米说。（巴士公司的一名经理告诉我：“与绑匪谈判不是我们的职责。我们不是安保人员。”）六天后，她的家人支付了赎金，她被释放了。

之后，我在维里塔斯（Veritas）拜访了伊德西米。校园里很平静，但处于警戒状态。年轻人自由地在赤陶色建筑和芒果树之间行走，但大门口设有军事哨所。维里塔斯大学的副校长海辛斯·伊乔库（Hyacinth Ichoku）表示，绑架危机“让大学时刻处于紧张状态”。“学生们很害怕，他们的父母也很担心。”大学加强了安保措施：伊乔库说，警察、州安全部门和当地治安小组的成员在校园内巡逻。他很少能一夜安眠，通常会醒来好几次与校园安保人员核实情况。

我和伊德西米在伊乔库的办公室里坐在一起。她看起来比实际年龄要年轻，声音轻柔，身材纤细。她在看心理医生，但仍会做噩梦。由于家人在支付她的赎金后背负了债务，她难以维持生活开支；伊乔库说他会帮忙安排某种形式的经济援助。

尼日利亚人在寻求警察帮助时，情况并不总是能好转。住在阿布贾（Abuja）的讲师兼政治人物阿多伊·奥马莱（Adoyi Omale）在开车离开城镇时，与他的侄女以及两名在他家工作的建筑工一起在车内被绑架。“那是光天化日之下，大约在下午两点钟，”他回忆道。他的家人支付了约6000美元的赎金，以换取奥马莱和其中一名建筑工的释放。“我直接去了警察局，”他说。然而，他没有得到帮助，反而收到了一张账单，要求支付警方在案件中花费的费用：将他的侄女和另一名建筑工送回阿布贾、雇佣当地民兵寻找奥马莱、以及在警局扣押他的车辆。总计约1200美元。“我直接付给他们了，”他说，“我想尽快回到阿布贾。”（警方的一位发言人将此归咎于一名违规警员的行为。“这是错误的，”她说，并补充道，“我们没能阻止绑架已经足够糟糕了。”）

2024年1月，一名公务员曼苏尔·阿尔-卡德里亚尔（Mansoor Al-Kadriyar）与他的五个女儿在阿布贾的家中被绑架。“他们把我们全部押了出去，”他说。卡德里亚尔打电话给他的兄弟，兄弟随后报警。警察到达后发生了枪战。但绑匪制服了警察，并将人质带入了森林。卡德里亚尔的女儿纳迪拉（Nadheerah）在离开前没能用希贾布（hijab）遮住头发，这让她感到毫无遮掩。她的姐姐纳比哈（Nabeeha）是其中最勇敢的；即使绑匪用枪指着她，她也没有退缩。卡德里亚尔同意支付约6万美元的赎金，随后被释放以便筹集资金。当他回到阿布贾时，得知他的兄弟在枪战中被杀。一名亲戚为他女儿们的赎金发起了在线筹款活动。但一周过去了，钱还是不够。随后，绑匪打电话来说，为了惩罚，他们已经杀死了纳比哈。“这是一场灾难，”卡德里亚尔说。

在纳比哈（Nabeeha）去世后，更多的捐款到账，家人支付了赎金。卡德里亚尔（Kadriyar）剩下的女儿们被释放了。“我们在庆祝，我们在感谢上帝，”他说。他为女儿和兄弟感到悲痛，但试图将注意力集中在其余家人幸存的感激之情上。当我拜访这家人时，纳迪拉（Nadheerah）还能用一种黑色幽默来谈论她的磨难。“在这件事发生之前，我一直想减肥，”她说，“所以我其实挺高兴自己在走路，这样能凑够步数。”卡德里亚尔随后将家人搬到了阿布贾一个更安全地区的公寓里，但那里很贵。“我们的生活并不轻松，”他说。

2024年2月4日，也就是他女儿生日那天，安扬武（Anyanwu）被绑架者释放了。当地的摩托车出租车司机带来了他姐姐提供的钱和电话卡，以及食物、充电宝、太阳能电池板和两辆新摩托车。一名司机将安扬武送到最近的高速公路，他的姐姐接他并带他去了一家酒店。第二天，他前往医院接受评估，最后回到了家中。他的妻子在见到他时哭了。她也瘦了。“我认不出我的妻子了。我的孩子不认识我，”他说。伊玛库拉塔（Immaculata）告诉我：“我的生活破碎了。我受到了创伤，非常抑郁。但我没有放弃。”

尼日利亚的绑架事件依然在毫无缓解地继续。在科吉州（Kogi State），绑匪最近袭击了一家孤儿院并劫持了23名儿童。在卡齐纳州（Katsina State），一名退役将领及其妻子在车内被绑架；该将领随后在囚禁期间死亡。根据国际特赦组织的数据，2026年前三个月，尼日利亚北部有1100多人被绑架。

今年早些时候，我前往阿布贾拜访了安扬武和他的妻子。他们的平房里摆着简朴的家具，阳光洒满了客厅。安扬武惊叹于伊玛库拉塔的美丽，她穿着一件豹纹连衣裙，戴着配套的发带。他们似乎在彼此守护：当安扬武和我交谈时，她一直紧贴在他身边，目光始终在他身上。“我们仍然感到不安，”他说，“那次事件一直伴随着我们。”他正在寻找出国深造的机会。他说，如果他们有能力，在他出院后就会立即离开这个国家。但他们必须偿还为三次赎金而借的钱。“没有任何制度上的支持，什么都没有，”安扬武说，“我得到的支持来自朋友、学校，当然还有家人和教会。”

如今，他直到午夜之后才能入睡——那是绑匪闯入他家的时间。在被绑架之前，安扬武听说过人们被绑架的事，但并没有过多地思考。他说：“我从未想过这件事会发生在我身上。”

♦ 16 --- 喧嚣与低语 (SHOUTS & MURMURS)

头条新闻

愚蠢的《洋葱报》编辑被拉里·多伊尔拒绝 大学毕业生逃离恶 vicious 学习循环 约会对象向男子讲述“AA制”的种族主义历史 男子在求职面试中笑得恰到好处 男友将第一次说“我爱你”留作应急之用 女子坚持要求重新求婚，仅因为他忘了戒指和她的名字 新郎在新娘的格莱美奖杯中看到了凶兆 将牙齿留在啤酒里 蜜月被过多的“腻歪”之事毁掉 男子的袜子、内裤和最喜欢的衬衫在烘干机中丢失 已婚男子仍能保持大学水平的饮酒量 见证了分娩奇迹的新父亲表示不会再尝试第二次 男子因几句无害的评论失去工作 圣诞老人扩大名单，将包含：淘气、乖巧以及太乖 邋遢的食客是狗的新好朋友 专家称，传统妻子提供更好的口交 父亲在椅子上观察到：第二个孩子比第一个更红 嫂子一直揪着厕所事件不放 在车道上的车里建立了“男人洞穴” 丈夫愤怒于妻子不让他更换那个已经老了的“自由性爱通行证”名人 “蜂蜜待办”罐突然起火 男子饮酒频率并不太高 牙仙就忘了，没关系吧？ 儿子最近说“爸爸”时的语气没那么坚定 父亲放弃婚姻，母亲誓言这里将有所改变 离婚男子的可靠酒吧现在成了家禽店 深夜奶酪零食并非奶酪，急诊室医生判定 男子所有大学时期的女友现在都成了女同性恋 前妻在与可能的黑帮成员、恋童癖约会 女儿不等结婚就更改姓氏 离婚男子震惊地发现口交突然变成了强制要求 男子被解雇，因为老板的孩子也是个白痴 男子的生活不值得继续，但他还是继续活下去了 《洋葱报》拒绝了搞笑男子的 10,000 个头条 前妻觉得男子的死亡极其好笑 ♦

LUCI GUTIERREZ 17 --- 美国期刊

砰！Grucci爆炸帝国打造的烟花。 作者：佩吉·威廉姆斯（PAIGE WILLIAMS）

在7月4日独立日之前的几天，我身处拉斯维加斯一家赌场顶楼，在那里我遇到了位于华盛顿特区的约翰·F·肯尼迪表演艺术中心艾森豪威尔剧院的首席电工。这位电工托马斯·本亚（Thomas Benya）同时也是一名持有执照的烟火技术员，他随一群烟火技术员来到拉斯维加斯，负责搭建并燃放一场被宣传为全美规模最大的烟花秀。而在华盛顿特区，唐纳德·特朗普总统声称，他在国家广场周围举办的演出规模会更大，并且他将发表一场“非常长”的演讲。特朗普一直试图将自己的名字强加在肯尼迪中心之上，随后，在经历了一系列员工离职和表演者取消演出后，他将该中心关闭，以进行一项“综合振兴项目”；本亚热爱“与人们共同创造艺术”，自18岁起就在肯尼迪中心工作了二十年，他告诉我：“这太令人心碎了。”

拉斯维加斯似乎无法提供喘息之机。一座金灿灿的“TRUMP”大厦耸立在拉斯维加斯大道北端。32.9万名游客来到这座城市庆祝美国的250岁生日，而他们全部都挤在我的电梯里。室外温度高得惊人。

在另一天的另一个顶楼上，一名穿着印有“AS REAL AS IT GETS”字样T恤的戴手套女性，在将橙色闪光烟花弹装入3英寸迫击炮管时停了下来，告诉我：“当你经历过120度及以上的高温后，这根本不算什么。”

我在拉斯维加斯见过的最汗涔涔的人是一位年长的女性，她留着盘起的黑发和刘海，右耳后塞着一朵像葡萄柚一样丰满的柠檬绿假菊花，手里拿着一把西班牙折扇。当时是在艺术区的一家咖啡馆里，距离拉斯维加斯大道有数英里之遥。在隔壁桌的是一名同样留着黑色刘海的女性，她打了唇钉，双腕都有纹身。她正全神贯注地阅读一本名为《愚人之举》（Fool's Errand）的书，这是一部关于一名叫菲茨奇瓦利·法西尔（FitzChivalry Farseer）的刺客的奇幻小说，根据谷歌的快速搜索，该角色“放弃了自我强加的流亡，以营救一名失踪的王子并应对险峻的政治局势”。这名女性穿着一件《入侵者齐姆》（Invader Zim）的T-shirt，上面写着：“末日！末日！ ! ! ! ! ! ”

地下则是拉斯维加斯环线（Vegas Loop）——埃隆·马斯克的创意。环线是一个私人出资的单向隧道系统，旨在利用自动驾驶特斯拉将乘客运送到九个目的地之间，主要是拉斯维加斯会议中心，其规模相当于80个足球场。马斯克旗下的企业之一，Boring Company，自2021年起一直在运营这些隧道。一位当地的公共政策教授称该环线是“我听过的最大、最荒谬的交通骗局”。《ProPublica》揭露了监管中令人不安的漏洞，称由于环线“没有获得联邦资金，因此免于此类项目通常要求的详尽政府审查和环境分析”。

为了庆祝美国250周年，Grucci燃放了数十场演出，其中包括一场覆盖整个3.5英里拉斯维加斯大道的烟花秀。 18 摄影：斯宾塞·洛威尔（SPENCER LOWELL）

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在其他地下隧道——实际上是雨水排放管——中，有人在那里居住。当时正值季风季节。在地面上，你会被烤熟；在地下，你会被淹死。

大道提供了令人分心的红白蓝饱和色彩。Sphere球体变换成了一个巨大的美国国旗沙滩球。礼品店出售缀满闪亮装饰的星条旗随行杯。我看到一名女子穿着一件亮片美国国旗超短裙，一名男子穿着美国国旗短裤背带裤。还有美国国旗细高跟鞋、牛仔帽和手提包。Topgolf 正在提供一项名为“让自由挥杆”的 17.76% 折扣。一家赌场在出售一种名为“爆竹”的鸡尾酒，价格高达不符合历史常理的 19 加元。一辆 GMC Terrain 正在四处巡游，车窗上用粉笔写着“多肽”和“静脉补水”的广告，暗示着万病皆有药。在古代中国，人们认为长生不老的药方是硫磺、木炭和硝酸钾的炼金混合物——后来被称为火药或黑火药。它并没有起作用。但是，这种混合物在燃烧时会发出“砰”的一声！它可以被塞进竹竿的空心中心，而竹竿此前已被用于驱赶恶灵和神话中的“山精”，因为竹节在投入火中时会爆裂。据历史学家约翰·威廷顿（John Withington）称，“据说几个世纪以来，任何一个自尊的中国旅行者在出门前都会准备一 stash 天然竹爆竹。”通过调节混合比例可以产生不同的效果。增加硝酸钾可以延长燃烧时间；增加硫磺则能加快爆炸速度。最终有人想到加入金属以产生颜色：钠产生黄色；锶产生红色；钡产生绿色；铝或镁产生白色。氯化铜在高热下迅速分解并褪色——呈现蓝色。加入钛会产生噼啪作响的效果。铁屑则呈现金色。如今，各种组合被装入纸板球体或圆柱体（炮弹）中，并配有涂有易燃浆料的导火索，然后密封在牛皮纸内，由玻璃纤维迫击炮发射。现代技术使人类免于用火炬或点燃的雪茄靠近烟花的额外危险：专业表演由电流触发。炮弹被设定为以特定的方式燃烧和爆炸。它们可以发出 POW, poof, boom, BOOM, BOOM!, BOOMBOOM, whoosh, CRACK, ffffffff, fssssssssssss, EEEEEeeeeee 的声音。结尾部分则发出 BOOMBOOM-BOOMBOOMBOOM 的巨响。有一种烟花听起来就像天空刚刚清空了它的数字垃圾桶。视觉效果有自己的名称——菊花、牡丹、柳树、棕榈。落叶效果看起来就像一个巨大的、隐形的亮片桶刚刚倾倒。交叉花火（Crossettes）像一簇被击中的台球一样飞散。烟花表演的设计师会按此顺序考虑：主题、场地、预算、播放列表。将烟花与音乐结合被比作“为芭蕾舞中的角色配乐——有些角色非常强健且具有巴洛克风格，而有些则非常精致、柔美”。一场一万加元的表演与一场成本高得多的表演之间的区别在于产品质量、节奏、时长、密度和难度。让烟花攀上华盛顿纪念碑通常比在湖上的驳船上发射要复杂得多。烟花的负面影响——垃圾、烟雾、山火、狗的创伤——是普通观众在心中将其摒除的东西。

拉斯维加斯的烟花表演接连不断。在7月4日之前的几个晚上，我站在皇宫车站（Palace Station）赌场的一个停车场里，等待一场表演开始。一名穿着百威轻啤（Bud Light）T恤的父亲正带着年幼的儿子拍自拍；一名保安在告诉人们不要靠在他的路虎车上。九点钟，我们听到远处传来一阵尖鸣声。附近一个碎石场升起了一团尘土，可以看到一群无人机同步起飞。突然，天空中出现了彩色灯光！是一个巨大的彩票摇奖机的形状！它像一艘宇宙飞船，而且似乎近到伸手就能触碰到。摇奖机滚动起来，旁边出现了一个带有数字 5 的绿色光球。球变成了红色，5 变成了 4。黄色 (3)，蓝色 (2)，回到绿色 (1)——砰！砰砰！烟花在摇奖机旁的黑色虚空中爆发——绿色的烟雾，金色的烟雾，银色的亮片，白色的彗星。无人机可以配备灯光并被编程到精确的GPS坐标，其目的是增强而非必然取代烟花；它们甚至可以配备烟花。如果观众知道无人机操作员使用的是计算机而非操纵杆，且烟花技术人员同样使用笔记本电脑，通过一种名为 F.S.K.（频移键控，听起来像 AOL 拨号上网）的无线电传输发送数千行代码，来告知烟花何时何地爆炸，这是否会破坏观众的体验？这些无人机飞行员来自内布拉斯加州，就职于一家名为 Fantasy Drone Shows 的公司。他们的负责人斯科特·巴斯（Scott Buss）是一名烟花技术员兼飞行员，在投身无人机领域之前曾经营零售店。他说，无人机让他能够在“天空中讲述故事”——比如一手黑杰克牌，或一杯巨大的玛格丽塔鸡尾酒——但它们无法用气味或震耳欲聋的冲击力来刺激我们的原始大脑。巴斯喜欢无人机，但他热爱烟花——热爱“这一切的感觉”。《巴黎评论》（The Paris Review）的创始人兼长期编辑，作家乔治·普林普顿（George Plimpton）将烟花视为“第八艺术”，并对其痴迷。在他 1984 年出版的著作《烟花：历史与庆典》（Fireworks: A History and Celebration）的研究过程中，他发现了一本行业期刊，其口号是“凡闻过此烟者，永不回头”。他采访了明尼苏达州的一位牧师，这位牧师将“个人爱好与神职工作相结合”，被人们称为“爆破牧师”。这位牧师向普林普顿解释说，在户外布道期间，“我可能会说，‘……这就是主的道路。’ 砰！”在伊丽莎白一世女王统治时期（1558 至 1603 年），她设立了英国烟花大师（Fire Master of England）的职位。历史学家威辛顿（Withington）在他最近的著作《烟花史》（A History of Fireworks）中指出，殖民帝国利用烟花来“威慑当地民众”并试图控制他们。烟花表演曾在凡尔赛宫、吉萨金字塔、天安门广场、白宫上演。它们曾从山顶、河岸、桥梁、中世纪城墙、大教堂中发射。烟花预告着世界杯、奥运会、就职典礼、婚礼、铁路开通、王室婚礼、圣徒、圣徒队（the Saints）、19 --- 春分、日食月食、新年、亡灵节、夏季的开始以及结束。普林普顿写道，彼得大帝设计了一场表演，用以“庆祝与瑞典国王查理十二世经过二十一年战争后的条约和最终和平”，并补充道，“显然，他单纯地热爱噪音。”美国的建国与烟花密不可分；约翰·亚当斯在 1776 年 7 月 3 日写给妻子的信中预言，国家的独立将通过包括“照明”（Illuminations）在内的多种方式来“庄重庆祝”。两百五十年后，这一点被人们铭记在心——且毫不懈怠。据估计，美国人今年在烟花上的花费达到了 25 亿美元，而这仅仅是后院级别的消费。

烟花弹按直径衡量——一英寸、三英寸、四英寸、十二英寸。烟花技术人员和专业烟花表演的设计师会根据场地的物理承受能力和法律规定来决定使用哪些烟花弹。在拉斯维加斯，肯尼迪中心电工本亚（Benya）及其同事在屋顶工作，那里的橡胶膜只能承受一英寸的烟花弹，而这种尺寸仍能炸断人的手。普林普顿（Plimpton）总是坚持亲自点火。烟花对他有着某种吸引力——那是“绚丽色彩”与“那细微的危险边缘”的并置。他在汉普顿举办的夏季派对从未缺少烟花表演。曾有一位客人在手臂被烧伤后起诉他，索赔1100万美元。在一次派对上，诺曼·梅勒（Norman Mailer）想点燃一枚烟花弹。“他拿着一杯波本威士忌，装在一个蓝色玻璃杯里，其实更像一个花瓶，那种通常在厨房橱柜深处才能找到的容器，因为家里其他所有东西，甚至塑料杯都被征用了，”普林普顿写道。“他一只手拿着饮料，安全地放在身后，然后拿着铁路信号弹靠近引信”，点燃了一枚重约八磅的六英寸烟花弹。它“几乎瞬间就发射了”，而这突如其来的冲击“让诺曼向后翻了个跟头，直接栽进了锯草丛中。令人惊讶的是，在他像风车一样翻滚时，那个蓝色花瓶依然直立着；没有一滴波本威士忌溅出来。他爬起来喝了一口，问能不能再来一次。‘你们有稍微大一点的吗？’”烟花有着神奇的名字——“红丝”（Red Silk）、“猴子之子”（Monkey Child）。普林普顿曾说，退休后他想找一份给烟花起名字的工作，并且希望自己的骨灰能作为烟花发射出去。在他突然在家人位于上东区的公寓里睡梦中去世前，他正准备开始写回忆录。这发生在2003年9月25日，他当时76岁。骨灰在等待。2005年，他的好友、同样热爱烟花的作家亨特·S·汤普森（Hunter S. Thompson）去世；在电影中饰演汤普森的演员约翰尼·德普（Johnny Depp）在阿斯彭附近用大炮发射了汤普森的骨灰。受邀嘉宾包括杰克·尼科尔森（Jack Nicholson）、肖恩·潘（Sean Penn）以及参议员乔治·麦戈文（George McGovern）和约翰·克里（John Kerry）。一位邻居告诉《时报》：“我将永远记得亨特被炸向天空时我在哪里。”次年7月4日，在汉普顿的加丁湾（Gardiner’s Bay），普林普顿在他最喜欢的烟花——日本“冠路”（Kamuro）中升空。他的儿子泰勒（Taylor）后来写道，这种烟花也被“称为‘男孩的发型’或‘日本柳’——一道金色的光之瀑布在空中悬停片刻，闪烁着，然后消失在黑暗之中”。烟花弹由泰勒亲自装填。Grucci烟花公司是普林普顿首选的烟花供应商。本亚在拉斯维加斯赌场屋顶工作时，就是为这家公司效力。Grucci家族从事这一行已有六代，始于1850年，最初在意大利亚得里亚海边的巴里（Bari），后来迁至纽约长岛南岸的贝尔波特（Bellport）。Grucci的先辈通过埃利斯岛移民。有人说他们“来到这里时，基本上只带了一个装着一些配方的鞋盒，以及一个在美国立足的梦想”。老费利克斯·格鲁奇（Felix Grucci, Sr.）于1929年在贝尔波特开设了一家小工厂。在大萧条期间，烟花表演陷入停滞，格鲁奇找了一份在乐队里打鼓的兼职。后来，为了多元化经营，格鲁奇承接了一项美国军方合同，制造模拟原子弹的训练模拟器。七十年代初，他的成年子女布奇（Butch）、唐娜（Donna）和吉米（Jimmy）开始经营这家烟花公司。吉米喜欢尝试新事物。Grucci家族是最早使用计算机和电子设备进行表演的人之一。据说吉米发明了一种名为“分裂彗星”（split comet）的效果，烟花在炸开时会成倍增加。1979年，他坚持让Grucci家族前往蒙特卡洛参加一场仅限邀请的烟花比赛。他们赢了。Grucci家族开始被誉为“烟花第一家族”，这一荣誉称号，

“如果没人想要你的烟花怎么办？”——直到今天，这句话依然出现在公司的标志上。1983年的感恩节周末，格鲁奇家族正为圣诞节和除夕演出做最后的准备，这时一场爆炸将他们位于贝尔波特的工厂夷为平地。地面在方圆二十英里内震动。当地人立刻认定是俄罗斯的炸弹——世界末日到了。费利克斯当时在工厂，但不知怎么地没有受伤。吉米和一名十九岁的表妹唐娜·格鲁伯丧生。与格鲁奇家族关系密切的普林普顿接到电话后，在几小时内就赶到了贝尔波特，他凭口才说服警察让他通过封锁线，进入一片“被摧残”的景象，这让他想起了第一次世界大战战壕战的照片。布奇告诉普林普顿，烟花技师永远无法停止思考可能发生的 worst-case scenario（最糟糕的情况）：“你每天都与此共存，就像知道核武器正对着你一样。”接着他说：“当它真正发生时，与你想象的完全不同。我原以为声音会很深沉且带有某种威慑感，像身处巨浪之中，但实际上不同。那是一种撕裂和撕扯的声音，高亢且刺耳，几乎像是一种尖叫。”国际烟花协会的一名成员怀疑爆炸是由自燃引起的。“想到这一点就令人毛骨悚然，”普林普顿写道，“一颗炮弹，被挤在同类之中，在仓库的黑暗中缓慢地改变着内部成分，直到现在，它成了一件致命的武器，等待着大气压力的某种微妙变化，或某种程度的湿度，从而触发第一缕烟雾。”另一种理论是纵火。一座城镇在曾经偏远的工厂所在地周围生长起来，一些邻居一直敦促格鲁奇搬迁，而这最终确实发生了。爆炸的原因从未被揭露，如果真的有人知道的话。吉米·格鲁奇的悼词由普林普顿发表，普林普顿的风格至少从他参加“匆忙布丁”剧团的日子起就带有戏剧色彩。（普林普顿在 P. J. Clarke's 餐厅结识第一任妻子时，穿着一件披风。）作为两个著名的“五月花号”家族的后裔，他的口音被泰勒描述为“古老的新英格兰，古老的新约克，并带有淡淡的国王学院式标准英语（King's English）”。因此，你可以想象当普林普顿向一群哀悼者提到，吉米餐后的“消遣”是“在床尾巨大的弧形特大电视屏幕上观看他最喜欢的格鲁奇烟花表演录像”，且他的闹钟就是这台电视，设定在“由亚瑟·菲德勒和波士顿流行乐团在户外演奏的柴可夫斯基《1812序曲》的高潮时刻”时，听起来是怎样的。普林普顿说，在表演期间，吉米经常额外多放几颗炮弹，“为了给观众提供比必要量稍微多一点的视觉效果”。吉米·格鲁奇有一个儿子菲尔，爆炸发生时他是长岛大学的一名新生。菲尔从小就随家人观看格鲁奇的演出，他记得在康尼岛的海滨大道上，观众们在每场压轴表演结束后都拥簇在祖父身边，向他表示祝贺和赞美。“这非常令人上瘾，”他曾说道。普林普顿叫菲尔为“菲利”——“Phil-lay!”他们曾一起攀登布鲁克林大桥，为该桥的百年庆典演出做准备。菲尔记得在表演期间，普林普顿坐在他身边，凝视天空，兴高采烈地拍他的膝盖，大喊：“快！快！快！”后来，菲利监督将普林普顿的骨灰装入 Kamuros 烟花中。

Grucci烟花公司在贝尔波特爆炸事故后幸存了下来，部分原因是次年，开发商史蒂夫·温（Steve Wynn）聘请该公司为拉斯维加斯金块赌场（Golden Nugget）的一座新塔楼举行开业典礼。从那时起，Grucci家族就一直负责拉斯维加斯的大型演出。他们随后承接了自由女神像百年庆典、多次奥运会、世界博览会、数十场跨年千禧之夜演出，以及罗纳德·里根、乔治·H·W·布什、比尔·克林顿、乔治·W·布什和唐纳德·特朗普的就职典礼。“有人跟我说：‘I can't believe you're shooting fireworks for that guy!’”菲尔告诉我，“我说，‘我们是一家跨党派的烟花公司。’”（巴拉克·奥巴马在就职典礼上没有燃放烟花。）菲尔和他的妻子德博拉（Debra）佩戴着一条缀有细小且雅致钻石的“Grucci”项链，编号为21，他们有两个孩子，劳伦（Lauren）和克里斯托弗（Christopher），他们现在三十多岁。他们与表亲科里（Corey）一起，构成了Grucci烟花公司的下一代。所有人都是持证的烟花技术员。劳伦的第一场演出是在珍珠港。作为一名摄影师，她记录着父亲和哥哥执导的演出。克里斯负责演出工作，同时也是Pyrotechnique by Grucci的项目经理，这是该公司的国防承包业务部门，目前仍为军方制造训练模拟器：现在包括手榴弹，以及士兵在触发绊线时可能遇到的地面爆炸类产品。他的妻子莱莫尼亚（Lemonia），习惯被称为莱娜（Lena），曾担任公司的人事总监，直到她决定花更多时间在家陪伴两年前出生的女儿西耶娜（Siena）——西耶娜出生在7月4日两天后，菲尔对此故作沮丧。Grucci家族成员并非必须在家族企业工作，但他们通常都会参与。菲尔告诉我：“我们在子宫里就被吸引了——在背景中听到那些噪音，出生就准备好投入其中。”2006年，温将Grucci家族带到澳门，为他在亚洲的第一处物业举行开业燃放。 “他总是说，‘我给你建筑，你给我排场（razzmatazz），’”菲尔告诉我。两年后，酒店大亨杰里·因泽里洛（Jerry Inzerillo）聘请Grucci家族为迪拜的人造群岛朱美拉棕榈岛（Palm Jumeirah）举行开业典礼。现在，Grucci演出的计划——即使是在美国演出的——也来自迪拜的工程师和设计师，Grucci在迪拜设有办公室。菲尔预计中东很快将超过美国，成为最大的整体市场。“他们追求的不是排场，而是‘规模’，”他说。仅沙特阿拉伯就有一个“巨型旅游”目标，计划通过U.F.C.格斗、一级方程式赛车、主题公园，在2030年吸引每年1.5亿名游客。用菲尔的话说，这是“石油之外的某种东西”。某些活动的烟花表演拥有巨额预算，尽管很难获得具体金额。是数百万美元吗？我追问菲尔。“噢，是的，”他说。预算越高，就越有“打破常规”的机会。Grucci家族曾在迪拜的哈利法塔（Burj Khalifa，全球最高建筑，高度略超过半英里）、沙特阿拉伯的一处由粘土建成的联合国教科文组织世界遗产地，以及拉斯海马酋长国的人造群岛马尔詹岛（Al Marjan Island）进行燃放。多年来，Grucci一直保持着制造并燃放最大航空炮弹的记录——60英寸。菲尔在公司的一个仓库里给我看了一个复制品；它看起来像个变异的圣诞装饰球。该记录在2020年于科罗拉多州的斯蒂姆博特斯普林斯（Steamboat Springs）被打破。此类记录需要工程学上的壮举。斯蒂姆博特斯普林斯的炮弹包含了380颗彗星烟花和1

由一台为此专门制造的机器包裹了51英里的胶纸。该炮弹重2,797磅，在山顶通过一台定制的迫击炮发射。升力必须足够强大，才能将这个巨大的球体送入天空，且炮弹必须在恰当的时刻爆炸，而不能落下燃烧的碎片。Grucci家族受命在迪拜的除夕之夜打破该纪录，届时将使用一枚66英寸的炮弹；他们还已被雇佣，计划在2027年挑战70英寸。Phil告诉我：“中东地区——尤其是阿联酋和沙特阿拉伯——对世界纪录非常、非常热衷。”Grucci家族进口的是组装好的烟花，主要来自意大利和西班牙。意大利人是资深的烟花制造者，而西班牙城市瓦伦西亚长期以来以其烟火节而闻名。“你想要无瑕、完美的产品？去日本。那就像在买钻石，”Chris某天早晨在拉斯维加斯告诉我。Grucci也从中国进口——但最近减少了。“太贵了，”他说。（关税原因。）进口业务通过Pyrotechnique by Grucci公司进行，该公司位于弗吉尼亚理工大学附近的拉德福德陆军弹药厂（Radford Army Ammunition Plant）。该工厂建于第二次世界大战期间，用于制造火箭和其他火炮的推进剂。在冠状病毒大流行期间，由于烟花表演被取消，公司向拉德福德增派了人员，目前Grucci的大部分业务都在那里开展。Chris从贝尔波特搬到了那里。他和来自希腊家庭的Lena在罗安诺克结婚，因为那里有他们能找到的最近的希腊正教会教堂。Phil用一场烟花致敬来纪念这一时刻。举办招待会的酒店在经过演示并获得Grucci家族保证不会发射任何产生近距离火花的物品后，才允许这样做。该酒店被列入国家历史遗迹名录，此前几乎被烧毁。相比于烟花表演在物流上的混乱（任何事情，从强风到许可证失误，都可能导致计划脱轨），Chris更喜欢国防制造业那种机械式的稳定性。在7月4日独立日之前的几周，我在拉德福德工厂见到了他和他的父亲，这是一个占据近7,000英亩、横跨新河（New River）的综合体。为了进入，我必须通过三个安全检查站。部分地产看起来无人使用且杂草丛生，标牌上写着“欢迎来到第一压药厂”和“增量称重房”。那里有钢制滑槽、筒仓、生锈的铁轨、加油泵，以及一些看起来像星际螺母的物体。一家名为B.A.E. Systems的承包商目前经营该工厂，并将工作空间租赁给13家商业租户。当我和一名Grucci的助手经过一栋诺斯罗普·格鲁曼（Northrop Grumman）的大楼时，助手说：“我不知道里面在干什么。我对自己的好奇心尽量保持谨慎。”Grucci的主办公室是一栋预制建筑，坐落在长而低矮、平顶的结构之间，那些带有开放式隔间的建筑让人想起旧时代的鸡舍。建筑采用了颜色编码。蓝色边框意味着没有爆炸物；红色则意味着显而易见。一名叫Scott的安全官员给了我一件防火实验服、护目镜和一副旨在释放静电的黑色布鞋。部分建筑设有特殊地板和照明，并有最大入住人数规定。在其中一栋建筑里，Scott让我踏上一台像秤一样的机器，其指针指示器从红色移向绿色，用于测量鞋子的导电性。22 --- 我的指针停在红色区域——我的脚太干了，存在潜在摩擦。Scott指示我脱掉鞋子，用那种给室内植物喷雾的喷瓶在袜底喷水。我重新穿上鞋子，再次尝试称重。指针瞬间跳到了绿色区域。

克里斯带我来到一栋建筑，那里的工人正使用自动化设备将黑火药和铝粉填入纸管中，用以制造手榴弹和地爆模拟器。这些纸管让我想起卷筒卫生纸的内芯。手榴弹模拟器旨在培养士兵的肌肉记忆：拔掉插销，扔出去，寻找掩护，而不是就那样站在那里观看。在一间弥漫着玉米淀粉气味的房间里，克里斯向我展示了工人如何将棉绳浸在黑火药浆液中，以制造被称为“快燃线”的导火索。在 X 光区域，一名员工正将爆炸物样本放入一台机器中，机器在像收据一样的诊断单上打印出水分含量。随后，我们看到一名叫保罗的组长将导火索用胶带粘在纸管上，并用玉米芯支架钻出两个小孔作为排气孔。我们经过一个区域，那里压缩空气发出的“嘶嘶嘶”声大到一名员工必须佩戴耳塞。她正在给模拟器安装哨子——有些可以模拟导弹袭来的声音——并用胶水密封。在一栋标有“底火与箍环”（Prime & Ferrule）的建筑附近，一名叫吉米的员工递给克里斯一个小型容器，里面是他一直在测试混合的一种由黑火药、樟脑和丙酮组成的油性混合物。我闻了一下——像是指甲油去除剂，但浓度强了一千倍。吉米笑着说：“这能把你熏个透。”我坐上一辆车牌号为“GRUCCI”的雪佛兰 Suburban，随菲尔前往一片广阔的开阔地。那里有一头大公鹿喜欢在棚屋下的凉沙中睡觉，还能看到土拨鼠在杂草丛中窜来窜去。四名 Grucci 的员工在一名叫艾莉森的年轻领班带领下，正通过试射最后一枚手榴弹和最后一个地爆模拟器来结束一天的工作。他们将手榴弹放在投石机上，并通过一根穿过窗户的绳子在三面围墙的安全掩体中进行操作。“这简直就像《乐一通》（Looney Tunes）一样——躲进你的小掩体里，然后拉绳子，”艾莉森告诉我。手榴弹落在沙坑前一点的位置并爆炸了——测试通过。一名叫加里的员工将地爆模拟器垂直放置在金属支架上并系好绳子，他们让我来拉。砰！模拟器爆炸了，留下了碎纸屑和一团烟雾。Grucci 的烟花储存在弹药库中，在拉德福德，这些弹药库是由水泥块建成并被土堤和厚木材掩盖的结构。弹药库之间保持着足够的距离，以防其中一个爆炸。菲尔开车带我去看一个看起来没人的弹药库。里面有三名员工正在为扬克斯的一场 7 月 4 日表演挑选箱子。产品按效果分类。当我看着一个标有“字母弹‘P’白色”的箱子时，菲尔说：“我们几乎拥有字母表里的每一个字母。”发往拉斯维加斯的烟花和设备已经运走。物流工作在 Grucci 位于附近都柏林的另一处设施（部分为办公室，部分为仓库）中管理。当我在那里见到菲尔时，卡车正往来穿梭，装满了迫击炮和模块化面板。办公室的主走廊

走廊两旁挂满了 Grucci 表演的大幅装裱照片。菲尔和我停在了一张棕榈赌场（Palms，拉斯维加斯的一家赌场）盛大重新开业的照片前：两座高层塔楼在烟花的装点下，宛如两只羽翼鲜艳的鸟。菲尔说：“我经常从我们合作的建筑结构中获得灵感。我们如何利用烟花来强调建筑，而又不至于掩盖掉我们要致敬的对象？”他构思了从建筑顶部发射的彗星，前方设有 20 英尺高的“喷泉”，以及在两侧上下运行的多色地雷烟花，像固定翼一样水平喷射。“接下来的问题是：如何将地雷烟花水平安装？如何让它们等距分布？这些窗户打不开，”他指着照片说，“所以唯一的方法就是从侧面速降，或者放下带有预装绳索的电缆。而且你必须让它与建筑保持距离，以免损坏建筑。”棕榈赌场的演出需要 20 人的团队和四天的布置时间。“所有的物流和制作最终都为了那十、十五或二十分钟的表演，”他说，“然后观众会欢呼——希望如此。”Grucci 的运营总监布伦达·阿尔巴诺（Brenda Albano）负责

“这个数据中心专门用于存储手机主屏的误触截图。” --- 每年数百场演出的物流工作。菲尔说：“这就像在调动一支小型军队。”需要办理许可证，需要敲定方案。驳船不会神奇地跨越州界。卡车需要规划路线，司机需要雇佣。阿尔巴诺是弗吉尼亚州人，在公司工作了 27 年。她最初从事国防业务。在那之前，她在一家工厂里给袜子缝脚趾。她更喜欢烟花。和许多 Grucci 的员工一样，她也是一名持证的烟火技术员。如果她是一枚烟花，她会是一枚“飞鱼”——处于不断的运动之中。菲尔会是一群黄蜂——无处不在。克里斯会是一个喷泉——稳定燃烧，脚踏实地。阿尔巴诺太好动了，无法坐在办公桌前；她习惯站着。她的办公室里放着 Skittles 糖果和一罐 Costco 尺寸的 Mt. Olive 莳萝酸黄瓜，旁边还有反光背心和一本名为《危险材料、物质与废物合规指南》的书。书架上的一个装饰木块写着：“但你记录了吗？”她告诉我：“我爱发号施令，要求严格，嗓门大，而且我不喜欢懒人。”Grucci 雇佣了 200 多名全职员工。一些从国防部门转岗过来的人无法适应烟花行业的节奏，该行业还拥有数百名兼职烟火技术员。全职员工在入职时就达成共识：5 月 1 日至 7 月 15 日期间没有人休假，并且他们可能会被要求在圣诞节后的第二天就出发前往拉斯维加斯——就像克里斯·Grucci 那样，为了准备跨年演出。在 7 月 4 日之前，阿尔巴诺在与员工进行近乎持续的检查，同时还要照顾一只生病的狗，并与消防局长会面，以获得接收存储舱的许可。我参加她的一个电话会议时，有人传来了坏消息：被雇佣在拉斯维加斯工作的首席烟火技术员安德鲁·沃比（Andrew Warby）住院了——他在慢跑时脚骨折了。“那个屋顶轮椅能上去吗？”电话里有人问。沃比是澳大利亚人，住在达拉斯，他穿着医疗靴出现在拉斯维加斯。当我与他在一家名为日落站（Sunset Station）的赌场屋顶见面时，他已经扔掉了靴子——那东西拖慢了他的速度。他一瘸一拐地愉快地告诉我：“演出必须继续！”这句话他肯定已经对媒体说过上千遍了。

Grucci 家族在拉斯维加斯有许多客户。他们曾为 Palace Station 的无人机表演制作配套烟花。在独立日期间，他们在拉斯维加斯谷地举办多场表演，拉斯维加斯会议和游客管理局（Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority）还雇佣他们负责整个三英半英里长的拉斯维加斯大道（Strip）的燃放工作。烟花技术人员被分配到 Aria、凯撒皇宫（Caesars Palace）、枫丹白露（Fontainebleau）、美高梅大酒店（MGM Grand）、好莱坞星球（Planet Hollywood）、世界度假村（Resorts World）、Strat、宝藏岛（Treasure Island）以及威尼斯人（Venetian）的屋顶。迪拜的设计师和工程师发送了定制的场地规划图。来自俄亥俄州哥伦布市的首席烟花技术员乔·塞德洛克（Joe Sedlock）——他几乎愿意免费工作，因为听到人群的反应“就像圣诞节早晨一样”——向我展示了用颜色编码的示意图，涵盖了迫击炮架、落区、安全距离、产品以及精确到毫秒的点火时间。四十颗彗星烟花从不同位置以七十度角发射，会产生什么？“一个漂亮且精致的十字，”塞德洛克说，并补充道，“我们可以填满天空——就像在上面作画一样。”他被安排负责美高梅大酒店的点火，根据我的计算，该酒店长达 28 页的场地规划涉及至少 2581 种效果：“带噼啪花蕊的红环”、“金雨时间”、“超级噼啪（礼炮）”。总技术总监奥斯卡·洛佩兹（Oscar Lopez）的日常工作是管理世界度假村的活动，他正匆忙地在各项设置和场地之间调度团队。在世界度假村屋顶门的内侧，团队成员包括本亚（Benya），洛佩兹用黑色记号笔在水泥地上勾勒出他大鞋子的轮廓，并写上“手机信号（CELL SIGNAL）”。他踩在自己的脚印里告诉我：“这是唯一能打电话的地方。”大片名为 duvetyn 的防火织物被胶带贴在世界度假村的屋顶上。本亚和其他烟花技术员正在为数百个彗星烟花架接线——这些烟花架看起来像是不透明的超大试管——将它们固定在胶合板上并放置在 duvetyn 上。电线中含有铜，可能会短路。本亚告诉我：“无论它是传输 12 伏电的 18 号线，还是传输 480 伏电的 00 号电缆——你必须敬畏它，必须小心对待，必须正确地将其端接。”在行动的指挥中心，即 Rio 酒店 Masquerade Tower 的 38029 号房间，巨大的弧形窗户俯瞰着整个拉斯维加斯大道和谷地的东侧。电脑显示器显示着实时天气状况，包括风速。专门的文件夹里存放着时间表和协议——落区前沿、观察员位置——正向“表演时间（SHOWTIME!）” 21:00 小时倒计时。音乐包括：《Born in the U.S.A.》（斯普林斯汀）、《Waking Up in Vegas》（凯蒂·佩里）、《Viva Las Vegas》（埃尔维斯）。克里斯（Chris）进行了一次彩排，以解决分配到各屋顶的笔记本电脑和点火系统中的问题。扬声器中传出模糊的 F.S.K. 代码。“那是所有事情潜在的心跳，”他说。就在 21:00 之前，一名保安护送我和另外几个人来到 Rio 酒店的屋顶。在我们下方，一个名为 VooDoo 的休息室露台上，几十个人手持饮料，在现场乐队面前跳舞。一名年长的男子一直试图发起“U.S.A.”的口号。精准地在九点，我们听到——嘘——噗——砰。烟花在拉斯维加斯大道的全部九个地点同时绽放。VooDoo 露台上的每个人都通过举起的手机观看。这场表演分布得如此之广，以至于感觉不如 Palace Station 那场带有无人机的表演那样具有个人色彩和冲击力。我想，更酷的景象是在谷地，那里规模较小的表演在不停地上演，而从我们站的地方看去，它们是无声的——一个由闪光和火花组成的立体模型。整个景观似乎都活了起来。

Grucci 以其结尾表演而闻名——那时节奏加快，烟花密集。这场表演在八分四秒后结束。VooDoo 酒店的少数几个人发出了“呜呼！”的欢呼声。《拉斯维加斯评论-日报》的直播捕捉到了观众在说：“瞧瞧那些烟花！”以及“拉斯维加斯确实懂得怎么放烟花，对吧？”而文字评论则不那么友好：“极其无聊”、“非常失望”。这就是演艺圈。随着烟雾飘散，VooDoo 乐队重新开始演奏，用吉米·亨德里克斯风格演绎了《星条旗》。似乎没人介意那不是原版。♦ 24 --- 《纽约客》

智能的政治对话。（终于有了。）Tune in 每周三次，听《纽约客》的作者和编辑剖析来自华盛顿的最新新闻——以及这些新闻对这个国家的意义。在任何你获取播客的平台均可收听。扫描以收听。如需查找《纽约客》的所有播客，请访问 newyorker.com / podcasts。

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来自北京的信

中国制造的未来

北京正与美国竞争技术霸权。胜出者将产生巨大的政治影响。 作者：埃文·奥斯诺斯 (EVAN OSNOS)

人工智能公司 01.AI 的首席执行官李开复住在北京一座镜像玻璃高层建筑中，附近是一系列被历代皇帝视为宇宙中心的标志性建筑。李开复在附近的一家酒店进行早间会议，这家酒店看起来像是在任何一个国家，唯一的不同是，客房服务是由涂成管家和女佣制服颜色的机器人提供的。国家宣传将这些机器人誉为中国崛起的象征；但在走廊里，大多数人避开它们的方式，就像对待 Roomba 扫地机器人那样冷淡。

最近一个早晨的早餐期间，穿着白色 Polo 衫、戴着无框眼镜的李开复以一种乐观且好奇的神情谈论着未来。他 1961 年出生于台湾，通过追随不断移动的机会前沿建立了自己的职业生涯。他在 80 年代获得了哥伦比亚大学的计算机科学学位，随后前往卡内基梅隆大学研究当时尚处于起步阶段的人工智能领域——他当时将其描述为一项“最有前途的科学”，将成为“人类理解自身的最后一步”。他曾在苹果公司负责语音识别，并在 1992 年出现在《早安美国》节目中，展示了一台使用语音命令在录像机上记录新闻的计算机原型。（主持人琼·伦登惊叹道：“这简直就像一个朋友。”）他回忆说，在微软工作期间，他曾敦促比尔·盖茨收购一家名为 Google 的雄心勃勃的初创公司，但盖茨拒绝了。李开复后来成为了 Google 中国区的负责人。

李开复在 2009 年转向投资，并计划同时关注中国和美国，但最终他关闭了美国办公室。“现在是两个不同的宇宙了，”他告诉我。这两个国家不仅在贸易、台湾、人权和间谍活动等长期问题上分歧，而且在技术政治方面也日益分歧。正如李开复所指出的，奥巴马政府在 2016 年发布了联邦政府首个针对人工智能时代的重大计划，但几乎没有引起关注：该计划在“Access Hollywood”录音带在总统竞选中引发爆炸性影响几天后出台。

当唐纳德·特朗普就职时，他废除了该计划，并将人工智能战略很大程度上委托给了硅谷。在特朗普削减研究资金的同时，中国采取了被一位投资者称为的“举国体制的国家创新方式”。

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不久之后，中国政府发布了自己的人工智能计划，其中充斥着冗长的共产党术语，但它也制定了一项庞大的工业政策，涵盖从农业到治安的各种应用，承诺到 2025 年取得“重大突破”，到 2030 年达到“世界领先”地位。李开复将其称为“举国体制的国家创新方式”。

长期以来，中国在展望未来时看向西方。而如今，它更倾向于自己的愿景。中国汽车公司比亚迪（BYD）最近在电动汽车产量上超过了特斯拉，成为全球最大的电动汽车制造商。一段热门剪辑显示，特斯拉首席执行官埃隆·马斯克在 2011 年被问到关于比亚迪的竞争时——当时比亚迪主要以一款方正且尺寸较小的轿车而闻名；马斯克笑了，说道：“你看过他们的车吗？”

十五年后，中国拥有超过一百家汽车制造商，他们通过车载卡拉 OK、机械足底按摩器以及能投影汽车电影的视频大灯等奢侈功能来竞争客户。李开福在社交媒体上的帖子吸引了超过五千万追随者，对于这两个他都曾获得成功的国家，他有一个惊人的预测。在

在他 2018 年出版的《AI 超级大国》（AI Superpowers）一书中，他预言了一个“新世界秩序”，其中“技术浪潮将很快席卷全球经济，并使地缘政治格局向中国倾斜”。这种预言契合了北京的官方基调，在那里，国家主席、中共中央总书记习近平将技术称为“国际竞争的主战场”，并直言不讳地断言“东升西降”。今年 7 月，中国公司 Moonshot 发布了一款 AI 模型，其性能与美国竞争对手相当，而成本仅为后者的一小部分。由于担心中国将像现在主导硬件一样主导 AI，微芯片股票大幅下跌。中国生产了全球至少 70% 的无人机、电动汽车、锂离子电池和太阳能电池。其部署的工业机器人数量比世界其他地区的总和还要多；在医学领域，其注册临床试验的数量已经超过了美国。其造船能力大约是美国的 200 倍，华盛顿的一些观察人士担心，在关于台湾的战争中，美国的弹药储备将无法与中国匹敌。

如今，两国都对其发展轨迹感到不安。美国担心是否能延续一个世纪的霸权，而中国则渴望在经历了党所认为的两百年的异常贫困之后，恢复其历史上的显赫地位。周波（Zhou Bo）是解放军一名退役大校，现为清华大学研究员，他告诉我：“常识告诉我们，国家的兴衰是周期性的。”但在他看来，美国人已经失去了这种历史意识。“他们强大了这么久，以至于每个美国人都相信，‘我是地球上最强国家的成员’，”他说。

中国人对其崛起同样深信不疑。一位曾参加过与习近平及其顾问会议的欧洲外交官告诉我：“他们觉得自己像世界冠军。他们认为自己可以与任何人竞争。”

十年前，北京很少有人会预言中国很快就会挑战美国。中国数十年的经济繁荣正在放缓，而政府对自由思想的钳制正促使有抱负的人们出国。在那个年代，一个在中国的人如果提起这两个国家的优劣，可能会陷入一种教条式的对话。你会注意到中国正在变得强大，而你的熟人会回答：“但没有美国那么强大。”

插图：CLEON PETERSON 27 ---

“饼干很平庸，但这里的队伍是全市最长的。”

中国建制派分阶段地放弃了那种观点。2016 年英国脱欧获得批准时，西方似乎在转向内敛。关于新冠疫苗的争夺发出了一个信号，表明美国正在分裂；国会山骚乱则提供了另一个信号。在特朗普重返白宫后，他的政府宣布：“美国像阿特拉斯一样支撑整个世界秩序的日子已经结束了。”他的助手斯蒂芬·米勒（Stephen Miller）则谈到了一个“由武力主导”的国际秩序，并补充道：“这些是自古以来就存在的世界铁律。”

在北京，中国人民大学的一个智库最近发表了一篇名为《感谢特朗普》的评估报告，讽刺地赞扬他通过破坏美国的盟友关系、公务员体系、科学机构和民主信誉，加速了“一个帝国的黄昏”。根据民主联盟（Alliance of Democracies）的一项全球调查，在过去两年中，美国的国际认可率下降了近 40 个百分点；在多项民调中，中国的评分现在高于美国。

对于中国而言，美国的退缩恰逢其数十年的国家投资、工业政策和外交规划开始产生回报。完全信任中国的官方统计数据将是鲁莽的；正如经济学家高山文（Gao Shanwen）曾对华盛顿的听众所言，官方增长率“将始终在5%左右”。但变化是显而易见的。在二十年间，中国的发电量从美国的一半左右增长到美国的两倍多，且价格低得多；2023年，中国安装的太阳能电量超过了美国整个历史上的安装总量。与此同时，特朗普重新拥抱化石燃料，历史学家蒂莫西·斯奈德（Timothy Snyder）将其称为“或许是最基本形式的大国自杀”。多年来，特朗普一直承诺将阻止中国通过不公平贸易行为“强奸我们的国家”。在2025年4月的“解放日”，他公布了一项广泛的关税计划。财政部长斯科特·贝森特（Scott Bessent）预测北京将迅速屈服，称他的对手们手中拿的是“一对2”。相反，中国通过限制稀土和高功率磁铁的出口进行了反击。几周之内，福特公司被迫暂停其芝加哥工厂的Explorer车型生产，汽车制造商们恳求达成协议。自那时起，中国不仅保持了全球最大贸易国的地位，还实现了1.2万亿加元的创纪录贸易顺差，因为它将其出口方向从美国转移。2001年，五分之四个国家的对美贸易额高于对华贸易额。到2023年，地图发生了反转：十分之七的国家与中国的贸易额更高。目前，中国的统治者避免公开对抗美国，因为他们认为，即使在衰落中，美国依然具有独特的危险性。在特朗普干预委内瑞拉和伊朗，以及威胁加拿大和格陵兰岛之后，共产党喉舌《北京日报》写道，美国正“凭借强大的军事力量将世界拖回掠夺与分裂的黑暗时代”。但这种叫嚣掩盖了一个更冷酷的计算：中国领导人认为，特朗普试图主宰世界的挣扎实际上在帮助中国。乔治城大学教授、对外关系委员会中国专家鲁什·多希（Rush Doshi）在特朗普追求领土控制的行为中看到了一个重复的历史错误。在18世纪，当俄罗斯执着于征服欧亚大陆时，英国开发了蒸汽机；在19世纪和20世纪，当欧洲人争夺非洲时，美国人掌握了流水线。多希表示，今天，当美国试图治理委内瑞拉并削弱伊朗和古巴时，“中国正专注于赢得未来的技术”。如果美国在下一波产业（包括人工智能、生物技术和机器人）的竞争中失利——就像它在太阳能电池板、电池和电动汽车领域失利那样——“这将不可逆转地改变权力平衡”。

28 --- 中国想象什么样的世界？其“一带一路”倡议提供了一种某种程度上的预演。自2013年以来，该倡议向数十个国家投入了约一万亿加元，建设高速公路、医院、矿山、港口以及配备中国技术的“智慧城市”。多希说，对中国而言，“独裁政体被认为是完全合法的，而技术被用来加强这些政体。中国越来越多地对独裁者说：‘你想继续掌权吗？我可以帮你。’”在尼泊尔，新安装的面部识别系统已被部署用于对付活动人士，一张来自安全总部的照片显示，在一面视频监控墙上方挂着一块标牌，上面写着“中国公安部敬赠”。

但北京全球愿景最清晰的迹象，或许就在于中国目前的现状。“一个国家倾向于创造一个与其内部秩序非常相似的外部秩序，”多希说道。“中国不希望你过多思考其崛起对世界意味着什么。他们想向你展示未来的前沿。他们想向每个人推销两条信息：一条是‘我们是不可避免的’，另一条是‘不必担心’。”

北京比我在那里生活的2005年至2013年期间要安静得多。车辆（现在很多是电动车）在街道上静静地行驶，而且无论如何，居民出门的理由也更少了；中国拥有全球最繁忙的电子商务市场，几乎没有什么东西不能通过电动车配送。人们整天扫描彼此的二维码，通过微信和支付宝等数字支付系统交换现金，向算法提供关于其行踪和偏好地日益复杂的画像。

在一个高科技的一党制国家首都，生活呈现出一种尴尬的宁静。“如果你不是异见人士，这里是世界上最安全的地方之一，”那位欧洲外交官告诉我。在习近平清除党内、军队和商业精英中不受欢迎人物的运动开展十多年后，清洗行动已经回到了最高层。（人们过去常说，这种清洗让人想起一句中国古话，“杀鸡儆猴”。）现在他们说，习近平直接在“杀猴”。

人们会对熟人的失踪产生一种奇怪的习惯。由于指控可以保密多年，一个人可能会简单地“凭空消失”，这位外交官说，并补充道，这被视为社会维护的副产品。“这里最大的优先级是党的机器。人排在第二位。”

中国领导层长期以来一直认为，技术可以帮助国家克服人事纷杂的混乱。习近平借用了斯大林将意识形态工具比作“人类灵魂工程师”的意象，以促进“文明”行为为名，将政府的触角延伸到了私人生活中。在南方城市广州，人工智能正帮助管教那些未能将厨余垃圾与普通垃圾分开的居民，方法是将他们的照片发布到垃圾桶附近的数字屏幕“曝光站”上。其他城市也使用类似的系统来曝光乱扔垃圾、乱穿马路和随地吐痰的人。

企业也在参与这项工作。在北京的一个人工智能产品博览会上，我看到一个由朗信（Langxin）公司制造的高大白色亭子，该公司将人工智能应用于心理学。这台机器被标记为“情绪识别训练增强系统”。我站在摄像头前，接受对我面部“微表情”的评估，屏幕上产生了一个标有“正负比例”的饼图。它告知我，我拥有76.67%的正向情绪和23.33%的负向情绪。结果显示，我的负面情绪包括13.33%的恐惧和6.67%的愤怒。

朗信向教师推销类似的产品，包括“综合风险预警系统”，该系统扫描学生是否有破坏性行为的迹象；通过结合课堂、宿舍、消费和心理记录的数据，它为每位学生分配红色、黄色或蓝色的“预警”级别。

警察拥有更强大的选择。在北京的一个贸易展上，另一家公司推销的一款软件可以远程扫描生命体征，并声称能在十五秒内做出性格评估，包括情绪稳定性和“行为倾向”。

人工智能已迅速融入中国的工作和生活。中国人看待技术的警惕性通常低于美国人，因为生活水平

在计算时代，生活水平得到了如此剧烈的提升。在 20 世纪 70 年代，超过 70% 的人口从事农业；而如今，这一数字已低于 25%。投资人李开复认为，中国人在文化上也为这类技术做好了准备。他说，对于美国人来说，“一直被监听是一件可怕的事情”。而在中国，摄像头几乎覆盖了所有被占用的空间。李开复推介了他公司的一款新软件，该软件允许他记录每一次办公室会议，并使用诸如“在我认为进展顺利的项目中，哪些实际上并不顺利？”之类的提示词来分析音频。该软件还在一个名为“承诺账本”（Promise Ledger）的日志中追踪口头承诺，以便在绩效评估期间追究员工的责任。我问他，这种录音是否会让人们不愿承担承诺。他说：“或许会有某种寒蝉效应，但在中国并不明显，因为人们总是认为老板权力很大，且有权监听。”他补充道：“这是一个自我筛选的过程。不喜欢这样的人不会加入我的公司。”

在北京南边，我参观了中国最著名的汽车工厂——超级工厂（Hyperfactory），这是一个规模相当于 100 个足球场的园区，在 14 个月内建成。它属于小米，这家公司在进入汽车行业之前，是通过销售智能手机和家用电器（如电动牙刷和煎锅）而闻名的。在大厅里，我看到一群中国访客正在展开一面镰刀锤头旗，准备拍集体照。在他们身后是一个繁忙的星巴克柜台。上方由电线悬吊着一辆跑车，姿态就像在莫比乌斯带上疾驰，旨在唤起对不断改进的永恒追求。一名导游将我们引导至高尔夫球车上，将我们带入一个巨大的场地，那里可见的工人如此之少，以至于人们可能会误以为今天是国家法定假日。汽车由大约 700 台机器人制造，它们被紧凑地排列在由粗电缆束控制的复杂且协调的阵型中。新鲜的零部件由 127 辆自动驾驶小车运抵，当有人挡在路中间时，这些小车会发出“让路！”的叫声。根据 29 --- 公司的说法，每 76 秒就有一辆成品车下线。

参观结束时，我被引导至一条赛道，一名司机在亮黄色的小米 SU7 Ultra 中等待。我爬进副驾驶座。他微笑着说：“三，二，一”，然后猛踩油门。我之前没有关注我们具体要做什么的细节，这可能是一个错误。汽车向前冲出的动力，是人们在没有喷气推进的情况下极少能体验到的。后来我得知，SU7 Ultra 拥有 1,548 匹马力，零到六十英里加速在两秒之内，比法拉利还快。我被死死地压在座椅上，胸口涌起一阵恶心感。当我们绕过一个弯道并冲向一段直道时，我盯着地平线，心想我的寿险保单是否办理妥当。司机兴致勃勃地提议再跑一圈，但我挥手拒绝了。

这家工厂被建在离北京豪华酒店区近在咫尺的地方，而非在偏远地带，这并非偶然。它成了外国游客以及通过抽签获得参观机会的幸运当地人的景点。旅行社一直在组织前往中国最令人印象深刻的工业遗址的“科技之旅”，提供他们大肆宣传的“全球最快列车”体验、“AI眼镜”试用，以及在咖啡休息时间观看“无人机为你送来拿铁”的场景。接踵而至的西方网红、投资者和评论员们如期发布了那些令人惊叹的桥梁和火车站照片，为“基建色情”（infrastructure porn）和“中国最大化”（Chinamaxing）等流派提供了素材。他们的认知是由持续不断的营销和宣传塑造的。在我参观超级工厂（Hyperfactory）的那个下午，机器人因为“调整”而停工，但导游很少停顿超过几秒钟，便会指着那台700吨的压铸机，或者那套能检测铸件是否在微小程度上偏离规格的快速X射线系统。

但在炒作之余，确实存在真正的优势。福特公司首席执行官吉姆·法利（Jim Farley）最近访问了中国的汽车工厂，并将中国的汽车进步描述为“我见过的最令人感到卑微的事情”。中国领导人似乎在押注，通过加速奔向未来，他们可以跑赢近期过去所犯的错误。在全国各地，城市中点缀着许多“烂尾楼”——那些由资金链断裂的开发商留下的未完工塔楼和别墅的混凝土外壳。多年来，地方官员鼓励过度建设，因为这能为基础设施提供资金，推动增长，并为他们赢得晋升。开发商在房屋建成之前就将其出售给公众。但房地产市场在 2021 年开始崩溃——最终导致新房销售额减半——中国被留下了估计 9000 万套空房，足以容纳俄罗斯的人口。在破产的开发商抛弃烂尾楼后，一些最坚韧的买家勉强维持——他们搬进未完工的壳房，用煤炉做饭，把水拎上楼。

现在的中国包含着一系列平行经济：在房地产崩盘的残骸和繁荣的新技术蜂巢之间，有大批大学毕业生，他们接受的是传统白领工作的培训，但进入的却是一个日益倾向于高科技制造业的劳动力市场。（在政府改变统计数据报告方式之前，官方的青年失业率曾升至 21% 以上。）去年由斯坦福大学和哈佛大学研究人员发布的一项关于中国公众舆论的研究，罕见地深入探讨了当地人的态度，并发现了一种明显的“从乐观到悲观”的转变。预期生活水平会提高的公民比例已下降至约 28%，大约是本世纪初的一半。有影响力的作家许知远将此称为“一个深刻混乱的 era, ”其特点是“经济下滑、国际地缘政治的不确定性以及人工智能的巨大影响同时到来”。去年秋天，政府审查机构在网上发起了一场针对“过度悲观情绪”的运动，包括诸如“努力没用”之类的评论。

一天早晨，我漫步走到我以前在北京居住的房子那里，惊讶地发现前门敞开着。那里已经空了，但人们在进进出出。我恰好在租赁中介拍照时到达，他们希望能找到租客并收取佣金。让我震惊的是，竟然有这么多中介在竞争一套两居室的租赁权——这正是盛行于中国各行各业的过度竞争的图腾。

一名穿着灰色风衣的房地产中介拿着一个电动车头盔向我走来。得知我不是潜在客户后，他表示遗憾，但仍很渴望聊天。他用英语交谈，语气带着一种勤奋的正式感，像是那些努力学习一门语言却很少有机会使用的人那样。他给自己起名叫 John，并在谈话中不时穿插一些英文格言。当我问起生意如何时，他说：“很难，但凡事都有两面性（every coin has two sides）。”他坦诚地讲述了职业带来的压力。事实是，他已经四个月没拿到佣金了。很多房地产中介都破产了。“只有不到 20% 的人在赚钱，”他说。John 四十七岁，离异，有一个在读大学的女儿。他的父亲和姐姐在帮他支付伙食费。“在我这个年纪遇到这种情况太糟糕了，”他说，“我仍然想寻找爱情，但这真的很难。”他参加过几次约会，但都没有结果。“我认为原因之一是我钱不够，”他说，“如果我是个大亨，她们会愿意和我交流的。”为了安慰他，我说他看起来是个心地善良的人。John 微笑了，挺直了身子。他又准备好了一句格言：“生活不容易，但我们不知道明天会发生什么。”

中国设计未来的渴望长期以来与对西方的焦虑交织在一起。1872 年，清朝时期，总督李鸿章痛苦地写道，一种“三千年未有之变局”正在发生：西方人凭借其“先进的枪炮和蒸汽船，能够在中国的土地上横行霸道”。中国在欧洲之前一千年左右就开始铸铁，但它变得自满了。他宣称，现在是时候“师夷长技以制夷”了。但帝国抵制 30 --- 现代化努力，中国的改革者被迫流亡。1902 年，改革运动的领导者之一梁启超发表了《新中国未来》，这部小说想象了数十年后的国家：拥有宪法、议会以及如此之高的技术威望，以至于海外学生纷纷涌入。

当毛泽东在 1949 年掌权时，他有不同的想法。“政治与技术必须统一，”他宣布。这是一个灾难性的结合：毛泽东的“大跃进”试图在短短十五年内让中国跨越英国，这种妄想导致了历史上最严重的饥荒，估计造成 4500 万人死亡。

从 70 年代后期开始，社会工程的幻象制造了另一场灾难。党设定了人均年收入达到 800 到 1000 加元的目标。它推论，为了实现这一目标，必须管理人口增长。一名叫宋健的中国火箭科学家领导了一项任务，利用国家最先进的计算机来规划正确路径。他和他的团队得出结论，整个问题的“关键”是将每个家庭限制在一个孩子。这是一个激进的想法，但宋健及其团队极具说服力；他们用印刷的图表和数据展示研究结果，而当时许多专家仍在通过算盘和口袋计算器工作。人类学家、《只有一个孩子》（Just One Child）一书的作者苏珊·格林哈尔（Susan Greenhalgh）写道，工程师们将“一切都封在一个贴着‘科学’标签的黑匣子中”，尽管这项政策基于的是关于政府角色、人体神圣性以及私人生活界限等未经审视的政治判断。而且这项政策也是错误的。正如格林哈尔所写，工程师们将零散的数据拼接在一起，并以虚假的精确度将其外推到小数点后两位。最重要的是，他们习惯于处理无生命的对象，而非复杂的人类社会，他们无视了社会科学家关于后果的警告：人口快速老龄化、劳动力和军事短缺，以及执行法律时的残酷必要手段。

在接下来的三十五年里，独生子女政策导致近两亿公民被绝育，并造成超过三亿次堕胎。到2015年中国取消该政策时，它还引发了一场经济惨剧，缩小了可用劳动力池，并使该国习惯于单孩家庭。自1987年以来，中国的出生人数下降了近三分之二。去年，出生人数不足800万——这是自1949年开始记录以来的最低率。尽管美国的出生率也在下降，2024年为每名女性1.6个孩子，但中国的问题要严重得多。其目前的生育率是每名女性一个孩子。为了扭转这一下降趋势，中国提供了育儿覆盖、税收减免、住房激励和生育治疗补贴。但这些都没有起作用。产科病房和幼儿园正在关闭。研究生育模式的耶鲁大学社会学家张艾玛（Emma Zang）去年访问中国时，惊讶地发现年轻人经常问她为什么决定生孩子。她得出结论，“真正的障碍不是养育孩子的成本。相反，是一种信念，即在这样一个感觉充满不确定性且不值得投资的未来中，为人父母已不再有意义。”

这些后果都没有动摇党对工程学变革力量的信念。在过去十年中，习近平习惯于用一个尖锐的词组来描述这个历史时刻：“百年未有之大变局”。他是在呼应1872年，但有所不同。那时，“未有”的变化是西方的新力量；而今天，习近平在号召利用西方的弱点。1978年，正当邓小平让中国走上改革道路时，一位名叫饶屹（Yi Rao）的有志科学家开始了大学生活。那些年中国的科学研究严重缺乏资金；甚至连移液管末端的 disposable 塑料头，实验室工作人员都几乎无法获得。但饶屹认识在美国的中国科学家，他们同意从垃圾桶里搜集这些塑料头并寄回国。“我们可以重复使用很多次，”饶屹说。中国领导人决心在科学领域“赶超”发达国家，其中三件事至关重要：人才、资金和基础设施。为了培养人才，他们派遣学生出国；在十年之内，在美中国留学生人数增长了十倍。1985年，饶屹搬到旧金山学习神经科学，他注意到一个普通的厨房台面所使用的材料就比中国的任何研究台都要好，他说：“我怎么能想象自己还会回去？”

但在21世纪初，当他在西北大学担任教授时，他收到了一份出任北京大学生命科学学院院长的邀请。中国正通过爱国号召和改变国家科学前景的承诺来吸引科学家回国。饶屹同意了，但他的预期有限。他回忆说，当时大学里没有人曾在国际顶级科学期刊上发表过论文。教授们将工作交给资历不足的朋友和门生，学术造假十分普遍。中国的生物技术公司生产的几乎只有廉价的仿制药。饶屹接手后，将植物学和动物学的必修课替换为遗传学和分子生物学。转折点出现在2015年，当时中国开始修订药品安全法以符合国际标准，允许本土生物技术公司获得利润丰厚的外国合同。科学人才开始回流，他们被丰厚的实验室资金和可能超过15万美元的签约奖金所吸引。

随后，与美国的紧张关系爆发。2018年，特朗普发动了贸易战，其美国司法部（DOJ）发起了“中国计划”，旨在根除间谍活动和贸易窃密，该计划针对了一百多名华裔科学家及其他人员。在外界未能充分意识到的情况下，特朗普打破了中国内部一场政治辩论的平衡。当时私营部门处于上升期，具有影响力的亿万富翁马云认为大学教育被高估了。“他基本上是说，知识分子不产生任何东西，”饶告诉我，“中国经济通过模仿西方取得了成功，那么我们为什么还要在原创研究上投入更多资金？但一旦特朗普上台，那一派观点就完全崩溃了。”2020年，党中央将“科技自立自强”设定为首要目标，去年，探索性基础研究的资金达到了国家研发预算的7%，创下历史新高。其效果令人震惊。到2024年，中国在临床试验数量上已经超过了美国。（招募

黄蜂

在八月或七月，你能如此清晰地听到它们整日啃噬着遮阳篷旁草坪椅的木头，不久之后，在它们的螯肢之下，每一根纤维都被磨碎，整件家具仿佛从未存在过。鸟儿在歌唱，鸟儿将唱完；风来了，风又走；一片阴郁笼罩在西方，唯有它们脆弱的巢穴将其点亮：像亮白色的灯笼，或像屋脊下鼓起的船帆，像煮沸的公猫头骨，像纸月亮，一些泡沫，一面海雾般的指引旗。空荡荡的花园上方，回荡着嗡嗡的鸣响。——扬·瓦格纳（Jan Wagner）（由大卫·凯普林格从德语翻译而来。）

（那里的受试者所需时间不到一半，且试验成本估计降低了40%。）那年秋天，来自中国公司康方生物（Akeso）的一种实验性癌症药物表现优于 Keytruda，后者是由美国制药巨头默克（Merck）生产的金标准疗法。今年年初，在特朗普政府削减美国联邦和学术科学研究资金后，中国政府宣布将科技资金再次增加10%。在发表具有影响力的研究论文方面（以被他人引用次数衡量），中国已经超过了美国和欧盟。中国生物技术公司目前产生了全球近三分之一的新药候选药物，几乎与美国持平。

“华盛顿的人们担心生物技术会成为下一个电动汽车，”一位美国高管告诉我，“我们把所有这些该死的人才都吓回中国了。如果你看看那些在做这些研究的人，他们以前在西方制药巨头工作，或者在某个顶尖大学担任系主任。”普林斯顿、哈佛和麻省理工学院的研究人员的一份报告指出，在 2010 和 2021. 之间，有近两万名华裔科学家离开了美国。研究过这一外流现象的加拿大学者大卫·茨威格（David Zweig）告诉我，在中国的一所新研究机构西湖大学，“大约有100个新实验室是由回国人员建立的，其中可能 80% 来自美国。”他说，“首先，是因为他们感到被排挤。然后，资金枯竭了。”

我最近拜访了饶毅，在一个学术综合体的顶层，在一间俯瞰湖泊的角落办公室见到了他。他向我展示了一个为学生研究员提供世界级设备的实验室。“我必须不断告诉他们，他们生活在怎样的奢侈之中，”他说。我询问饶毅关于特朗普削减科学经费的影响。“这非常愚蠢，”他说，“发明不会凭空出现。”他举了一个例子：如果美国减少对癌症研究的资助，“那么现在中国可能在美国之前发明出癌症疫苗，这将是很自然的事情。”

饶毅坦率地谈到了中国科技面临的持久问题。例如，中国从未掌握商业喷气发动机或最高性能微芯片所需的超精密制造技术。他将该国 30% 的生物学论文斥为“垃圾”，并表示另外 50% 代表的是渐进式发现，而非“从0到1”的突破。他说，目前中国主要擅长“从2到100”的进展，但他认为标准将会提高。如果中国成为开发癌症疗法而闻名的地方，情况将在根本上 32 --- 变得不同。

“目前的世界秩序是由一群天才建立的，他们主要在美国，但来自欧洲，”饶毅说，“如果特朗普能有效地维持这个秩序，中国将很难突破。特朗普真的帮了我们。”

北京的许多科技公司都位于中关村地区，这是一个办公综合体集群，其所在地在帝国 era 曾是宫廷太监的墓地。一代以来，中关村随着科技时尚的每一次更迭而演变。如今，人工智能产品的广告正迅速取代那些褪色的元宇宙广告。曾在中国和硅谷都工作过的人倾向于评论两者的相似之处：对快速变革的信念、工程师的力量，以及掩盖了对真实人类缺乏耐心的那种对人类整体的乐观。在中关村的一家 Peet's Coffee 里，到处是戴着 AirPods 的二十多岁年轻人，一个来自帕洛阿尔托的访客很容易在这里感到宾至如归。

这两个国家的 AI 中心之间最大的区别在于人们如何谈论自己的意图。美国工程师倾向于关注实现通用人工智能的变革潜力，以及随之而来的乌托邦式（或反乌托邦式）的连锁反应。中国科技公司的目标则更为迫切；由于美国对最先进芯片的出口管制，他们的资本和计算能力较少，因此他们主要专注于将产品推向日常商业。

去年，中国初创公司 DeepSeek 发布了一个令硅谷震惊的 AI 模型。批评者将其成功归功于走私芯片和不透明的融资，OpenAI 则指责其抄袭更优秀的模型。中国观察人士则注意到，DeepSeek 运行良好，且花费要少得多。

在 AInnovation（一家将 整合到传统工厂的公司）中，我见到了首席技术官范力（Fan Li），他曾通过一个针对天才的政府项目从一座煤矿城市被选拔出来。他在微软和亚马逊工作，随后于 2021 年回到中国加入 热潮。范力带我走到一台标有“ 螺钉检测设备”的机器前。在机器内部，微小的螺钉沿着生产线飞速移动，高分辨率摄像头扫描它们是否存在微观问题。通过测试的螺钉滑入标有“合格产品”的滑槽。（这让人想起文化大革命时期的一句口号，号召每位同志要做“革命机器上的一颗不生锈的螺丝钉”。）

范力说，在 出现之前，工厂需要人工检查螺钉，这“没有效率”。现在，这些人可以被取代。中国的工厂仍然生产大量廉价的玩具和鞋类，但该国也实现了技术飞跃。对工厂自动化和机器人技术的投资使得商品生产成本极低，以至于美国的关税基本没有影响；即使加上这些费用，价格依然很低。

在屏幕上，范力调出了一个复杂的工厂图表，那是他的客户之一——青岛啤酒的工厂。他输入了一个提示词：“他们在过去一年中是否实现了节能目标？如果没有，原因是什么？”这是一个看似简单的问题。你不仅需要知道过去的表现和未来的目标——他说，“你还需要深入挖掘每条生产线、每台机器。”

片刻之后，系统闪现一条消息：“我们已成功检索到四台设备的能耗数据、异常原因及建议操作。”它指出巴氏杀菌机和麦芽磨中潜伏着“异常”，并告诉我们该怎么做：检查麦芽磨是否有湿麦芽或堵塞；调查巴氏杀菌机的蒸汽和泵行为。范力说：“一个人完成整个过程可能需要三个小时。现在你可以在几分钟内完成。”

中国并非对 将导致大规模失业和社会动荡的恐惧免疫。李开复在其书中警告称，“ 可能会创造一个 21 世纪的种姓制度”。但他预测，失业在美国引发的动荡将比在

中国，因为美国工人中从事白领工作的人员比例更高。我问他如何看待美国大学毕业生在毕业典礼上对推崇 AI 的演讲者发出嘘声的消息。李开复说：“美国的方式非常容易理解。但中国的方式将导致人才、应用和数据的激增——直到发生某些可怕的事情。那时情况可能会改变。但在社交媒体时代，人们很容易遗忘。”

来自 AInnovation 的李（Li）听到的声音则更多是关于风险的担忧。在会议室里吃三明治时，他告诉我他有一个十五岁的儿子，其他家长经常问：我们的孩子应该学什么？“我也在问自己同样的问题，”他说。近年来，中国大幅削减了被认为已经过时的本科专业，包括许多人文科学专业，同时引入了具身智能等领域的研究项目。许多大学开设了 AI 专业。但李说：“三年后，当我儿子上大学时，人工智能可能甚至不再是一个专业了。”李表示，即使是从事 AI 工作的人也无法跟上技术的发展，其变化速度“可能比十年前快十倍”。“你离这个生态系统越近，就越了解细节和即将发生的事情，你就会变得有点担心。”

减少对人力需求的一种方式，是中国政府弥补劳动力萎缩的方法。另一种方式是机器人。2024年，中国每安装一台工业机器人的数量是美国的九倍。人机之间的竞争甚至蔓延到了流行文化中。2025年初，北京举办了一场机器人与人类对决的半程马拉松，由于许多机器人过热，人类轻松获胜。但一年后，一个亮红色的类人机器人——挥动着一对细长的手臂以保持平衡——击败了所有 1.2 万名人类参赛者并打破了世界纪录。

在年度收视率最高的电视节目——春节联欢晚会上，又一次大规模展示了机器人技术。类人机器人行进、后空翻并挥舞双节棍；机器人熊猫则在嬉戏。一些中国观众感受到了一种缺失。一名 33 岁的观众据报道在网上写道：“在这么多机器人之中，我们在寻找人类。”但政府的目标是增强人们对未来汹涌而来的信心。一家机器人公司的负责人告诉记者，他感受到了巨大的压力，必须“交付一场明显优于去年的表演”。在某种意义上，编排好的奇观比应对混乱的日常工作世界要容易得多。中国电视上的类人机器人同步得非常完美，但如果出现任何脱离剧本的情况——比如一次失足，或一个错过信号的人——这些机器可能会变成一堆纠缠在一起、挥舞着肢体的废铁。

在李的办公室里，我看到两名员工演示一项初步工作，他们希望让机器人能够从工厂供应橱柜中取回物品。其中一人将一些瓶子、罐头和小吃随机摆放，而另一人戴着虚拟现实头显，两手各持一个追踪设备，引导一个黄色的小型类人机器人迟缓地捡起日常物品。这个练习看起来困难得令人费解。

李说，机器人的进步速度比预期的要慢。“ChatGPT 能够成功，是因为它消耗了世界上几乎所有被写下来的文字，”他告诉我，“人们希望机器人能完成的任务很多，但我们没有足够的数据。”在附近的一张桌子上，一对纤细的金属手臂正在反复折叠一件蓝色 T 恤。在技术圈，折叠衣物有时被称为“机器人技术的圣杯”，这既是因为挑战的复杂性，也是因为一旦成功将引发公众的极大热情。李说：“我们关注两个指标：机器人完成工作的速度——三十秒还是一分钟——以及失败率。”失败源于随机性。“你可以用很多种方式把衣服放在桌上，”李说，“每次形状都不同。”

在离开时，我参观了大堂外的一家便利店。柜台由一个拥有闪亮银色面孔和强壮手臂的人形机器人把守。它的左边，香肠在镀铬滚轮上旋转；它的右边，一名穿着鲜艳制服的人类店员显得耐心且困惑。该机器人的制造商 Galbot 在这座大楼里设有办公室，而且就像我所见到的许多东西一样，这台机器的安装似乎既是为了功能性，也是为了公关价值。它用中文愉快地向我打招呼：“我可以帮您寻找商品，拿一些香肠或饮料，或者给您讲个冷笑话来活跃气氛。”

当我停下来思考这一场景时，机器人催促我：“您需要什么商品？”其他顾客在我身后排队，在我回答之前，机器人补充道：“您看起来有点累。”事实上，我确实累了；我一直在一个接一个的会议之间奔波。在我还没来得及询问机器人是如何获得这种敏感度之前，它提出了另一个问题：“需要我为您拿一瓶 Vitality Water Balance 或清香柚子茉莉花茶来帮您恢复体力吗？”

我选择了香肠。“我马上为您拿！”机器人说，并将其左臂伸进展示柜。但香肠从它的抓取中滑落，啪地一声回到了队列中，与那些在滚轮之间懒散旋转的其他香肠待在一起。机器人没有注意到这个意外；它收回手臂，将并不存在的货物放在我面前，并宣布：“记得在左侧结账！”店员紧张地笑了笑，挥手示意无需付款。

我在中关村闲逛了一会儿。那是一个炎热的下午，一群外卖骑手聚集在立交桥的阴影下抽烟。随着经济增速放缓，超过两亿中国人加入了零工经济。其中约有两千万名外卖骑手，他们已成为这个新 era 的最显著标志。2018, 一个名叫胡安延（音译）的年轻人曾在便利店当店员、卖自行车以及当保安之后，在北京找到了一份快递员的工作。典型的一天包括 11 小时的配送，但在电商平台进行促销、订单量激增时，班次会更长。“我们必须在打卡下班前送完当天所有的包裹，这通常意味着要工作 15 或 16 个小时，”他告诉我。胡时刻警惕那些他无法控制的障碍——电梯缓慢的大楼，以及必须等待住户开门才能进入的锁闭大门。为了实现每天约 40 美元的收入目标，他必须每四分钟完成一次配送。停下来小便会浪费大约两分钟，所以他尽可能少喝水。

有些雇主比其他的更好，但他们都共享着一种算法时代的文化。正如一位严厉的老板告诉胡的时候那样，“平台告诉你必须完成哪些配送！”并且“你没什么特别的。”这让胡感到困扰，但他意识到，老板“实际上也只是机器上的另一个齿轮”。随着时间的推移，为算法服务的生活改变了他对人情世故的看法。他开始怨恨同事，并将他们的挣扎视为零和博弈。“少数资深员工会长期把简单的路线占住，而那些被分配到困难路线的新手，通常直接辞职并被替换，”他告诉我。他变得“更加没耐心且焦虑”，但最让他不安的是一种悄然袭来的麻木。有一天，在得知一位年长的顾客在市场等了他近三个小时后，胡没有感到任何同情。“在正常情况下，我会感到内疚，”他说。“但那一刻我还有一大堆包裹要送，我不能为他停下来，哪怕只有五分钟。”胡做了二十个月的配送员。随后他辞职，并在一部语言质朴的回忆录《我在北京送快递》中描述了自己的经历。这本书出人意料地成为了畅销书，并启发了近期其他关于不稳定就业的中国回忆录，包括《我在上海开出租》和《我的母亲是一名清洁工》。但在中国，这种不稳定状态从未局限于底层人群。今年三月，当局突然禁止一家名为 Manus 的 AI 初创公司的两名创始人出境。他们此前达成了一项协议，将公司以 20 亿美元的价格出售给美国社交媒体巨头 Meta，而中国政府对此并不满意。这向其他 AI 公司传递了一个令人胆寒的信号：某些人才对国家而言过于宝贵，不能被允许离开。多年来，中国崛起的力量一直依赖于经济自由与政治控制之间的一种脆弱平衡，早期的党内改革者将其称为“鸟笼经济”——空间足够宽敞以允许企业繁荣，但又不足以宽阔到可以牺牲权力。这种安排—— 34 --- 很少像现在这样显得如此岌。加里·里斯切尔（Gary Rieschel），一位在中国有深厚经验的美国投资者，去年告诉听众，习近平正试图“拴住”这只“下金蛋的鹅，而这只鹅带来了中国非凡的崛起”。里斯切尔补充道，“如果你不知道的话，鹅是不喜欢被拴住的。”他说，“关键问题变成了，北京的领导层能否有效地平衡控制与活力之间微妙的关系？”在罗伯特·卡根（Robert Kagan）的《美国创造的世界》（The World America Made）一书中，他列举了一系列全球强权，它们都曾坚信自己的持久性：“曾有过埃及秩序、罗马秩序、希腊秩序、伊斯兰秩序、莫卧儿秩序、奥斯曼秩序，以及许多其他秩序。”每一个都诞生于特定的、通常是脆弱的环境中。卡根在 2012 年写道，美国秩序将持续“直到某个尚未确定的时刻”。那个时刻似乎已经到来。欧洲对外关系委员会主任马克·伦纳德（Mark Leonard）告诉我，美国在第二次世界大战后构建——并经常为了自身利益而运行——的国际体系“绝对已经死亡且无法挽回”。他说，特朗普对美国盟友关系的拆解，标志着“美国公众愿意扮演美国在过去八十年大部分时间里所扮演的角色”的终结。但美国地位的下降并不一定会为中国铺平道路。如今很少有人会对由任何一个超级大国主导的世界前景感到热情。在欧洲，自 2010 年代后期以来，对北京的看法已经僵化，当时中国的使节尝试了一种被称为“战狼外交”的好斗风格。在一名香港异见人士获得一项授予受迫害作家的瑞典奖项后，一名中国大使表示：“我们用美酒对待朋友，但对于敌人，我们准备了散弹枪。”

最近，欧洲的焦虑集中在贸易经济上。随着中国致力于主导全球科技制造业，它开始生产远超其国内经济需求的产品——电动汽车、太阳能设备、电池、风力涡轮机以及基础化学品。理论上，这种产能过剩应该会导致工厂关闭，从而使激增势头消退。但中国政府一直在推动企业继续生产，部分原因是担心失业率上升可能会引发动荡。过剩的产品被出口，且价格通常低到足以削弱其他国家的工业经济。“这是系统性的，而非偶然的，”欧盟在华商会前负责人约尔格·武特克（Joerg Wuttke）告诉我。

欧洲的恐惧感日益紧迫。大众汽车（Volkswagen）正考虑裁减多达十万个工作岗位并关闭四家工厂，这将是全球汽车工业历史上最大规模的裁员。伦纳德告诉我，对中国工业政策的愤恨已达到“白热化程度，尤其是在德国，人们感觉到中国正在加倍实施导致欧洲去工业化的政策”。他补充道，“最大的恐惧是巴登-符腾堡州（Baden-Württemberg）——梅赛德斯-奔驰的总部所在地——会变成底特律（Detroit）。”他说，欧洲政治家在私下里将这种感觉描述为同时遭受来自华盛顿、北京和莫斯科的攻击，并且正“意识到他们必须在一个需要自我保护免受所有大国侵害的世界中生存”。

目前讨论的应对措施带有应急即兴发挥的色彩：阻止中国公司建厂或竞标利润丰厚的合同，对钢铁和化学品征收严厉关税，甚至暂停技术专利——这一系列手段被统称为“贸易大炮”（trade bazooka）。一些经济学家认为，欧洲可以通过现代化地更有效地竞争。但这种强化防御的感觉已延伸至贸易之外。德国已承诺在军备和基础设施方面投入高达一万亿美元的新支出。武特克表示：“特朗普正在切断联系，到处征收关税。而中国人没有退让。因此，决定不再是‘北京还是华盛顿’，而是与雅加达（Jakarta）、德里（Delhi）以及其他国家建立联系。”

中国官员经常警告不要让世界陷入一个“弱肉强食”的无法无天状态。但该党自身的策略无论在国内外都毫不妥协。前美国驻华大使尼古拉斯·伯恩斯（Nicholas Burns）告诉我：“中国总是说，‘美国政府太好斗了。’那是他们的修辞掩饰。现实是他们在幕后在进行你死我活的竞争。”去年，特朗普向巴拿马施压，要求将其两个重要港口的控制权从一家总部位于香港的公司手中剥离，交给一个由美国领导的财团。据报道，在这场争端中，中国警告外国高管不要从事“损害中国公司利益的非法活动”。

忽视此类警告是危险的。被卷入 35 --- "还记得以前大家都特别迷青铜的时候吗？" 地缘政治争端的国际商务人士已被禁止离开中国。这位欧洲外交官告诉我，传递出的信息是：“我们是一个大国，我们将报复任何损害我们权利或利益的人。”而这一切的背后，是中国共产党的绝对统治。

然而，中国并不急于重建近期已然崩溃的国际秩序。自1949年以来，北京仅签署了两项正式联盟——分别与朝鲜和苏联——且这两者都被证明代价高昂。布鲁金斯学会的专家帕特里夏·金（Patricia Kim）将北京的姿态称为“中国优先”战略。“中国很乐意发表声明，但它没有兴趣介入成为危机管理者，”她告诉我，“它想要更大的影响力，但同时也想逃避责任。”她说，中国领导者将“美国全球领导地位的负担视为美国过度扩张和衰落的根源”，“他们没有兴趣效仿这种模式”。退休的中国人民解放军军官周波从另一个角度提出了类似的观点。“特朗普政府已经退出了66个国际组织，”他告诉我，“这是一个中国根本无法填补的巨大缺口。”

那么，美国秩序可能的继任者并非一个“中国秩序”，而更像是伦纳德（Leonard）所称的一个“无序”时期：一个每个国家都在进行对冲、扩军、补贴、囤积，并寻找可利用的扼制点的丛林。用丹佛大学中国研究学者赵水成（Suisheng Zhao）的话来说，这就是一场“21世纪霍布斯式所有人对所有人的战争”的雏形。

在冷战期间，当铁幕两边的未来学家们策划着如何控制历史方向时，另一组人围绕着一个更谦逊的想法聚集在一起。这个自称为“人类2000”（Mankind 2000）的组织由欧洲法西斯主义的幸存者组成，他们既警惕共产主义的决定论，也警惕美国的傲慢。他们警告说，人类可能会“被自己的机器所吞噬”，并宣布：“未来属于我们所有人，而不仅仅属于少数寡头团体。”

如今在北京和华盛顿待足够长的时间，你会发现这场竞争看起来不像是竞争体系之间的冲突，而更像是少数寡头团体之间的竞赛——一群掌握着他人未来巨大权力的核心圈子。在中国，习近平试图让技术服务于服从与增长。在美国，特朗普及其在硅谷的盟友将人工智能的开发置于对其风险的担忧之上。“我们必须培育这个孩子，让它茁壮成长，”特朗普在2025年公布一项人工智能战略时说道，“我们不能用愚蠢的规则来阻止它。”在这种观点看来，监管、安全测试、责任追究和劳工保护都是超级大国再也无法负担的奢侈品。投资者、前白宫人工智能主管大卫·萨克斯（David Sacks）最近警告说，建立一个“人工智能领域的FDA”可能意味着输给中国。

这是一种古老的政治手段。1988年，当日本汽车制造商处于上升期时，罗纳德·里根的交通部长嘲讽更严格的燃油经济标准是对抗“亚洲人”时的“竞争劣势”。一年后，在华尔街的压力下，比尔·克林顿废除了商业银行与投资银行的分离，称这将帮助美国“在全球金融市场竞争”。这一决定后来被认定为大衰退的原因之一。

中国确实能够以一种令美国人既敬畏又绝望的速度进行建设。在 2025 年出版的《Breakneck》一书中，斯坦福大学胡佛研究所的研究员王丹（Dan Wang）将两国之间的竞争形象化为“工程国家”与“律师社会”之间的较量。事实上，这本书比这个表述更为微妙。（王丹曾考虑将其命名为《快速行动，摧毁他人》，但他的出版商介入了。）王丹探讨了独生子女政策带来的宏观经济影响——他告诉我，自该书出版以来，这些影响变得更加令人担忧。他说，尽管中国能够在“科学技术领域产生强有力的成果”，但其内部问题十分深刻。“上海非常令人惊叹，它甚至可能是全球前三大伟大城市之一。但如果几乎没有人想要孩子，中国如何能成为一个伟大的文明？”他补充道，“尤其是中国年轻人，被一种平静的不满所笼罩。人们对于经济繁荣并没有 36 那么大的希望，因为这种繁荣基本上将避开除少数从事 AI 或金融工作的人之外的所有人。”工程国家可以每 76 秒生产出一辆电动汽车，但如果人们感到如此疏离，以至于拒绝将孩子带入这个为他们构建的未来，那么这种能力能起到的作用也就有限。党希望拥有能令世界惊叹的 AI 创业者，但同时也希望拥有决定他们能去哪里、能成为什么的权力。

美国则有不同的弱点。到目前为止，技术的反乌托邦式应用更多地并非来自政府的面部识别系统，而是来自少数几家利用数据来增强对人们生活控制力的超强公司：例如使用 AI 来决定涵盖哪些治疗方案的保险公司；以及部署“监控定价”，根据客户的位置、习惯和紧迫程度提高成本的零售商。但这种区别正在消失，因为私人国防承包商正帮助将国内执法、移民管理和国家安全合并为一个互锁的机制。即使在机器确实能让生活变得更好的领域，决策也是在秘密中做出的。Waymo 报告的安全记录优于人类驾驶员，但自动驾驶汽车公司一直抵制公众审查。当参议员埃德·马基（Ed Markey）询问七家大公司远程人类操作员引导车辆通过困难情况的频率时，他们拒绝回答，其中几家以“商业机密信息”为由。

系统越集中，错误的传播范围就越广。今年 3 月，在中国十几个城市运营自动驾驶出租车的百度出现故障时，车辆在繁忙的高速公路上停了下来。我们几乎可以肯定，没有人类驾驶汽车和卡车会更好，但历史警告我们，不应让工程师独自做出这些决定。最能帮助其人民的国家，将不会是那个仅仅竞相将 AI 渗透到公民生活每个方面的国家；更有可能是那个能让部署决策免受意识形态扭曲和腐败影响、能找到分配 AI 收益与损失之方法，并让人们感到自己在未来拥有发言权的国家。美国近来运行状况不佳，但其政治制度在设计上赋予了公众更多修复问题的权力——如果他们选择去修复的话。正如武特克（Wuttke）所言：“美国有一种在烈火中毁灭然后重生的天赋。中国没有。”优势可能会属于那个能最坦率地面对自身问题的一方。“在中国、俄罗斯或美国，你都可以生活在另一种现实中，”他说，“这始终是一个危险的主张，因为你可能会错过向你袭来的历史信号。”

在北京的一个下午，当我发现自己有一个小时的空闲时间时，我扫描了一辆共享单车的二维码，骑车穿城而过，享受着新鲜的空气。我差点被几个外卖骑手撞飞，但能身处一个无需对我的一举一动进行实时反馈的地方，真是一种快乐。尽管在采访过程中，我听到了许多笃定的计算和预测，但我始终无法摆脱一种感觉：未来太不透明，难以预测，更不用说精确到小数点后几位地去预定它了。中国的年轻人和美国的年轻人一样，正在参与一种新的算命热潮。人们出门喝酒并寻求占星解读，或者使用占星应用程序。（在中文里，“算命”一词与“算法”一词共用一个字。）北京有数百年的算命传统，尽管党反对其所谓的“封建迷信活动”并定期进行打击。但他们总能潜回，在佛教和儒家寺庙附近的社区里悄悄恢复工作。我联系到了一位七十出头的人，我称他为孙师傅。他并非随时都在——算命先生也是零工经济从业者——但他同意见面，并穿着一件老式的蓝色棉服，戴着一条玉项链来到约会地点。他推着自行车走在旁边，车前有个篮子，车架上还包着塑料膜，就像为了防止液体溅出而保护起来的沙发一样。孙师傅的办公室在街区之隔的地方，我们走在路上时，他问我是怎么学会普通话的。我说我以前在中国住过，但我是美国人。“美国是个强大的国家，”他告诉我。“中国也很强大，”我回答。“不如美国好，”他说。我们到达了他的办公室，它蜷缩在一家便利店后面。他的办公桌上有一个小神龛，上面放着一个陶瓷佛像、一个香炉、三个葫芦和一块巧克力。他研究了我手掌上的纹路，给了我几枚铜钱让我投掷，询问了我的出生日期，然后开始在纸垫上计算。看着他工作的感觉隐约有一种激进感；他找到了一种在面对共产党和算法时代时都能体面生存的方式。过了一会儿，他从眼镜上方看了我一眼，告诉我：“你的命格显示你拥有高贵的命运。”我很喜欢这个说法。这让我想起当 ChatGPT 赞美你的问题时，那种瞬间产生的快感。我问：“我想把孩子培养好，给他们一个光明的未来。我该怎么做？”孙师傅思考了一会儿说：“你应该给他们伟大的智慧。这比给他们钱更重要。确保他们好好学习。有了这个，财富自然会随之而来。”这番话很友善，尽管我不确定现在是否还有人知道答案。最后，孙师傅拿出一叠折叠的红色卡纸条，让我挑三张。他看了看，宣布道：“你命中注定要么拥有政治权力，要么拥有巨额财富！”我决定在自己还感到至少 76.67% 正面情绪的时候结束这次会面。但这时他停了下来，举起我挑的三张纸条中的一张。上面写着“喜临门”。他说这是整叠纸条中最幸运的一张，并给出了建议：“你应该花一点钱来守护这份好运。”哦？我问。多少钱？“六百六十元，”他说——大约九十七加元。我不想和算命先生争论。他接受多种支付平台。我们拿出手机，我把钱转给了他。♦ 37 --- 美国纪事

导师

罗伊·科恩如何教会唐纳德·特朗普一切。 作者：SUSAN GOLDMARK

2017年，当唐纳德·特朗普总统的首任司法部长杰夫·塞申斯（Jeff Sessions）在涉及特朗普竞选团队与俄罗斯之间关系的联邦调查中申请回避时，总统愤怒了。“我的罗伊·科恩在哪儿？”他大吼道。但罗伊·科恩——一个美国无赖，一名曾协助将朱利叶斯和埃塞尔·罗森堡夫妇送上电椅、协助参议员约瑟夫·麦卡锡实施“红色恐慌”、并向特朗普传授房地产业务门道的律师——早已离世。

特朗普与科恩是在四十四年前，即1973年相识的。《纽约邮报》的八卦专栏作家辛迪·亚当斯（Cindy Adams）后来报道称，不久后在一次晚宴上，她的老友科恩将他的新门生介绍给了她。当时的特朗普还不满三十岁，是一个野心勃勃的外区房地产开发商。亚当斯在专栏中写道，科恩告诉她：“有一天，这个孩子将拥有纽约。”

科恩是一名深柜同性恋者，总是被那些可以被称为“超级非犹太人”的人所吸引——身材高大、金发蓝眼。曾在六十年代为他工作的离婚律师罗伯特·S·科恩（Robert S. Cohen）观察到：“罗伊喜欢让自己被有吸引力的异性恋男性包围。”金发、身高六英尺三英寸的特朗普正好符合条件。

他们第一次见面的场景是在 Le Club，这是一个位于东55街416号的私人用餐场所，距离东河半个街区。科恩是该俱乐部的会员。Le Club 开业于1960年的除夕，占据着一座白色灰泥小房；一块写着“仅限会员”的黄铜牌是其唯一的标志。这里有一种国际化的、名流社交圈的氛围。伊戈尔·卡西尼（Igor Cassini）担任 Le Club 的董事会主席，他曾是赫斯特报业的社会专栏作家，也是杰奎琳·肯尼迪最喜爱的高级定制服装设计师奥列格·卡西尼（Oleg Cassini）的兄弟。

“无视规则，做你想做的事，不要留下书面记录，”记者大卫·凯·约翰斯顿（David Cay Johnston）在列举科恩教给特朗普的教训时说道。“如果有人找你麻烦，就出卖别人来救自己。” 摄影：MARY ELLEN MARK

38 --- 39 ---

“在那样的场所，你很可能会看到一个75岁的富翁带着三个瑞典金发女郎走进来，”特朗普在他1987年的著作《交易的艺术》中写道。几年后，特朗普会吹嘘自己是 Le Club 的“董事”，但在1973年，他还住在东75街196号的一间租金管制单身公寓里。特朗普将那间“阴暗、肮脏的小公寓”描述为窗外只能看到一个水箱。

他的父亲弗雷德·特朗普（Fred Trump）在1971年任命他为特朗普管理公司的总裁。该公司在皇后区和布鲁克林拥有数千个租赁单元，但年轻的特朗普渴望将家族帝国扩张到曼哈顿。他写道，他想成为一个“城市人，而不是一个来自外区的孩子”。他加入 Le Club 是因为他认为这能帮他打入曼哈顿社交圈。

一天晚上，特朗普在 Le Club 用餐时，在附近的桌子上发现了科恩。在《交易的艺术》中，特朗普回忆了他们的会面，这段描述很可能经过了润色。他声称，在被介绍给科恩后，特朗普告诉他：“我不喜欢律师。我认为他们所做的就是拖延交易，而不是促成交易，而且他们给你的每一个答案都是‘不行’，他们总是寻求和解而不是战斗。”他继续说道：“我天生就不是那样的人。我宁愿战斗也不愿屈服，因为一旦你屈服一次，你就会背上一个‘屈服者’的名声。”

在去年接受我们的采访时，特朗普讲述了这次会面的另一个版本，声称是科恩发起了对话。“我当时表现得很好，我想人们读到很多关于我的报道，”他说。“我记得非常清楚——他当时和一群人在一起，然后他走过来，想自我介绍。”特朗普继续说道：“他说，‘也许我们可以做点生意——如果你以后有案子的话。我很愿意和你合作。’我记得他当时没带名片。他不是那种随身带名片的人。但我后来给他打了电话。”更 plausible（可信）的情况是，当时几乎无人知晓的特朗普向科恩自我介绍，并紧张地解释说他需要一些法律建议。在《交易的艺术》中，他描述了他们的对话：“政府刚刚起诉了我们的公司……说我们歧视黑人，”特朗普告诉科恩，并问道：“你觉得我该怎么做？”“告诉他们滚蛋，在法庭上抗争，让他们证明你歧视了，”科恩厉声答道。特朗普认为这是一个极好的建议。没过多久，科恩就开始在城里向人们介绍特朗普。“我认识了所有人，”特朗普说。1973年11月，科恩邀请他的新门生参加在比尔特莫酒店举行的一场黑领结晚宴，庆祝他执业律师二十五周年。（这次活动同时也是为斯佩尔曼枢机基金会和美国反共犹太联盟筹款。）科恩的朋友威廉·F·巴克利（William F. Buckley, Jr.）在演讲中向他致敬：“罗伊·科恩是一个战胜了折磨他的人的人，他理应获得我们在这里如此热情地给予他的赞誉。”一封来自总统理查德·尼克松的贺信被读给客人们听，出席者包括州最高法院法官约翰·M·默塔（John M. Murtagh）和候任市长亚伯拉罕·比姆（Abraham Beame）。特朗普被深深吸引了。他渴望这些关系，并且他知道，在科恩身上，他找到了那种能够对抗政府歧视指控的强悍律师。

特朗普的父亲弗雷德似乎有长期的种族主义历史。1927年的阵亡将士纪念日，二十一岁的弗雷德在皇后区警察与一群戴白头罩的三K党成员发生暴力冲突期间，因拒绝散场而被捕；他不久后被释放。（他不清楚他在那场骚乱中扮演了什么角色。）近三十年后，住在弗雷德首批重大开发项目之一——布鲁克林海滨避风港（Beach Haven）公寓综合体的一名租客，对他观察到的管理层种族歧视感到如此不安，以至于为此写了一首歌。这首歌名为《老特朗普》（Old Man Trump）。这名租客就是伍迪·格思里（Woody Guthrie）。

“我们不仅拒绝给你终身教职——我们还要关闭你的部门，并把整个大学付之一炬，以确保万无一失。”

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我想老特朗普知道，他在人类心灵的血锅中 激起了多少种族仇恨…… 海滨避风港是特朗普之塔 黑人们绝不能在此游荡

到1973年特朗普遇到科恩时，弗雷德的公司歧视黑人的证据似乎已无可否认。根据司法部的文件，三十九栋特朗普拥有的公寓楼系统性地禁止黑人租房。联邦调查人员发现，四名特朗普的管理员或租赁代理愿意证实，申请表是按种族编码的；表格上会标有一个大写的“C”，表示申请人是“有色人种”（colored）。一名特朗普的员工向一名联邦调查局（F.B.I.）特工描述了这一政策：“弗雷德·特朗普告诉我不要把房子租给黑人。他还想让我把大楼里的黑人赶走，告诉他们只要支付五百美元的首付款就能获得廉价住房，而特朗普愿意亲自支付这笔钱。”这些行为将明显违反1968年的《公平住房法》。

如果特朗普家族仅仅签署一份同意令，同意将其大约1.5万套房产进行整合，联邦政府本会感到满意；那样就不会有罚款，也不必承认有罪。但科恩鼓励特朗普拒绝该同意令，并声称联邦政府在向公司施压，要求其将房屋租给“福利领取者”。美国司法部（DOJ）对此感到愤怒，随即提起了一项正式的歧视诉讼，对此科恩反诉政府诽谤，寻求一亿美元的损害赔偿。科恩和特朗普在纽约希尔顿酒店举行了新闻发布会，宣布他们的诉讼。后来，《美国律师》（The American Lawyer）的创始人史蒂文·布里尔（Steven Brill）表示，他当时对竟然有记者出现感到震惊：“任何人在法学院读到第二天就会知道这完全是一个虚假的诉讼。”这场噱头是一次勇气的展示，占据了当地的新闻头条，但一个月后，一名联邦法官以轻率为由驳回了特朗普家族的诉讼，并责骂科恩在“浪费时间和纸张”。

特朗普和科恩拒绝退让，且拒绝回应关于种族主义的指控。科恩的一位朋友告诉我们，在私下里，科恩经常将黑人称为“Schvartze”（一个他从母亲多拉那里学来的蔑称），而且至少有一次有人听到他使用了N-word。特朗普总是说自己不分肤色，他衡量租客的唯一标准是男性户主的收入：“我们通常不计入妻子的收入。我们希望看到家庭中男性的收入。”

科恩将诉讼拖延了20个月。他攻击政府关键证人（一名特朗普的前雇员）的可信度，声称该证人受到了“类似盖世太保式审讯”的胁迫。他还提交了一份宣誓书，指控联邦调查局（F.B.I.）特工的行为像“冲锋队”。法官就科恩的言论对其进行了谴责，称这些言论“完全没有根据”。科恩迅速撤回了关于冲锋队的言论。“我这辈子从未对联邦调查局提出过指控。我有个人原因不能这样做，而且我永远不会，”他说，暗示他与前联邦调查局局长J·埃德加·胡佛的亲密友谊。“我与（联邦调查局）的关系过于密切。”

但这些离题之谈是极佳的戏剧，而科恩则是那个驯兽师。这些马戏团式的闹剧起到了进一步推迟诉讼程序的目的。有一天在法庭上，科恩针对控方团队的一名初级成员唐娜·F·戈德斯坦（Donna F. Goldstein）提交了一项蔑视法庭的动议。他声称戈德斯坦在凌晨 4 点给潜在证人打电话，并威胁如果他们不作证指控特朗普，就将他们关进监狱。如果这是真的，戈德斯坦可能会被吊销律师执照。这一指控足够严重，以至于法官暂停了主案，举行听证会以对该蔑视动议做出裁决。根据一名在场的年轻审判律师回忆，在听证会当天，科恩在法庭上站起来说：“法官大人，那个女孩！——戈德斯坦——犯了个错误，如果她保证不再这样做，我就撤回动议。”这位审判律师对法官对科恩如此恭敬感到震惊。在另一次机会中，这位律师目睹了特朗普接受证词笔录的过程。科恩把律师拉到一边告诉他：“别管唐纳德。他有一天会成为大人物的。”

后来在《交易的艺术》中回顾这次诉讼时，特朗普写道：“和解的想法让我发疯。”但那正是他最终所做的，他在 1975, 6月签署了一份与他在 1973. 本可以签署的几乎完全相同的同意令。他同意启动一项计划，要求他在黑人经营的报纸上刊登租赁广告，并将空房信息提交给民权组织纽约城市联盟（New York Urban League）。他没有支付罚款，也没有承认有罪。然而，美国司法部（DOJ）

将该法令描述为“有史以来谈判成果最深远的法令之一”。黑人创办的《纽约阿姆斯特丹新闻》（New York Amsterdam News）的一则头条宣布：“少数族裔赢得住房诉讼”，随附的报道提醒读者，“符合条件的黑人和波多黎各人现在有机会租赁特朗普管理公司（Trump Management）旗下的公寓”。尽管如此，特朗普和科恩仍宣布胜利。科恩喜欢说，仅仅获胜是不够的——人们必须知道这件事。在接下来的几年里，特朗普反复声称自己赢得了该案。三年后，联邦政府宣布特朗普家族藐视同意令，指控其持续存在歧视行为。科恩告诉记者，这些新指控是“炒冷饭”，且“毫无根据”。（他此前曾将政府的起诉称为“沧海一粟”。）但此事最终不了了之，特朗普家族从未承认有过错。特朗普从科恩那里学到的教训是，事实总能被激烈的反向主张所淹没。对于其涉嫌歧视的行为，特朗普从未承担过任何经济后果。那时，特朗普已经转向规模更大的曼哈顿房地产领域。他已经从科恩那里学到了很多。“我那时很年轻，而罗伊是一个非常有政治手腕的人，”特朗普后来告诉《时报》的玛吉·哈伯曼（Maggie Haberman）。“一个不同类型的人。”特朗普 41 --- 对看到科恩的名字每周几次出现在小报上感到惊讶。科恩教会了他，宣传的烟火之效比法律更重要。关键在于控制叙事。“罗伊是情境式不道德的大师，”曾在七十年代为《每日新闻》（Daily News）报道城市政治的萨姆·罗伯茨（Sam Roberts）告诉纪录片《我的罗伊·科恩在哪里？》（Where's My Roy Cohn?）的导演马特·蒂尔诺尔（Matt Tyrnauer）。“他有一套行使权力的规则……你总是要试图激怒你的敌人，让他们表现出最糟糕的一面，然后将其反过来利用，这样罗伊·科恩看起来就像个好人，而他实际上几乎从未是好人。”科恩教会了特朗普不要担心别人怎么看他。“他会对家人根本不在意他这个事实轻描淡写，”父亲是科恩表亲的大卫·马库斯（David Marcus）告诉蒂尔诺尔。马库斯说，特朗普表现出的是另一种自恋，“一种与不安全感相结合的自恋。但在罗伊身上，是对自我身份的绝对自信，除了他不希望公众知道他是同性恋这一事实。”特朗普将科恩视为结识有影响力人士的手段。科恩带他进入的世界之一是 Studio 54, 其所有者是科恩的客户。特朗普参加了在那个夜总会举办的科恩 52 岁生日派对。喜剧演员乔伊·亚当斯（Joey Adams，辛迪·亚当斯的丈夫）担任司仪；他经常使用的一个笑话梗是：“如果你被起诉，你就会被邀请。”马库斯回忆起与特朗普和科恩一同在 Studio 54 中。 “罗伊的眼睛死死盯着特朗普……他观察特朗普的一举一动。”特朗普有时会走到楼下查看半私密的 VIP 房间。“我在那里看到了一些直到今天我也再没见过的事情，”他告诉作家蒂莫西·L·奥布莱恩（Timothy L. O'Brien）。“我会看着超级名模被干，知名超级名模在房间中间的长凳上被干。”直到七十年代初，特朗普基本上还是个跑腿的，为他那要求苛刻、专横的父亲收取租金。这不是一份光鲜的工作。但特朗普野心勃勃，他明白在商业地产领域，为了达成盈利交易，他需要政府的税收减免、分区例外许可以及友好的城市监管者。而科恩则是一个能够铺平道路的中间人。

同年，科恩在市长新任选举中发挥了关键作用，帮助亚伯拉罕·比姆（Abraham Beame）当选，科恩从比姆年轻时就认识他。到1973年，比姆作为市审计长，正在竞选该党的市长提名。他的主要对手是来自布朗克斯的国会议员马里奥·比亚吉（Mario Biaggi）。科恩向《时报》泄露了一个消息，称比亚吉在前一年接受联邦大陪审团质询时行使了第五修正案的权利（拒绝作证），这场争议帮助击垮了比亚吉的竞选。1974年初，比姆宣誓就职，成为纽约首位犹太裔市长，而科恩则成为了他信任的顾问。尽管科恩因在麦卡锡时期的工作而赢得了右翼“攻击犬”的名声，但现在他已成为民主党内部权力机构中的一个显赫人物。

根据《乡村之声》记者韦恩·巴雷特（Wayne Barrett）的说法，在比姆就职三周后，唐纳德·特朗普正试图说服内德·艾克勒（Ned Eichler）与他在中城进行一项房地产交易合作，艾克勒是一名商人，管理着宾夕法尼亚中央铁路公司在曼哈顿的部分物业。艾克勒要求特朗普证明他拥有能够获得必要分区许可的政治关系。“什么样的证明？”特朗普问。艾克勒回答说，他想和市长谈谈，以确保市长支持该计划。“你想什么时候见他？”特朗普问。“明天下午 2 P.M.,”艾克勒说。特朗普告诉艾克勒，他的豪华轿车将在一点半接他。

第二天下午，特朗普在市长办公室会见了他的新商业伙伴。他还带上了他的父亲，后者曾为比姆的竞选活动捐款。特朗普父子迅速向市长简报了这笔交易以及它将如何使城市受益，随后，身高五英尺两英寸的比姆站起身，伸手拍了拍特朗普父子的肩膀，说道：“无论唐纳德和弗雷德想要什么，我都完全支持。”弗雷德可能给市政厅打过电话，但更有可能是科恩策划了这次会面。在70年代的剩余时间里，科恩将担任特朗普所有曼哈顿交易的法律顾问和“解决问题的人”。

1975年，特朗普和科恩将目光投向了一处由濒临破产的宾夕法尼亚中央铁路公司拥有的物业：位于东42街、紧邻中央车站的破旧的Commodore酒店。该酒店建于1919年，曾是纽约同类建筑中最庞大的结构之一。Commodore酒店是以康尼利厄斯·范德比尔特（Cornelius Vanderbilt，绰号“the Commodore”）的名字命名的，这位铁路大亨在1871年建造了中央车站。但到了70年代，这家机构已成为这座城市财务窘迫的象征。这座破旧的酒店几乎停止运转，一半的房间空置，无家可归者在底层蜗居，一家按摩店占据了其中一个店面。它是一个令人尴尬的眼中钉。

市长比姆渴望将酒店卖给合适的开发商，但几乎没有潜在买家。纽约处于破产边缘，而由共和党控制的联邦政府并不同情。在市长的一次华盛顿特区访问后，杰拉尔德·福特总统明确表示，联邦政府不会提供任何救助资金。《每日新闻》用头版标题报道了总统的拒绝：“福特对该市：去死吧”。

特朗普是唯一一个对接手Commodore酒店表现出浓厚兴趣的开发商。但房地产行业的许多人对此持怀疑态度；他们认为特朗普是个吹牛大王。一名银行家告诉《时报》，特朗普被“高估了”，而且“极其令人厌恶”。

特朗普在谈到自己的野心时可以坦率得令人惊讶。负责比姆下曼哈顿开发办公室的迈克尔·贝尔金（Michael Bailkin）开始与特朗普会面讨论可能的交易。在第三大道的一家酒吧进行了几次交谈后，贝尔金脱口而出：“你是个非常浅薄的人。”特朗普回答道：“当然。这是我的强项之一。我从不伪装成其他样子。”

在谈判过程中，情况变得很明显：特朗普难以说服银行向他提供翻修酒店所需的7000万美元贷款。银行只有在市政府向开发商提供税收减免的情况下才会发放贷款。贝尔金提出了一个新颖的解决方案：将Commodore酒店交给一个市政机构，使其免税，然后由特朗普向该机构租赁并进行开发。特朗普支付了4.2386万——极低的1000万美元以获得该物业的租赁权，并获得了一项非同寻常的40年税收减免，每年为他节省了约400万美元的房产税。他将支付一笔名义上的年“租金”，起步价为25万美元。完成这笔交易花费了两年时间，而敲定细节的人是科恩。他向好友、副市长斯坦利·M.（Bugsy）弗里德曼提出了一个建议。弗里德曼此前已经是科恩的秘密商业伙伴，曾帮他租赁了六个市属停车场，每周产生数千美元的收入。这些停车场的运营通过科恩在家里经营的壳公司进行，他申报的收入远低于实际收益。实际上，他一直在定期从纽约窃取数十万美元。弗里德曼在特朗普的Commodore交易中发挥了关键作用，在1976年的一次预算委员会会议上投下了决定性的赞成票。因此，在比姆政府交给市长埃德·科赫政权的前几天，他能够促使税收减免获得批准。作为确保税收优惠的回报，弗里德曼为自己争取到了一项重大特权：被终身任命为市水务局主席，该职位年薪2.5万美元，并配有一辆带司机的豪华轿车。此外，科恩邀请弗里德曼成为其律师事务所Saxe, Bacon & Bolan的合伙人，并为弗里德曼提供了一间宽敞的独立办公室。《华尔街日报》在报道Commodore故事时，将特朗普前所未有的减税称为“世纪税收交易”。1980,年9月，酒店以君悦酒店（Grand Hyatt）之名重新开业。特朗普彻底改造了Commodore酒店，将砖墙外墙更换为古铜色玻璃和钢材。新酒店拥有1400间客房、一个闪亮的宴会厅和会议设施。Commodore交易一直充满争议。有人质疑一个年轻且缺乏经验的开发商是如何获得如此优厚条件的。“唐纳德·特朗普与那个继续在这座城市幕后操纵事情的小圈子混在一起，”市议员亨利·J. 斯特恩告诉科恩：“如果说唐纳德不够老练，他们在某种程度上是对的。”《时报》称该交易为“甜心合同”。斯特恩继续说道：“罗伊·科恩是他的律师。他在政治竞选中挥霍大量资金。”对此，科恩告诉该报：“唐纳德希望自己不必给政治家钱，但他知道这是游戏规则的一部分。”科恩还鼓励特朗普追求成为焦点。在1976年11月由朱迪·克莱姆斯鲁德撰写并发表的一篇谄媚的《时报》人物报道中，开篇写道：“他身材高挑、精瘦且金发，牙齿洁白耀眼，看起来非常像罗伯特·雷德福德。他开着一辆带有他姓名缩写DJT车牌的银色凯迪拉克在城里穿梭，由司机驾驶。他与身材苗条的时尚模特约会，出入最优雅的俱乐部，而且在年仅30岁时，估计自己的身价‘超过2亿美元’。”特朗普仔细研究了科恩，从个性化车牌到他在豪华轿车里安装的笨重车载电话。但这全部是表象。特朗普并不值两亿美元。1977,年，他的收入为$1.1853亿,530，缴纳了$42,386的税款。1978,年，他的年薪不足10万美元，是由他的父亲支付的。

科恩教给特朗普的另一件事是，他应该始终避免留下书面记录。特朗普说，科恩“不记笔记”。而且，科恩也不希望其他人记录他说的话。特朗普从科恩那里学会了通过电话开展业务。韦恩·巴雷特在特朗普身上看到了科恩的烙印。“他们两个都是攻击犬，”他说。特朗普在2016年接受《华盛顿邮报》采访时对这一描述做出了回应：“嗯，我不认为自己是一只攻击犬。我认为自己是一个赚了很多钱、做了很多出色工作并让很多人就业的人，但除非我被攻击，否则我不认为自己是一只攻击犬。”特朗普和科恩经常通电话。“唐纳德一天给我打十五到二十次电话，”科恩告诉记者玛丽·布伦纳。“他 43 --- 总是问，‘这个……那个……现在进展如何？’”

特朗普从科恩那里习得的另一个特质是对支付账单漫不经心。科恩从未有过信用卡，他曾说过自己经常出门时“口袋里连两分钱都没有”。他无视堆在办公桌上的小额发票。一名与科恩共事过的出庭律师回忆起看到一封来自供应商的信。“亲爱的罗伊，”供应商写道，“我仍在等待 $1万,000. 的付款。”科恩在回复中潦草地写道：“亲爱的路易——去你的，罗伊。”1976, 年，科恩的律师事务所欠缴了办公家具、文具、旅行社以及锁匠和电报服务的账单。在与公司飞机相关的费用上，他欠款 $1.0121万,121.92。“他会去餐厅，”科恩的朋友帕梅拉·纽豪斯·门施说，“然后就记账。我从未见过他真正付钱。他根本不在乎。”

到了七十年代，科恩名声在外，正如 Voice 所言，他被视为一个“名人级的吝啬鬼和骗子”。一名债权人告诉记者：“他像百万富翁一样生活，像百万富翁一样购物，但像穷人一样付钱。”1976, 年，美国国税局（IRS）坚持认为科恩欠缴了37万美元的税款。他已被审计了十七年。1978, 年，他指责美国国税局（IRS）在进行一场“私仇”。到 1985, 年，美国国税局（IRS）声称科恩欠款超过300万美元。科恩对他对待税务的傲慢态度毫不掩饰，曾在《游行》杂志上写过一篇题为《你可以击败美国国税局》的文章。“我是这个领域的专家，”他写道，甚至提供了如何向联邦政府隐瞒收入的技巧。“要领先他们一步。如果出现问题，就更换银行账户，这样他们就无法通过你的记录得知你在哪家银行，从而无法没收你的资金。”他试图通过在康涅狄格州农村地区开设小额存款账户来误导美国国税局（IRS）。

由于他的房屋、劳斯莱斯、飞机和游艇都是租赁的，或以壳公司名义持有，债权人的诉讼未能触及科恩的资产。在七十年代末的一段时间里，他位于东68街的联排别墅房产证神秘地登记在了他事务所办公室经理杰里·霍华德的名下。“我拥有的只有身上穿的衣服和一些个人物品，”科恩说。“我没有资产。我不想拥有资产，也不需要资产。我的父母去世了。我没结婚，没有孩子。我不需要遗产。如果我出了什么事，律师事务所有一份一百万美元的寿险保单。”

史蒂文·布里尔注意到，在2016年总统竞选期间，特朗普听起来就像科恩，使用相同的习语和硬汉语言——比如“如果你想知道真相”或“这个我可以告诉你”。布里尔回忆道，每当科恩准备撒一个大谎时，他都会用“坦白地说”这句话作为开场白。据罗杰·斯通称，科恩还教特朗普如何即兴演说，

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科恩的一个朋友，他在1979年见过特朗普。“特朗普最伟大的艺术形式应该是他的即兴发挥能力，”斯通告诉特恩诺。 “这是一个在没有安全网的情况下工作的人……他利用罗伊·科恩的战术和策略，采取咄咄逼人的态度，发起攻击，主导争论。”他继续说道，“政治就是关于谁主导对话。”特朗普钦佩科恩那种咆哮式的举止。在他们相识后不久，他就把一张科恩的签名照放在办公室里，每当与对手的面对面谈判陷入紧张时，他就会指向那张照片说：“你是不是更愿意和跟他打交道？”科恩令人恐惧。“仅仅是罗伊·科恩寄来的一封信就为我们省了很多钱，”特朗普告诉作家肯·奥莱塔，后者曾在1978年为《时尚先生》（Esquire）撰写过关于科恩的人物报道。“当人们知道罗伊参与其中时，他们就不愿卷入诉讼。”另一方面，特朗普发现，在实际的法庭上，科恩倾向于临场发挥。“他可以不带任何笔记就进入案件，”特朗普在《交易的艺术》中写道。“当他准备充分时，他是才华横溢且几乎不可战胜的。然而，他并不总是准备充分。”特朗普声称，在每次出庭前他都会审问科恩。“如果他没准备好，我会要求推迟，”特朗普说。他不介意科恩充满争议。在去年的一次采访中，特朗普告诉我们：“他是一个出色的律师。他做得非常好。”这位总统接着说：“其他人可能会说他们对他不满意。但生活就是这样，对吧？”

1976年，特朗普开始与伊万娜·泽尔尼奇科娃·温克尔迈尔约会，她是一位来自捷克斯洛伐克的27岁模特。他们相识于麦克斯韦之李（Maxwell's Plum），那是上东区一家镶嵌着彩色玻璃的单身酒吧。在2016年接受《纽约邮报》采访时，伊万娜描述了与“这个高个子、金发蓝眼家伙”相遇的情景。“他说：‘我是唐纳德·特朗普，我看你在找桌子。我可以帮你。’我看着我的朋友们说：‘好消息是，我们很快就能拿到桌子。坏消息是，这个家伙要和我们坐在一起。’”第二天早上，特朗普向伊万娜所在的酒店送了一百朵玫瑰。随后是一段快节奏的追求，他们在Le Club、“21”和Tavern on the Green共进晚餐。约会五个月后，特朗普在阿斯彭的一次滑雪旅行中提出了结婚。（多年来，他一直虚假地吹嘘伊万娜曾是捷克奥运滑雪队的替补队员。）回到纽约后，特朗普从蒂芙尼买了一枚三克拉的钻石订婚戒指。但当他打电话告诉科恩这个消息时，他的朋友却劝阻他。“你最好不要结婚，”科恩坚持道。“我不明白你为什么要这么做。”特朗普坚持订婚，但他确实听从了科恩的建议，签署了一份婚前协议。由科恩起草的合同初稿中包含一项条款，规定伊万娜每生育一个孩子可获得一笔现金奖金，另一项条款则要求如果他们离婚，她必须归还丈夫赠送的所有礼物。当伊万娜看到草案时，她感到震惊，并威胁要离开。特朗普删除了这些令人反感的条款，并将责任推给起草它们的科恩。随后插入了新的措辞，明确规定在离婚的情况下，伊万娜可以保留她的衣服以及来自特朗普和其他人的任何个人礼物。她在个人储蓄账户中获得了一笔10万美元的“应急”基金。但在潜在的赡养费问题上，科恩赢了；最终协议规定，如果两人在结婚九年之前离婚，伊万娜每年仅能获得3万美元。这份44 --- 协议写道：“在任何情况下，伊万娜绝不能拥有或试图主张对唐纳德的任何资产或其家族业务利益的任何权益。”

这份婚前协议单方面地倾向于一方，令人震惊。文件的一处写道：“唐纳德已向伊万娜解释，且伊万娜保证其知晓，唐纳德的生活标准和生活方式既不奢华也不铺张，因为他以及他持有利益的公司均不拥有游艇、飞机或通常与大型实质性企业相关的常规附属设施。”“伊万娜承认，她熟悉这样一个事实，即唐纳德的生活标准基本上是简单的，并且在本文所述的婚姻之后将继续保持如此。”伊万娜签署了这份婚前协议，但在1990年两人分居时，她对此决定感到后悔。（离婚申请是以“残酷且不人道的对待”为由获准的。）她在签署婚前协议时的律师劳伦斯·H·莱夫纳（Lawrence H. Levner）同时也是科恩的律师，是由科恩亲手挑选来代表其客户未来妻子的。根据科恩律所的接线员克里斯汀·西摩尔（Christine Seymour）的说法，她曾偷听过相关对话，“拉里是个蠢货。罗伊绝不会雇他去给狗展当裁判……拉里在那儿纯粹是因为罗伊能控制他。”科恩很好地服务了他的客户。他后来承认，根据定义，此类协议保护的是较富裕的一方：“你是在剥夺配偶的一项婚姻权利。”

这对夫妇于1977年4月在曼哈顿的一家教堂举行婚礼，由电台名人、《积极思考的力量》这部畅销书的作者诺曼·文森特·皮尔（Norman Vincent Peale）主持。教堂的长椅上坐满了弗雷德·特朗普的商业和政治伙伴，包括市长比姆（Beame）和科恩。随后，科恩参加了在21俱乐部（21 Club）举行的招待会，并在会上担任司仪。第二天早晨，这对新婚夫妇飞往阿卡普尔科进行短暂的蜜月旅行，随后返回，以便特朗普继续就Commodore酒店进行谈判。

甚至在君悦酒店项目完工之前，特朗普就开始筹划一项交易，以建造一座将成为他最具标志性建筑的楼宇：特朗普大厦。他看中了位于第五大道和第56街的旧邦威特-泰勒（Bonwit Teller）百货公司。在得知该店财务状况困难后，他获得了该空间的租赁权，随后开始谈判购买相邻的蒂法尼（Tiffany & Co.）大楼上方的空中权。特朗普的志向远大。他构思了一座综合用途的摩天大楼，上层为豪华公寓，下层为办公室和商店。1980年，他邀请科恩加入该项目，以帮助他获得建筑许可和分区例外许可。

那个春天，施工队开始拆除邦威特-泰勒大楼，这座深受喜爱的地标是由大中央车站的建筑师惠特尼·沃伦（Whitney Warren）和查尔斯·韦特莫尔（Charles Wetmore）设计的。很快，特朗普发现自己陷入了一系列争议之中。一方面，在保护主义者对拆除工作发出警报后，特朗普曾承诺保留一对装饰艺术风格的浅浮雕饰带以及位于商店入口上方的一块大型镀镍格栅，并将它们捐赠给大都会艺术博物馆。尽管有此承诺，这些雕塑仍被电锤击成了碎片。《纽约》杂志一篇关于这场骚乱的报道显示，特朗普运用了从科恩那里学到的几种公关手段。他称被砸碎的饰带“毫无价值”，并吹嘘这次负面宣传是一场意外之财：“在报道登上《时报》头版后的第二天早晨，我大概接到了二十几个想要在特朗普大厦买公寓的电话。这是极好的宣传。”

特朗普还因为雇佣了两百多名无证波兰劳工来负责拆除工作而陷入麻烦。（这些劳工由一家名为 Kaszycki and Sons 的公司雇佣，该公司主要从事窗户清洗。）特朗普支付给他们的工资低于标准，且他们的工作条件极其恶劣。当工人们威胁要停止项目时，特朗普请来了科恩，科恩安排雇佣了来自房屋拆除工会 Local 95 的另一组工人，而该工会由他的一名黑帮客户控制。（几名波兰工人提起诉讼，十五年后，特朗普支付了 140 万美元以达成和解。）

当特朗普大厦开始施工时，科恩将特朗普引荐给黑手党成员安东尼（胖托尼）·萨莱诺（Anthony (Fat Tony) Salerno），他是所谓的“混凝土俱乐部”中的重要人物，该辛迪加控制着曼哈顿的水泥浇筑。这对特朗普的项目至关重要，因为他的建筑师说服他建造一座几乎没有钢筋的混凝土骨架摩天大楼。特朗普雇佣了 S&A Concrete 公司，该公司由萨莱诺（热诺维斯犯罪家族的副头目）和保罗·卡斯特拉诺（Gambino 家族的首领，他将在 1985 年在 Sparks Steak House 被枪杀）共同拥有。

当工会水泥工在 1982 年夏天举行罢工时，特朗普大厦的工人继续浇筑水泥。“就工作表现而言，他们是难以置信的优秀承包商，”特朗普后来告诉《华尔街日报》。“但他们中的许多人据称与黑帮有关。”

科恩不仅保证了特朗普大厦的水泥供应，还策划了其尚未建成之豪华公寓的早期销售。他的客户罗伯特·J·霍普金斯（Robert J. Hopkins），一名 Lucchese 犯罪家族的关联人士，以 160 万美元购买了五十九层和六十层的两套公寓。此类销售有助于制造热度，使特朗普能够售出其余 260 个单元。

此外，1981 年，当市长科赫拒绝给予特朗普该项目关键的税收减免时，特朗普请来科恩以推翻这一决定。特朗普原以为自己有资格获得 421-A 税收豁免，因为他的大厦改善了社区环境并提高了地块的评估价值。但涉及的法律制定于 1971 年，旨在鼓励开发商建设低收入和中等收入住房。预期的减免金额高达数百万美元，且有效期为十年。科赫认为，如此规模的税收优惠不应被用于补贴豪华公寓。

当特朗普得知税收优惠被否决后，他愤怒地给市长住房专员安东尼·格利德曼（Anthony Gliedman）打电话并警告他：“我要让你知道，我是这个城市一个非常富有且有权力的人，我能成为这样的人是有原因的。我永远不会忘记你所做的事。”

1981 年 4 月，科恩向纽约州最高法院提起上诉。一年多后，法院以 7-0 的投票结果裁定科赫政府应重新考虑特朗普的申请。但特朗普再次被拒绝。科恩毫不退缩，重新提交上诉并再次走完整个流程。这一次，他们得到了不同的结果。

“我的律师罗伊·科恩表现得非常出色，”特朗普在《交易的艺术》中写道，“在七位法官面前辩论，甚至没有拿一张便签。”

1982 年 12 月，州最高法院上诉分庭命令市政府给予特朗普税收减免。科恩欣喜地告诉《时报》：“很多人一直坐视不管，在这件事解决之前不敢动工。这对他们拟建的大楼来说是一剂强心针。”

上诉法院的裁决书由洛克菲勒共和党人索尔·M·瓦赫特勒（Sol M. Wachtler）法官撰写。科赫政府再次对该裁决提出上诉，但在 1984 年，该州最高法院做出了有利于特朗普的裁决。

科赫感到很恼火，后来他称特朗普为“小猪，小猪，小猪”。作为回击，特朗普称他是个白痴。特朗普说，这位市长“极其恶劣、心胸狭隘且非常阴险，是一个极其不忠的人”。但特朗普已经得到了他想要的东西。他给科恩寄了一封热情洋溢的感谢信。他写道：“毋庸置疑，你在特朗普大厦案件中代表我的表现堪称精彩。每个人在面对我们追求这场艰难胜利时都嗤之以鼻，说‘这绝不可能赢’。那些怀疑者……从未见过罗伊·科恩在行动时的样子……干得漂亮！谢谢，回头见，唐纳德。”科恩将这封信装裱起来，挂在办公室的墙上。

科恩非常珍视他与特朗普的关系。在七十年代后期的某个六月，他在一封信中写道：“亲爱的唐纳德，生日快乐。当我回顾多年来我们亲密的个人和职业关系时，这些回忆是我生命中的高光时刻。在我们每天面对的那些令人沮丧且不知感恩的被帮助者中，你是一个有意义的例外。你从未说过不，从未停止过完全的支持，并且是我所认识的最好的士气鼓舞者。你的鼓励和善良对我来说比任何金额的钱都重要——我将永远为能成为你团队的一员而感到自豪。”这封信写在科恩的私人信纸上，上面印着一个他自己的愤怒漫画形象。

科恩声称，他从未要求特朗普——他喜欢称其为“年轻的天才、建筑商和开发商”——为他所做的法律工作付费。但特朗普显然还是付了钱。“我这辈子从未 46 --- 给他寄过一张账单，”科恩在1980年告诉记者彼得·曼索（Peter Manso）。“但他寄给我的每一张支票，金额都比我原本会向他开出的账单金额要高。”

科恩的亲戚大卫·马库斯（David Marcus）认为科恩对特朗普有着真挚的感情：“我认为罗伊在特朗普身上真的感受到了一种所有权式的自豪感，”马库斯告诉泰纳（Tyrnauer）。“是他创造了特朗普。在他们相识后，他将特朗普从毁灭的边缘救了回来。直到最后，他都对他有一种奇怪的吸引力。”

科恩意识到特朗普粗俗且没教养，但这个年轻人对他浅薄之地的坦然公开反而令人卸下防备。“如果指责唐纳德不够成熟，他们在某种程度上是对的，”科恩说。“如果你和唐纳德一起去看艺术收藏，他并不那么感兴趣。他更愿意看向窗外的建筑。”

特朗普将科恩视为一个极具娱乐性的朋友。“罗伊·科恩让我觉得很有趣，”特朗普后来告诉《华盛顿邮报》。正如特朗普在办公室里放着一张科恩的照片一样，科恩也珍藏着一张挂在办公室墙上的特朗普照片。照片上签着：“给罗伊，我最伟大的朋友，唐纳德。”

特朗普喜欢将科恩与所有那些通过“吹嘘自己绝不妥协的正直……但如果朋友变成了麻烦，就毫不犹豫地在背后捅朋友一刀”而获得事业成功的“体面”之辈进行对比。他偶尔会顺道拜访科恩的联排别墅（Saxe, Bacon & Bolan 事务所的所在地），因此亲眼目睹了该公司运营中的一些混乱。在谈到科恩时，特朗普告诉我们：“他是一个经常与法官社交的人。他很受很多法官欢迎。他是一个非常复杂的人。他在很多不同方面都非常聪明。但他也经常让自己陷入麻烦。”

科恩过着秘密生活，经常与男妓约会。特朗普几乎肯定知道这件事。“罗伊有一整套疯狂的把戏，”他告诉《华盛顿邮报》。在接受我们的采访时，特朗普说：“他热爱生活。他是个不同类型的人，但他热爱生活。”特朗普继续说道：“很多人直到快到最后才知道他是同性恋。”（当科恩死于艾滋病时，特朗普不再与他保持日常联系。但在1986年科恩去世前不久，特朗普邀请他参加在海湖庄园的一次晚宴。据报道，之后特朗普命令他的员工对餐具和刀叉进行“熏蒸消毒”。）

科恩始终明白，在与特朗普打交道时，需要一定程度的谄媚。特朗普可能要求很高。随着时间的推移，科恩的功能与其说是导师，不如说是一个“解决问题的人”（fixer），他不得不动用自己的人情银行来满足特朗普的需求。1983年，科恩利用他在罗纳德·里根白宫的众多关系，促成了特朗普的姐姐玛丽安·特朗普·巴里（Maryanne Trump Barry）被提升为联邦法官。但科恩的人情银行是不分意识形态的。他并不关心玛丽安的资历，对他而言，她的政治立场或法律经验完全不重要，他只知道她是特朗普的姐姐。特朗普的父亲培养了他那种残酷的野心，而科恩则教会了他战术。《时报》记者大卫·凯·约翰斯顿（David Cay Johnston）告诉蒂诺尔（Tyrnauer），科恩曾指示特朗普要“无视规则，做你想做的事，不要留下书面痕迹，不要记录日程，永远不要用书面形式处理事情；如果有人找你麻烦，就出卖别人来救自己。拖延，拖延，再拖延，因为大陪审团的时间有限，你可以耗尽时间。然后联系新闻媒体，编造一个离奇的故事。我们就只是被这些腐败的纽约市警察、联邦调查局（F.B.I.）特工，尤其是那些腐败且冷酷的美国国税局（IRS）特工攻击的诚实商人。这样一来，这就是新闻报道，会让政府陷入被动。”科恩的规则变成了特朗普的规则。

1984年春，《GQ》杂志将这位38岁的房地产开发商放在封面，并刊登了格雷登·卡特（Graydon Carter）撰写的一篇报道，封面标题为“成功：它是如此甜蜜”。这篇人物特写以科恩某天早晨打电话给特朗普反映一个问题开头。他当晚需要为一名客户找一间酒店房间：“怎么了？谁？抱歉，罗伊，我想君悦酒店满了，”特朗普说，“但巴比宗酒店怎么样？稍等，我帮你查查。”片刻之后：“好了，我想我们可以帮他订到巴比宗。只有你才行，罗伊。”卡特捕捉到了年轻特朗普的贪婪与虚张声势。卡特写道：“这个来自外区（outer borough）的奋斗者，唯一能暴露其身份的大概就是他的袖扣：巨大的金石材质，像半美元硬币一样大。”这篇文章让特朗普显得空洞。“你晚上经过特朗普大厦，看到它发光的样子吗？”特朗普问，“它几乎在黑暗中发光。那是因为我用了真正的青铜。如果你用仿制品，看起来就完全不同，毫无美感。”在特写中，卡特注意到特朗普的手“小而修整得整齐”，这一观察在随后的几十年里，甚至在他担任总统期间，一直让特朗普感到恼火。

科恩来自纽约，但他深切地憎恨纽约的知识分子、大学和精英律师事务所。特朗普一直持有同样的愤恨。1990年，特朗普说：“我永远无法获得建制派，也就是纽约那些品味决定者的好感。”另一次，他评论道：“我热爱那些受教育程度低的人。”就像之前的科恩一样，特朗普喜欢将他那种反建制、基于愤恨的政治包装成对工人阶级的共情。对于这两个男人来说，这不过是一场戏，但特朗普学会了如何在竞选集会上有效地利用这种情绪。在谈到科恩时，特朗普告诉我们：“他非常尊重我。他说，‘如果你想的话，有一天你会成为总统。’”他补充道：“他说过很多次。”据《名利场》报道，在2016年11月特朗普当选总统的第二天，罗杰·斯通（Roger Stone）通过电话向他表示祝贺。“总统先生，”斯通说。“噢，请叫我唐纳德，”特朗普回答。随后，特朗普用沉思的语气评论道：“罗伊要是能看到这一刻该多好？天哪，我们太想他了。”

♦ 47

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小说

48

摄影：伊莉莎·博纳（ELIZA BOURNER）

从厨房的桌子望出去，到处是阳光和薄雾。透过玻璃推拉门，晨雾在绿色的玉米波浪中消散。远处一座低矮的红色小牛舍标志着地势升高并转为林地的地方。那个名叫伯迪（Birdie）的女孩正勤快地将葡萄干麦片舀进嘴里，冷牛奶顺着下巴滴落；她不由自主地想起了前一天去小牛舍的经历：小牛的舌头在奶瓶淡紫色奶嘴上的吮吸，以及瓶内晃动的白色配方奶。早餐后，她感到胃痛，坐在客厅窗边，看着车辆不定期地驶过，倾听发动机在靠近时低吼、轰鸣，然后渐渐远去。她走到砖砌壁炉旁的橱柜前，轻拍每一本皱巴巴的故事书书脊。她用手指揉搓着米色地毯的纤维，看着书里一只鸟、一只狗和一台嘈杂机器的图片。你是我的妈妈吗？故事一直在这样问。前一天，她和年长很多的表姐安吉（Angie）一起喂小牛。安吉是个漂亮的女孩，说伤心事时会微笑，并计划在叶子变红时结婚。这就是她告诉伯迪的方式，同时向她演示如何顶住小牛的吮吸来拿稳奶瓶。安吉住在家族农场，就在伯迪暂住的姑姑和祖母家山坡下方。小牛舍有一种伯迪在其他任何地方都闻不到的味道——先是消毒水的味道，然后像花一样甜，又像粪便一样腐烂。这让她想起身处一家每个人都在死去或已经死亡的干净医院，尽管她从未去过那样的地方。伯迪觉得那些小牛可爱极了，可爱到让她心口发疼。她喜欢揉搓它们两眼之间粗糙的旋毛。每当她这样做时，它们就试图舔她的手腕。它们的鼻子、耳廓内部和长长的舌肌呈现出令人愉悦的粉红色，像蜡笔的颜色。每只小牛都戴着带链条的项圈，睡在乱糟糟的稻草床里。当伯迪和表姐回到室外，空气显得浓郁而翠绿。她必须绕过整个玉米地，沿着市场大道（Market Avenue）上山，才能回到姑姑家。她更想回家去找父母，但他们不在那里。在壁炉漆黑的口部坐着一个小黑铁块，重得像个保龄球，重得不可思议。她触碰了聚集在壁炉边缘的金属链帘，手指沾上了黑色的烟灰。她在裙子上揉了揉，毁掉了裙子的漂亮。她拿起一个空的鸵鸟蛋，将一只眼睛凑近一端的那个小孔，然后迅速放下蛋壳，感到一阵厌恶。离开客厅后，伯迪漫步到餐厅，那里笼罩在一种水下光影中，阳光透过长窗边布置的植物筛落下来。一张白色蕾丝布覆盖着餐桌，蕾丝上面又覆盖着一层僵硬的塑料布。她爬上椅子，伸手去够桌子中心的碗。她从中取出那一串紫色葡萄，触摸每一颗黏糊糊的塑料水果，然后将那根太黄的香蕉拿在手里轻轻咬了一口，留下了几个小印记。她轻轻地将香蕉敲在桌子上，听里面空洞的声音。

在厨房里，她的丽贝卡姨妈在撒了粉的台面上揉面团。伯迪坐在滑动玻璃门旁的小桌子边，看着她将面团前后推揉，她的衬衫袖子卷到了肘部以上，一件围裙遮住了她的牛仔裙。丽贝卡在头发上戴着简单的平日头巾，头发被扎成马尾，然后编成辫子并别在脑后。在周日，她会戴上女孩更喜欢的蕾丝头巾，但会将头发盘成简单的发髻，因为那样更虔诚。丽贝卡用宾夕法尼亚德语问了一个问题，然后笑了笑，重新尝试了一次：“伯迪，你想吃点面包吗？”当然，她想吃面包。姨妈给了她一块温热的面包，中心点融化着人造黄油。“看在老天的份上，伯迪，洗洗手。还有，最好不要去动壁炉。”丽贝卡为她展开了一个小金属凳，放在厨房水槽前。当伯迪在桌边吃面包时，她看着祖母提着一个蓝色水桶从棚屋走到花园，在那里，她和伯迪的另一个姨妈米里亚姆以一种虔诚的方式劳作，穿着飘飘的裙子弯腰除草。米里亚姆穿着一件深蓝色工作夹克，以抵御早晨稀薄的寒意。祖母的白色开襟羊毛衫在绿色背景中像雏菊一样绽放。伯迪试图理解祖母那双米色的鞋，鞋底厚实且僵硬。祖母干完活进来时，会将鞋留在门外的一块小地毯上。伯迪依然坐在桌边，盘子里只剩下几粒碎屑。此时太阳已升到高空，尽管米里亚姆在推开玻璃门时带着微笑，但女孩的胸口却充满了哭泣的冲动。她的父母去了印第安纳州拜访老朋友，那是他们曾在非洲一起做志愿工作的其他门诺派教徒。她的哥哥姐姐住在同学家，但她还太小。把她留在马基特大道上的房子里交给姨妈们和祖母照顾，比带她长途开车要容易得多。明天，周二，是二年级的第一天。厨房里弥漫着咖啡和酵母的味道。祖母坐在女孩对面，背对着滑动玻璃门。当姨妈们谈笑时，她微笑地用指尖轻轻触碰伯迪的手。祖母说着话——一些女孩无法理解的话。墙上的电话响了，丽贝卡抓起听筒，然后拉着卷曲的电话线走下地下室的台阶并关上了门。台面上的一台电池驱动的收音机播放着单薄的福音歌曲。女孩感到身体变得沉重，越来越沉重。她的头向桌子倾斜。她的嘴唇撇了起来。接着丽贝卡出现了，鼻孔里塞着碎纸巾。伯迪笑了，但并不感到快乐。日子就这样漫长地延续着。不久，一只雕刻的小布谷鸟从墙上小房子敞开的门中钻出，唱了五声。在厨房外的走廊里，米里亚姆从高处的壁橱架子上取出一盒游戏。伯迪坐在冰冷的油毡地板上，半在壁橱里，半在走廊里。红，红，蓝，黄，绿。红，红，蓝，黄，蓝。一个蜂鸣器发出尖叫。她又玩了一次。厨房里女人们的谈话声像歌曲一样起伏。一种紫色的忧郁沉淀在走廊地板的阴影中。她的腿后侧粘在了油毡地板上，当她抽离时，皮肤被撕扯得一阵疼痛。不久，夜晚就要降临了。晚餐后，丽贝卡切开了一个来自花园的甜瓜。她从橙色的果肉中挖出毛茸茸的种子。果块温热而甜美，像止咳糖浆一样。女孩吮吸着果肉，当她终于咬下去时，果汁 49 --- 漏到了下巴上。她用手擦掉，然后手指粘在了一起。当她将手指分开时，她看到指缝的凹陷处积了污垢。在女孩洗澡时，米里亚姆准备就寝。在浴室镜子前，她从口中取出三颗连接着闪亮金属部件的牙齿，用牙刷刷洗。她转向女孩。

“那么，你觉得怎么样？”她说道，微微一笑。她的前牙已经没了。她用一只手捂住嘴，随即因这恐怖的景象而笑了起来。她将一副假牙放在女孩柔软的小手掌心中。“小心点，小鸟，”她说道。女孩触碰着那个连接着金属丝的泛黄之物。那是米里亚姆身上已经死去的一部分。伯迪将牙齿放在浴缸边缘，在水中拨弄着白色泡沫，然后将脸埋进泡沫里，继续向下潜。在伯迪上楼睡觉之前，她站在祖母小卧室的门口。她的祖母坐在单人床上，丽贝卡正在解开她连衣裙的后背。“来看看她切除乳房留下的疤痕，”丽贝卡说。女孩畏缩了。“没什么好害怕的，”丽贝卡坚持道，用力拽着母亲的裙子。伯迪摇了摇头。“如果她不想看，就不要强迫她，”祖母轻声说。丽贝卡的手停了下来，女孩睁大眼睛盯着她的祖母。祖母长长的白发平时盘成发髻，此刻却像平滑、苍白的波浪般垂过肩头。这是女孩见过的最美丽的事物。那是另一个 era，甚至是那个时代的终结。伯迪不想长大。她喜欢保持娇小，除非在害怕的时候。她留在米里亚姆的卧室里，因为这位姑姑才是她所属的人。以前，当她的父亲还小的时候，他也属于米里亚姆。总共有十几个孩子，米里亚姆是排行第三的女孩。大女儿露丝抚养了中间的孩子们。次女丽贝卡负责烹饪。而米里亚姆则抚养年幼的孩子，包括伯迪的父亲。这一切都发生在山下的农舍里，现在安吉住在那里，还有亚伯叔叔、玛莎姑姑以及她的三个兄弟。安-

跨行（ENJAMMENT）听着，这并非一夜之间发生的。有一天，你在那件东西的蓝色残骸中醒来，那件东西就是你的床，你凉爽的早晨，你的马克杯，突然间你成了那个，你的“物性”对你而言变得显而易见，你成了一个被支配的，曾经拥有过灵魂，拥有过力比多，拥有过一个神秘的微笑，但那个现在不需要考虑这些，一个不能是安全的或不安全的，一个不能说出安全词，因此不需要安全词，一个思考并取消思考，并接受指令，一个可以见证但不能捍卫那在争吵中被泡沫化地洒在 Formica 桌上的垂死之光，此时太阳下沉，下沉，下沉，然后一只拳头猛击，一个大声回击，但一个大声回击仅仅是一个，一个思考着的，该死的，警察来询问那个那个是否还好，邻居们担心那个，那个邻居是一位八十多岁的女性，见过不少世面，但这个感到恼火，这个不与警察交谈，无法相信他们的物性，无法理解他们，聪明睿智、深受爱戴的人，竟然不能免疫于成为一个，一个讨厌创伤的话语，厌恶成为一个陈词滥调，急诊室现在在询问是否，一个成年，在街上昏迷后是否在和填充动物一起睡觉，无法忍受人们最近看他们的样子，在可怜的迷雾中压低声音，与 Aria 一起喝醉，Aria 告诉她，她也曾是一个，哦，，可怜的，小，物化，是一个美丽的混乱，在展望公园散步，踢飞积雪然后道歉，就是那积雪，在她的物性表演结束时鞠躬，结果却发现全世界都是一个舞台，且没有出口能从剧院中看到，给她母亲打电话但无法忍受说出，“我怎么了”，给她姐姐打电话并告诉她部分真相，几个朋友说时候到了，发誓会有 gie 的卧室是 Birdie 的父亲小时候睡觉的地方，每当 Birdie 进去时，她能感觉到一个白色幽灵穿过她的身体。她的 June 叔叔十七岁时死在哪个房间里？那是他在一场棒球赛中在外野与人碰撞后脑出血而死。她的祖父是在哪个房间里看到天使警告他 June 将死？她从未问过。她的父亲称 Miriam 为公主，但 知道她不仅于此：她是一位女王。没有什么比 Miriam 更好的了，除了 自己的母亲。 在她嫁妆箱上的小黑白电视机上看肥皂剧，尽管这些剧在家里是被女孩的父母禁止的。 对小屏幕上的那个女人对着一个男人大喊“我恨你！”，然后又拥抱他，绝望地亲吻他感到困惑。“好吧，小鸟，有爱，也有恨，你认为它们是对立的，但它们几乎完全一样，” 解释道。尽管那个女孩只有八岁，但她能理解。 的镜子上贴着照片，其中一张是一个 见过几次的男人，一个名叫 Zoltan 的匈牙利人，他有着好听的口音和一张亲切的脸。他总是穿着一套深色西装。“他想娶我，” 50 ---

没有关于这些月份的诗，事物既是讲述者也是被爱者，事物读到琼·乔丹和艾德里安·里奇曾有过一段友谊破裂但后来又重归于好，读到威廉·卡洛斯·威廉姆斯在西班牙流感期间每天接诊六十名患者并失去了一位年轻同事，读到桑尼·罗林斯在威廉斯堡大桥上练习萨克斯风每天长达十六小时，只要还能阅读关于真实与死亡的事物，她就能生存下去，她收拾好午餐，乘车在夜晚教那些看不见的女性读诗，而‘s 的颜色恢复了一点，每个周二，这些女性询问为什么其他女性在诗中的那个时刻断行，这些女性在询问关于跨行，第一个无重音 lamb 音的轻盈着陆，像蹦床一样跃向天空的扬抑格硬着陆，这些女性在询问为什么我们在某些词处断行而不在其他词处，每一次有了答案，就变得没那么像“事物”，有很多答案，因为之前是一个 ，学习非常刻苦，在睡在某个糟糕的东西旁边之前拥有一个聪明的头脑，不是一个玩偶，也不是那些秘密地想成为玩物的人之一，不是那些通过出售关于被拍打或鞭打这种半心半意的“违禁”之书的作家，无法认同写关于成为一个 的特权，想象将其变成艺术，多么美国，你这个美国 ，你 ，像一架坠毁的飞机在交代最后的错误一样在海洋上发出乒乓声，像贝克特那篇名为《Ping》的短篇小说一样发出乒乓声，多么美国，你多么美国，梅根，我是说，看看你，观看《月光之恋》，不想公正，不原谅任何人，对治愈不感兴趣，看着雪儿说，我爱他爱得要命，妈，而雪儿的母亲，银发聚集，聚集在一张脸上，聚集在岁月里，说，那太糟糕了。——梅根·费尔南德斯笑了。“他给我带来了一套非常漂亮的刀具。”“你为什么没做？”“噢，那不对。而且我想我想做我想做的事。”她停顿了一下，然后脱口而出，“他比我还矮！”“那有什么关系？”米里亚姆犹豫了，这个问题扭曲了她的嘴巴和眼睛。她看了看伯迪，然后笑了。“也许我很琐碎，”她说。“而且，我已经有一套好刀了。”米里亚姆四十岁，或者可能是五十五岁。伯迪不确定。至少她比伯迪的父亲年长。她在肉类冷库工作，伯迪的父亲曾带她去过那里。米里亚姆给了她一件厚外套，猛地推开银色的门。里面，血淋淋的动物碎片在寒冷中悬挂。一个灯泡照亮了房间，伯迪一进去就想离开。她能闻到血腥味。她看着自己的白色呼吸在脸前绽放又消逝，而米里亚姆在尸体间行走，触摸每一具使其摇摆，同时讲解切割部位。在床上，伯迪穿着一件将她包裹在温暖中的花卉睡裙。她的新背包和折叠好的第一天衣服放在米里亚姆的软垫阅读椅上。她本想穿一件光滑的白色纽扣衬衫配她的短裙，但当她试穿时，丽贝卡说这让她看起来像个男孩。她为自己喜欢它而感到羞愧。相反，她们选了一件带有让她厌恶的瘙痒蕾丝领的漂亮上衣。蜷缩在被子下，伯迪看着米里亚姆在镜子前用手指搜寻头部，将深色头发中的发夹一个个拔掉。“你想听个故事吗？”米里亚姆想道。“我有一个来自我朋友苏西·科布伦茨的好故事。”她说，那是发生在苏西朋友身上的事。

在床的对面，天花板陡峭地倾斜，上面开了一个老虎窗。窗户的两侧各有一扇小门，通向一个大小刚好适合一个小女孩的空间，她的姨妈在那里存放包装纸和在庭院拍卖会上淘来的东西。米里亚姆不喜欢伯迪在里面玩，但那是这个女孩唯一想玩的地方。在那个刚好适合她进行幻想的空间里，如果不让她带着手电筒把自己关在里面，简直像是一种惩罚。然而在夜晚，那些小门便染上了一层恐怖的色彩。它们的大小也刚好适合矮人、地精以及其他各种怪物。在深夜里，你无法确定如果转动把手，门后会开启一个什么样的世界。伯迪觉得，人们的房子里不应该有小门。这不对劲。

“那么，我朋友苏西的朋友，”米里亚姆继续说道，“有一天晚上，这个女人正躺在床上，忽然听到客厅里传来‘哒-哒-哒’的敲击声。她起身去看是什么声音，结果发现，在丈夫用来记账的小书桌前，魔鬼正坐在那里，在打字机上不停地工作。”

伯迪在滚烫的床单下僵住了，她想象着下方的客厅，那里有一张小木桌，上面放着一台老式的黑色打字机。一盏油灯——就像丽贝卡房间里摆设的那盏一样——照亮了魔鬼，他穿着深色西裤和深色背心，一件洁白无瑕的衬衫。一条金链在背心上闪闪发光，没入他的口袋。他的皮肤是棕色的，脖子和下巴上长着稀疏的汗毛。他戴着一副圆形的金边眼镜。他的鼻子和嘴巴像狼一样凸出。一只烟在手边的烟灰缸里缓缓燃烧。

“当然，苏西的朋友当时 51 --- 简直吓呆了，但很快她找回了自己的声音，”米里亚姆说。故事接下去说，苏西的朋友问：“你在这里做什么？”魔鬼用一种她无法辨认的奇怪口音回答道：“我是来写你的传记的。”

烟雾从他的耳朵里飘出！那个女人无法呼吸。仅仅是靠近他，她就感觉像是要窒息了。

“我是来写你的传记的，”魔鬼重复道，“无论你想怎么写。只要告诉我：你接受我的提议吗？如果你接受，我就让它实现。”他等待着，长而尖的指甲悬在键盘上方。

“我想你想要我的灵魂作为交换，”女人说。

“当然，”魔鬼微笑着说。他英俊的笑容迷住了她，她开始想象生活可能走向的所有方向。也许她能成为一名著名的爵士歌手。也许她能乘坐远洋客轮环游世界。或者住在纽约市，开一家吸引四方客人的汤面包餐厅？

伯迪感觉到那个女人的梦想在自己的胸中膨胀。她自己想成为一名宇航员，或者一名芭蕾舞演员。她想住在城市里，每天去参观美术馆。她想订装在白色纸盒里的中式外卖，尽管她从未吃过中国菜。她的母亲说她见多识广，而她的父亲说，在任何情况下，她都不可能成为宇航员。而且，他们不会为了像芭蕾舞课这样的事情开车带她穿过整个城市，但她脑海中挥之不去的依然是一件粉色的芭蕾舞裙。她的父母常笑着说，不确定她这些想法是从哪儿来的，但伯迪不明白为什么她的愿望会很有趣。

“那个女人深思熟虑了很久，比一个虔诚的基督徒女性该思考的时间还要长，”米里亚姆说，“最后她说，‘我不接受。不，我不接受你的提议。不，我不希望你写任何东西。我要我的灵魂归于主。我热爱我作为母亲和妻子简单而美好的生活，热爱我的家庭，没有什么能取代这一切。’正如你可以想象的，魔鬼愤怒了。他用拳头猛击键盘，发出一声恐怖的尖叫。当她走回房间，上床并轻松进入安稳的睡眠时，他还在呻吟和咆哮。”

尽管故事已经结束，但伯迪想象中的那个魔鬼已经搬到了楼上，现在就在走廊对面，在丽贝卡的卧室里处理他的事务。当丽贝卡在油灯的光芒中熟睡时，他依然在那里，坐在他的书桌前。伯迪担心如果丽贝卡仔细倾听，会听到键盘的敲击声。米里亚姆打开床头灯，触了触女孩的肩膀。“这让你害怕了吗？”她关切地问道。伯迪点了点头，尽管答案比简单的“是”要复杂得多。米里亚姆的脸色沉了下来。“我应该考虑得更周全一些。对不起。”米里亚姆从嘴里拔出一颗牙，接着又拔出一颗，将它们叮当作响地丢进床头柜上的一个瓷盘里。米里亚姆在女孩小小的手和手臂上涂了一些粉色乳液，好让她感觉好些。然后，女孩看着她的姑姑阅读，努力让自己的眼睛尽可能长时间地睁开。魔鬼表链闪烁的金属光芒在她的脑海中闪现，还有他的头发和牙齿。她想到了一道长长的、锯齿状的伤疤，横切在祖母的胸前。“为什么那个女人不能拥有她想要的生活，”伯迪问，“而不需要魔鬼的帮助？”米里亚姆停止了阅读，凝视着房间一个黑暗的角落。伯迪已经很累了，几乎要睡着了，但姑姑的沉默让她保持清醒。她等待着，但姑姑什么也没说。伯迪翻过身，将脚从被子下面伸出来。在女孩床边的一面墙上，有三层长长的书架。她的目光扫过每一本书的脊背，读出那些词语以让自己保持清醒。她在的一本书前停了下来，厚厚的书脊上写着《根》（ROOTS）这个词。这可能会讲什么？她闭上眼睛，想象根须钻入土壤，将房子锚定在山顶，仿佛房子本身就是一个生物，然后是花园和田野里的所有植物，所有遥远的树木，将上方的景观与下方的土地连接在一起。白色的根须穿透祖母那双奇怪的鞋子，钻进黑暗柔软的土壤中，接着丽贝卡的主根穿透厨房地板，穿过阴凉地下室的广阔空间，扎入混凝土地板，向下，向下。她想象米里亚姆被种在室外的花园里，和西葫芦以及茄子在一起，像树一样强壮。她想到了那些让一个人留在原地的根，一个人们看起来像亲戚、闻起来像她父母那样的地方。在那里，人们搬进装满疙疙瘩瘩番茄的木篮，谈论着潮湿的天气并发出笑声，而不是抱怨，并且修剪玫瑰丛，使其繁茂地绽放。在那里，人们是快乐的，快乐的，快乐的。但在她的想象中，伯迪自己没有长出根。她长出了翅膀，飞在他们所有人之上。就在她飞翔之时，她违心地陷入了沉睡。在接下来的几年里，伯迪询问她的父母、兄弟姐妹，甚至一些表亲，米里亚姆是否曾给他们讲过关于魔鬼和打字机的故事，这种故事是否会被传诵，可以说成了文化的一部分，或者是门诺派版本的都市传说，但她从未找到其他听过这个故事，或者能帮她准确回忆起故事经过的人。这让她执迷，因为这个故事看起来像某种预言，或者钥匙。伯迪在黎明前醒来。剧烈的疼痛在她的头部深处跳动。汗水浸湿了她的睡裙。她呻吟了一声，米里亚姆醒了，触了触女孩的脸。

“你发烧了，”她低声说道。女孩的一只耳朵听不见。米里亚姆起身离开，随后拿着一块冷毛巾回来，敷在伯迪的额头上。女孩闭上眼睛，再次睁开时，房间里已是一片白昼的亮光。米里亚姆在她失聪的那只耳朵里滴了温油。她给伯迪端来一大杯加了冰的水。小女孩哭了，因为她错过了开学第一天，而且她很担心，担心母亲会怎么想，担心自己生病是做错了什么，担心自己本该表现得更好，不该对魔鬼感兴趣，担心自己现在是在受罚，而且罚得理所应当。“可怜的孩子在说胡话，”丽贝卡说着，俯身在床边，握着女孩滚烫的手。伯迪哭着，睡着，又哭着，然后醒来，发现枕套上有一个油渍斑点。她脱掉睡裙，只穿着内衣睡觉。后来，很久以后，当她回想起那个关于魔鬼的故事时，感觉那个故事本身就像是她发烧的最早症状。她将这个故事融入到她的病中，融入到她二年级开学第一天缺课的经历中，那时她的父母在遥远的另一个州。她不仅仅是对魔鬼感到恐惧。她曾想坐在他的膝盖上，亲吻他多毛的脸颊。她曾想在他那黑色的琴键上敲得叮当作响。为此，她被高烧击中，一只耳朵失聪——这是一个警告。她的发烧之梦是漂浮在无尽黑色空间的虚空中，是受困于空旷舞台上刺眼的聚光灯下，不知该如何移动，也不知往哪里走。在感觉像是傍晚时分的时候，伯迪起身，将头探出卧室门，倾听以确保她的姨妈们不在附近，然后打开了倾斜天花板下方的一扇小门，走进了里面阴凉的地方。就在门内，米里亚姆放着一个手电筒。光束照亮了一箱卷装包装纸、一张木凳，以及一个装满旧相框的破盒子。在包装纸后面，在一块边缘磨损的薄纱布下面——她确信魔鬼的黑色打字机就在那里。这对她来说就像自己的心脏一样真实。她拉开那块布，露出了一个木制刀架，黑色的刀柄整齐地插在每个槽位里。她触摸了最大的那个柄，只是为了确认它是真实的。她的高烧在她周围闪烁着橙色的光芒，勾勒出她的手形。她将大刀从刀架中滑出，举在脸前，将刀刃前后倾斜。她看到一个穿着黑色西装的男人。他用一种奇怪的口音深情地对米里亚姆说话，然后单膝跪下，递给她六把插在木方块里的刀。伯迪缓慢地眨眼以看清视线，然后小心地将冰冷的金属刀刃压在脸颊上。就这样蜷缩在黑暗中，刀子给了她一种慰藉，突然之间——或者也许过了很久很久——她变成了那个她曾经恐惧的、住在小门外的地精。她发出沙哑的小声哼唧和喷气声，用舌头舔唇。她用手掌在头皮上来回揉搓，直到头发打结，然后用指甲在脸颊上向下划。她挖了鼻子并将其擦在地毯上，然后尿在了内裤里，尿液在顺着大腿流下并溅在脚上时滚烫如火。她从小门中走出，进入了月光之下。她纳闷，怎么会这样。从老虎窗看向外面，花园溢出了它的小地块，成了由繁茂的羽衣甘蓝和瑞士甜菜组成的、不受约束的怪诞之景，番茄植株在夏末的漫延中显得巴洛克式地繁复，卷须爬出笼子向外延伸，南瓜植株用它们精巧的肢体铺就床铺。躺在那个花园里，它就会将你吞没，小女孩想。它会将你包裹起来，你永远无法离开。当她前后倾斜时，刀刃闪过蓝色，然后是白色。

内衣湿透了，头顶披着一块薄纱。他们都会笑，包括伯迪。但米里亚姆没有告诉伯迪父母的是，当她发现伯迪时，伯迪手里拿着一把剔骨刀。就在那时，伯迪从姑姑那里得知，有时撒谎是一种必要的罪孽，尽管她不确定这是否是姑姑想要教给她的教训。那天晚上在走廊里，米里亚姆靠近地触碰伯迪发红的脸颊，那脸颊因病而潮湿且滚烫。她揭开了伯迪头上的面纱。女孩的眼睛漆黑，闪烁着银色的点点光芒。“小鸟，”她低声说道，“你吓我一跳。来，我们把你收拾干净。你在外面做什么？而且还拿着这把刀。”几十年后，在她自己的六月婚礼那天——仪式在一棵年轻的枫树下举行，招待会在一座红色的谷仓里，热得像发烧一样——伯迪会想起那天晚上她说过的话。她会想起自己在走廊里是如何对姑姑说，“我是新娘，”她递出那把刀，“而这就是我的承诺。”一个男人将一枚金戒指套在她的手指上。玉米地在他们周围升起，像一面坚固的墙，一种防御，保护什么免受什么的侵害？在那之后的所有年岁里，她都记得自己手持利刃所许下的承诺，然后，在她说出“我愿意”之后，她忘记了。 ♦ NEWYORKER.COM / FICTION 注册即可在收件箱中接收作者访谈。 53 ---

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书籍

宁静的生活

一部关于沉默的文化史。 作者：安东尼·莱恩 (ANTHONY LANE)

《天路历程》的作者约翰·班扬 (John Bunyan) 的优点之一，就是他极少在意那些权贵之辈。无论是在论述中还是在社交圈里，他都更偏好卑微与平凡。在他的灵性自传《恩典充盈于罪魁》(Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners) 中——该书在 1666 年首次出版后经历了多次修订——启示总在他最不期待的时候降临。“我正的一位好人的店里走来走去，为自己悲哀凄惨的状态而哀叹，”他写道。我们都经历过这种时刻。突然，在购物途中，他听到了主的话语：

它带来了光芒，并命令我心中那些喧嚣的思绪陷入沉默，此前这些思绪就像失去主人的地狱之犬，在我内心咆哮怒吼，发出可怕的噪音。

看来，与风暴中心的宁静相比，风暴本身根本不算什么。在《恩典充盈于罪魁》的结尾，经常会附上班扬关于 1660, 年因公开传道而被捕的记录。他被强行与妻儿分离（他将此举比作“将肉从骨头上撕下”）并被监禁。当一名地方法官建议他闭嘴并离开这个国家，并警告如果他不听话将会被“绞死”时，班扬简单地回答说，如果被释放，他将继续传道。一本 1905 年的美国版书籍中的插图配文是：“班扬拒绝被禁言”。

所以，情况就是这样。沉默既是当你身处罪恶世界的喧嚣之中时，降临在你身上的神圣静谧；也是当你必须讲述真理时，必须撕掉的封口布。它怎么能既是前者又是后者？

这类谜题散见于凯特·麦克劳林 (Kate McLoughlin) 的新书《沉默：一部文学史》(Silence: A Literary History)（牛津大学出版社）之中。遗憾的是，班扬在她的综述中没有被提及，因为他对于“不多言”有许多深刻的见解；这同样令人惊讶，因为这本书说得委婉一点，是非常“宽容”的。全书长达 696 页，其中 221 页被注释占据，字体之小，足以让你的眼内肌向你的大脑提起诉讼。如果把这本书掉在脚上，你会发出一声痛苦且绝非沉默的尖叫。

公平地说，麦克劳林的任务非常艰巨。沉默就像欲望、信仰或疾病一样，是一种难以界定边界的溢出主题。她对证据的搜寻如此不可遏制，以至于即使搜寻到了洗手间门口也毫不退缩：

成立于 1933, 年的“反噪音联盟” (The Anti-Noise League) 致力于从字面上降低日常生活的音量。1935, 年，该联盟在南肯辛顿的科学博物馆举办了一场展览，展品包括“静音交响厕所套装”，这是一款拥有“极静”冲水功能的厕所。

你会好奇，这种探索最终会在哪里结束？我曾希望在牛津大学教授英国文学的麦克劳林能通过参加一场激流金属音乐节，或者一场钟琴比赛，或者也许是一次响亮的皇家同花顺来收尾，但即便如此，我怀疑她仍会被促使去探索在极端声音之后那颤抖的沉默。

凑巧的是，她将最优雅的一章留到了最后，引导我们领略海顿第 45, 号交响曲《告别》中机智的收尾，在其中，“乐谱指示音乐家们分批次熄灭谱架上的蜡烛，然后离开舞台”。

从时间顺序来看，《沉默：一部文学史》（Silence: A Literary History）涵盖了从《贝奥武夫》中空旷的大厅到新冠疫情封锁及其之后的所有内容。（书中甚至还回顾了更早的时期；我喜欢想象哈佛教授们在得知毕达哥拉斯要求他的学生在敢于开口说话之前必须保持五年沉默的消息时，因嫉妒而面色发青的样子。）书中不仅为“12世纪普雷蒙特雷修会（Premonstratensian）的哈文格修道院院长菲利普”留出了空间，还提到了BBC的节目《舞动风暴》（Strictly Come Dancing）。在2021年，该节目在表演中途切断了音乐，从而让观众能够短暂地分享那位参赛舞者——一名先天失聪的女演员——所习惯的沉默。对于黄金时段的电视节目来说，其结果令人惊叹。毕达哥拉斯一定会给它打十分。随着书页的翻动，我们经过了一些熟悉的里程碑。麦克劳林（McLoughlin）驻足向多恩、弥尔顿、华兹华斯、柯勒律治、济慈致敬——济最初写道“当某些韵脚浮现时的沉默”，仿佛它们是雨后现身的蜗牛——以及一群著名小说家，包括塞缪尔·理查森（他的书信体史诗《克拉丽莎》长达近100万字，但依然充满了未竟之言）、乔治·艾略特、亨利·詹姆斯，以及

54 上方：米格尔·波兰（MIGUEL PORLAN） 据报道，毕达哥拉斯要求他的学生在敢于开口说话之前必须保持整整五年的沉默。 插画：本·希基（BEN HICKEY） 55

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托马斯·哈代。最后一位作家不断向我们展示那些无法、不愿或觉得没必要表达真实想法的情侣，更不用说表达他们对彼此的意义，即便他们仍在继续交谈。《无名的裘德》（Jude the Obscure）就是一个典型的例子：当他们谈论一个无关紧要的话题时，就像现在这样，他们的情感之间总有一场第二场沉默的对话在进行，因为他们之间的共鸣如此完美。哈代将这种客厅戏剧转向第一次世界大战结束停战后那片广阔而疲惫的寂静，这很有他的风格。在1920年的一首名为《当时一片大平静》（And There Was a Great Calm）的诗中，他写到困惑的士兵们低声嘀咕道：“奇怪，这怎么可能？所有的枪火都停止了。”麦克劳林引用了这些话，并通过复制一份由美国陆军信号兵团在1918年那个准确时刻制作的音频记录图表来支持这些话。左侧断断续续、上下剧烈跳动的线条代表枪炮的轰鸣；右侧的线条几乎是平的，因为沉默降临了。（一份官方文件能否凭借其庄重代表的内容而成为一件艺术品？）为了纪念那个时刻并向死者致敬，英国全境每年11月11日上午11点仍会遵守两分钟的沉默仪式。就习俗而言，全国范围内暂停正常活动是很罕见的。（我曾一次在英国机场，正艰难地通过安检，这时两分钟的沉默仪式开始了；当传送带颤抖着停止时，我周围旅客脸上的表情是一种国际性的困惑。）然而，麦克劳林仅在随笔中一次提及这两分钟的沉默，仿佛对其国家赞助的正式感感到不适。总的来说，她更倾向于几个世纪以来由抗议或绝望而生的更激进的缄默形式。“在21世纪20年代，就像在17世纪和18世纪一样，政治动荡具有一种使人沉默的效果，”她写道。在她引用的安静生活的三个组成部分——“创伤性的沉默、斯多葛式的沉默和快乐的沉默”——中，第三种往往被其他两种挤掉，至少在这本书中是这样。感谢麦克劳林，我们得以了解“围绕跨性别身份的沉默——隐藏、拒绝、对传统类别的反抗”，以及“气候危机中令人恐惧的沉默”。而且不要忘记那种“培养对其他非人类生命形式细心关注”的沉默。换句话说，如果你对着你的狗大吼大叫，那你完全找错了方向。

在《沉默：一部文学史》（Silence: A Literary History）中，总能找到适合各种口味的内容。无论你向往什么样的风味，都可以尝试一下。“这里有令人尴尬的沉默、掌控性的沉默、引发愤怒与同情的沉默，以及变幻莫测、悄然溜走的沉默，”麦克劳林（McLoughlin）写道。人们几乎无法抑制地想要在书页中嗅出一种“香草味”或“草莓味”的沉默。在同一个页面上，沉默被描述为“时而令人屏息，时而凄美，时而令人惊愕，时而令人捧腹，时而显而易见地真实”；而几行之后，它又变成了“令人悲伤、令人屏息、抚慰人心、咄咄逼人、难以理解且令人敬畏”。这得深呼吸多少次才行。

就涵盖范围而言，麦克劳林选择研究的许多内容与其说是真正的沉默，不如说是“沉默相关”。例如，对孤独与宁静的渴望可能非常强烈，但这在逻辑上并不意味着必须闭嘴。并非所有的隐居都是苦修，隔绝外界反而容易滋生八卦的温室。此外，虽然这本书避开了文学界的顶流而转向鲜为人知的人物，这一点令人欣慰，但在将这些人强行纳入讨论时，能感觉到一种明显的技巧，或者说是一把沉重的扳手在起作用。

其中最有趣的人物无疑是纽卡斯尔公爵夫人玛格丽特·卡文迪什（Margaret Cavendish），她于1673年去世，享年50岁，留下了二十多卷诗集、剧本和随笔。诚然，她自称是“沉默的怪物”，并且写了一部名为《沉思女士》（The Lady Contemplation，1662年）的剧本，但她在现实生活中却是健谈的典范——根据她自己的描述，她属于那种“说话如此之多、如此之快，以至于没人能听懂他们所说的话，或者说，快到他们既不停止，也不做区分”的人。听听那些逗号在其中地喘息。

“卡文迪什有胆量（chutzpah），”麦克劳林宣称，这很难反驳，但让我们坦白点：公爵夫人唯一不具备的天赋就是保持沉默。

面对莎士比亚，不出所料，麦克劳林的论据更为稳固。我们被提醒注意到《科里奥兰纳斯》（Coriolanus）中一个惊人的场景：主角对他的妻子说话，仿佛她是一个抽象名词：“我优雅的沉默，向你致敬！”她没有回答。（想象一下女演员在这里的选择：她是应该谦卑地低头，顺从这份问候，还是畏缩，或者用愤怒的目光让对方僵在原地？）

麦克劳林最深刻的研究灵感来自《冬天的故事》（The Winter's Tale），该剧的结尾场景展开在奇迹的维度上。多年之前，被嫉妒扭曲的国王利昂特（Leontes）下令处死他纯洁的妻子赫米奥妮（Hermione），此时帷幕拉开，显现出一尊看起来像她的雕像。雕像动了，在无声中恢复了生命。“如果这是魔法，愿它像进食一样合法，”利昂特说。当赫米奥妮终于开口说话时，她明确地没有对他说话，而是对着他们的女儿。因此，从麦克劳林那里了解到19世纪早期的一次演出就更有趣了：在演出中，利昂特被装扮成拿破仑——嘘，嘘！——而他那大理石般的王后则被装扮成一名英国女士，高贵地用一次冷漠的拒绝向他致意。

但请问，你如何能构思一部关于沉默的文学史，却连一句篇幅都不愿分给《亨利四世，第2部分》？这部剧里就有一个叫作“沉默”（Silence）的角色。在第五幕的果园场景中，这个名叫“沉默”的小乡镇治安官喝了点酒——情况变得糟糕了，或者说，既然这是莎士比亚的作品，情况反而变得更妙了——他不再名副其实，开始唱歌。法斯塔夫听着这些零碎的小曲，评论道：“我没意识到‘沉默’先生竟是个如此有激情的人。”“沉默”的回答既醉醺醺又带着抵触：“谁，我？我之前开心过两次，在此之前还开心过一次。”1945年，伦敦的老维克剧院（Old Vic）上演了一场著名的该剧演出，由劳伦斯·奥利弗和拉尔夫·理查森主演。评论家肯尼斯·泰南在本杂志上对其进行了评论，在写到果园中那些成熟的场景时，他写道：“如果我在剧院里还能多花半小时，且能随意选择，毫无疑问我会选择这些。”在微醺的黄昏中打破沉默，即便仅仅是为了些滑稽的胡言乱语，也可以像黎明破晓一样令人欣喜。或许，责备《沉默：一部文学史》的作者有所遗漏是不公平的，但她决定挖掘其主题在宗教层面的深度，却对法律层面的影响不予触及——比如米兰达权利的使用与滥用，这可是许多犯罪小说的主干——这在某些读者看来可能显得古怪。麦克劳林本人敏锐地意识到了这类指责，她在最后一章这样开篇：“尽管篇幅很长，读者们仍可能会揪住本书中‘缺失’的内容不放。”当然，揪住不放是阅读的永恒乐趣之一，就像体育迷们最极致的快感莫过于抱怨那些没被选入关键比赛、但若在场定能扭转乾坤的球员。因此我认为，在麦克劳林书中仅零星出现的尼采，正是她所需要的那个“紧端锋”。在《此人》（Ecce Homo）中，他是这样直言不讳的：最粗鲁的话语，最粗鲁的信件，都比沉默更善良，更诚实。那些保持沉默的人几乎总是缺乏心之微妙与礼貌；沉默是一种反对，强行吞咽必然会导致性格恶劣——它甚至会毁掉胃口。所有倾向于沉默的人都患有消化不良。正如往常一样，尼采抛出了一枚挑战书，而我们此前并未意识到这枚挑战书是

简讯

《日光临世》（Daylight Come），约书亚·杰利-沙皮罗（Joshua Jelly–Schapiro） 著（企鹅出版社）。这部关于 2023 年去世的哈里·贝拉丰特（Harry Belafonte）的传记，将这位歌手兼民权活动家描绘成“我们第一位后种族时代的流行巨星”。在音乐中，贝拉丰特试图致敬他的加勒比血统——他 1927 年出生在哈莱姆，父母是牙买加人——而又不被简化为一个单纯的异域形象。在他的整个职业生涯中，他将演艺工作与政治信念相结合（例如，他拒绝在实行种族隔离的场所演出），这种追求要求他将自己的名声与“对他赋予这种名声的社会的愤怒”相调和。杰利-沙皮罗利用了包括与贝拉丰特的对话在内的多种资料，塑造了一个强大人物的肖像，正如贝拉丰特的儿子所说，他“在为两个家庭服务：我们，以及人类这个大家庭”。

《拾荒之美》（Scavenging Beauty），安杰丽卡·格拉斯（Angelica Glass） 著（Riverhead 出版社）。在这部优雅的处女回忆录中，一段由经济困窘和虐待标记的童年记忆与自然世界交织在一起。全书围绕作者在加利福尼亚州圣克鲁斯县步行走遍每条街道的七年计划展开。格拉斯曾是一名儿童福利社会工作者，她以安静而精准的笔触写道，她是八个孩子中的一个，母亲的爱经常转化为暴力，而父亲的失败则投下了同样持久的阴影。与变幻的海岸线、高耸的红杉和菌丝网络的邂逅，引发了关于继承、韧性以及重建生活的思考。

《杜宁》（Dooneen），基思·里奇韦（Keith Ridgway） 著（新方向出版社）。这部奇异且雄心勃勃的小说设定在一个版本的都柏林，那里禁止汽车，人们通过瞬间移动进入该国。住在伦敦的爱尔兰作家巴塞洛缪·波特（Bartholomew Port）回到故乡参加一个文学节，并在一次民粹主义起义的前夕抵达。他观察到，都柏林已变成一台“让富人更富”且“让穷人更穷”的机器，一个“生命不如金钱重要”的地方。随着波特加入一群准备起义的阴谋家，这本书呈现出一种幻觉般的、离题的特质，模糊了生与死、现实与幻象之间的界限。最终，里奇韦探讨了旁观者必须为周围的不公正承担什么样的责任。

《玛布女王》（Queen Mab），艾米莉·麦克布莱德（Emily McBride） 著（Farrar, Straus & Giroux 出版社）。玛德琳是一位“前途光明”的二十三岁研究生，她决定生个孩子，这让她生活中的其他女性学者感到震惊。（一位同事说：“顺便说一句，她们都表示祝贺，并觉得是你替她们承受了这一切。”）分娩时的身体恐怖让位于早期母亲身份的童话式恐怖，居住在巴塞罗那的翻译家麦克布莱德在书中散布了来自民间传说和维多利亚时代诗歌的文学彩蛋。这个婴儿真的是婴儿吗，还是被换灵（changeling）取代了？玛德琳还是她自己吗，还是她也被偷走了？她的丈夫可以信任吗？结果是一部关于精神崩溃的、灵动且令人不安的小说，背景设定在一个将母亲身份视为一种古怪矫揉造作的女性世界中。

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就在那里等着被摘取。他的重点不像麦克劳林那样在于沉默的类型（尽管其类型多种多样），而在于潜藏在所有沉默之下的紊乱——即基本的心理健康问题。我认为，如果你在准备第一次观看英格玛·伯格曼 1966 年那部毫不留情的双人剧《Persona》，这种方法会非常有用。在那部电影中，一个角色喋喋不休，而另一个角色则完全沉默，在表演一部希腊悲剧的过程中陷入了自我封闭的静默。没有比这更好的例子能说明“失语”是如何被当作武器使用的，它迫使那些健谈的人仿佛被枪指着头一样，用言语去填补空白。遗憾的是，《Persona》在麦克劳林的书中甚至没能获得一个脚注。除了对哈波·马克斯的点头致意外，麦克劳林似乎奇怪地没有从电影中获得滋养，尽管电影是唯一一种在沉默中诞生并成长起来的戏剧艺术形式。如果不向梅尔·布鲁克斯在《沉默电影》（1976）中那个绝妙的笑话致敬，怎么行？在那部电影中，唯一能听到的词是“Non!”，由世界上最著名的哑剧表演者马塞尔·马索说出。公平地说，麦克劳林确实提供了补偿，提供了一个我此前并不知晓的关于马索早年生活的非凡细节：马塞尔开始教那些他帮助从法国走私到瑞士的犹太儿童，在危险时刻如何通过肢体动作而非开口说话来进行无声交流。

《沉默：一部文学史》是写给谁看的？从书页中使用的词汇来看，这本书属于文学理论的内殿，那里的墙上挂满了艰涩的修辞比喻。如果你能分清“adnotations”（注释）和“asyndeton”（无连接句）；如果你知道“anacoluton”（句法不连贯）是指句子语法结构的突然中断或转向，而不是一种会慢慢把你体内的动词挤出来的蛇；如果你能说出“euthanasia”（安乐死）这个词而不会向身边的人吐口水，能说出“problematically anthropomorphic”（问题性的拟人化）这个短语而不会吹泡泡；如果这一切对你来说像小孩子玩游戏一样简单，那么恭喜你。

对此该如何看待？2016 年，在英国脱欧公投中投票支持“留在”的 1614.12万,141,241 人（包括我在内），体会到了在历史转折点处于失败方是什么感觉。难以置信、愤怒、悲伤、羞耻、否认。在同年晚些时候的美国总统大选之后，我注销了我的 Facebook 和 Twitter 账号。我的一部分知道继续战斗比以往任何时候都重要；另一部分则需要关闭噪音。这就是麦克劳林，她袒露了全部的政治立场。即便你同意她的观点（而且在她的书中，潜流中有一种假设，即没有任何脱欧支持者或任何派系的反动分子会想读这本书，或会对文学上的精巧感到自在），看到她以这种方式公开表态仍然很奇怪。有人可能会认为，人文学科的学术写作从未像现在这样危险地脱离了日常语言，而像麦克劳林这样的学者在意识到这种风险后，偶尔采取一种闲聊式的个人坦诚，以赢得读者的共鸣并让他们保持参与，这是正确且勇敢的。问题在于，在涉入这样的离题之后，评论者必须猛然地回到正轨。此时，麦克劳林将注意力转向了英国内战后的漫长余波，那时谨慎的乡村退休生活正流行：。

嗯。我也许错了，但我不认为领导留欧运动的大卫·卡梅伦被获胜的脱欧派掘坟并锁链处决了，或者他的死头被砍下并钉在尖桩上超过二十年——这是1661年查理二世国王复位后，对奥利弗·克伦威尔，或者至少是对他那有罪的尸体所施加的惩罚。而且，这次对历史类比的探讨与“沉默”究竟有什么关系，也并不十分明确。像麦克劳林那样脱离社交媒体可能是一个明智之举，但这在多大程度上能掩盖普遍的喧嚣？由于从未加入过Facebook、Twitter、X、Instagram、TikTok或潘多拉应用商店提供的任何其他“礼品”，我没有资格发表评论。我只知道，我尚未达到特拉普派修士那种坚韧的宁静。尽管——或者，宽容地说，正因为——这些以及其他古怪之处，《沉默：一部文学史》（"Silence: A Literary History"）值得你花时间阅读，无论你是否有耐力将其一口气读完。它最适合作为一本“触发之书”。随机翻开，挑选一个章节，你几乎可以保证会被推向一条陌生的思考轨迹。谁能想到梭罗写过一篇标题如此考究的文章，名为《本月下半月——1838年12月——关于“声音与沉默”随笔的一些片段》，并在其中本能地将他的主题比作女性？（“对我而言，解读‘沉默’是徒劳的。她无法被翻译成英语。”）同样，在敦促我们尝试阅读安妮·勃朗特（Anne Brontë）的《艾格尼丝·格雷》（"Agnes Grey"）之前不久——书中将沉默视为一种盔甲，具有一种战斗性的视角——“当我的内心充满苦涩时，我习惯于戴着一副平静微笑的面孔”——麦克劳林告诉我们，当萨克雷为夏洛特·勃朗特举办派对时，她的沉默寡言“让她的主人如此紧张，以至于他竟然溜出了自己的家，在俱乐部度过了那个夜晚”。只能相信勃朗特姐妹是一支“沉默突击队”（Shtumtroopers），把人们沉默得体无完肤。最吸引人的是那些麦克劳林化身为热情女主人（chatelaine）的时刻，她不像是单纯地提及名人，而更像是在向他们互相介绍，希望能产生一种令人眩晕的知识化学反应。除了这里，阿尔弗雷德·丁尼生勋爵还能在哪个括号里与艾德·希兰和Foo Fighters乐队同场出现？除了麦克劳林，谁能把简·奥斯汀、杰克·本尼和伊曼努尔·康德塞进同一个句子？那么“粉红蒲公英”（Pink Dandelion）又是谁——既不是你可能想象的民谣摇滚乐队，也不是一种清爽的果饮，而是英国伯明翰大学一位专门研究贵格会历史的教授的名字。整本书在无声中喧嚣；你几乎能听到酒杯被重新斟满时的叮当声和气泡声。随着派对接近尾声，你会被留下一种愉快的讽刺：古往今来，向我们传授沉默这一核心艺术的创意人士如此之多，以至于到最后你已经受够了。你只想让他们闭嘴。♦ 58 --- 书评

最孤独的数字

一位不妥协的比利时小说家的数字后世。 作者：KATY WALDMAN

走进任何一家实体书店，你可能会看到至少有一张桌子专门摆放那些在“BookTok”上走红的书籍。自 2020 年左右以来，社交媒体平台 TikTok 的文学领域似乎已经取代了旧有的营销和宣传策略，成为推动销售的主要动力。该标签下的 5200 多万个视频通常以镜头感十足的年轻人面对色彩鲜艳的书架抒情为特征；推荐内容环环相扣，形成一股自我补充的潮流。该平台推崇的许多书籍属于商业类型，如浪漫小说和浪漫奇幻小说。但 BookTok 也挖掘出了经典之作，包括像《孤独的鸽子》和《伊甸之东》这样的大部头，以及一些基调忧郁、鲜为人知的短篇作品，例如费奥多尔·陀思妥耶夫斯基 1848 年的《白夜》，以及日本小说家太宰治 1948 年的《人间失格》。

如果说 BookTok 最值得称赞的重新发现的被忽视的瑰宝，那可能就是比利时犹太作家雅克琳·哈普曼（Jacqueline Harpman）的一部纤薄小说《我，从未认识过男人》（I Who Have Never Known Men），该书于 1997 年首次以英文出版。2022 年，非营利出版商 Transit Books 重新发行了这部小说的修订译本（由 Ros Schwartz 从法文译出）。雅克琳·哈普曼的小说探讨了囚禁、孤立和流亡的主题。很大程度上得益于社交媒体，该书仅在北美就售出了 80 多万册；于 2012 年去世的哈普曼在死后成为了互联网名人，甚至还拥有荣誉 Google Doodle。今年夏天，Transit 出版了她的三篇此前从未以英文面世的短篇故事，书名为《我们被禁止》（We Were Forbidden）。

BookTok 的偏好可能倾向于熟悉的套路和直白的感官刺激，但在哈普曼的作品中，这种集体意识捕捉到了某种更宽广且难以捉摸的东西。《我，从未认识过男人》是对孤立如何塑造和扭曲人类心理的一次顽强且不抱幻想的研究。这本书采取证词的形式，由一名无名主角写就——她是某场未知灾难的最后一名幸存者，在死于子宫癌之际记录下这一切。她最早的记忆是一个地下掩体，由拿着鞭子的男性守卫巡逻，她与 39 名年长的女性被囚禁在一起。她对父母、爱情、性、咖啡的味道、橙子的气味以及天空的样子一无所知。

小说进行到不到一半时，士兵们消失了，留下了一扇未锁的门，囚犯们爬上 100 级台阶，发现了一个拥有中立平原和持续温和天气的世界。她们从未得知自己为何被囚，被囚禁期间发生了什么，甚至不知道自己是在地球上还是在某个其他星球。她们四处游荡，在像她们之前那样掩体中遇到成组的男女死囚，但没有活人。她们用石头和泥土盖房子，共进晚餐，并搜寻食物和物资。然后，她们一个接一个地死去，只留下主角孑然一身。

哈普曼笔下这种被剥离到极致的荒凉感引起了许多社交媒体用户的共鸣，他们赞扬这本书的故事“令人心碎”，并将其比作“凝视虚空”。一个悖论在于，一部在出版时因其哲学严谨性和内在聚焦而受赞赏的、简朴的 20 世纪反乌托邦科幻作品，竟然在一个由设计之初就注定可被随意丢弃的短视频平台中获得了新生。但《我，从未认识过男人》具有一种富有成效的模糊感。叙述者除了她的渴望、她的理性能力和她的不归属感之外，被剥离了所有身份标识，这反而产生了一种反直觉的共鸣——这是一个关于基础的、普世的人性的画像。（哈普曼愿景中那一抹情节剧式的色彩，可能在网络上也很吃香。）

SOPHIE BASSOULS / GETTY 59 ---

可能同样重要的是，《我从未认识过男人》（I Who Have Never Known Men）所关注的许多问题，正是那些使用转瞬即逝的媒介、并承担起文化保存者新角色的 BookTok 用户们有理由关心的问题。当你消失之后，什么样的创意形式能够持久存在？是什么让一件艺术作品能够超越信息流？哈普曼（Harpman）写作于一个不同的 era，但她小说中那种挽歌般的孤独，预示了我们如今这种孤独且被屏幕禁锢的现状。她的书似乎在问：外面有人吗？我该如何找到你？

哈普曼 1929 年出生于比利时的埃特贝克（Etterbeek）。在纳粹占领期间，她和家人逃往摩洛哥，在那里生活直到战争结束，从而避开了她父亲那边几位亲属的命运——他们死在了奥斯威辛集中营。回到祖国后，哈普曼开始学习医学，但在患上肺结核后不得不停止学业。她在疗养院休养了两年——这段经历，就像欧洲犹太人记忆中依然新鲜的噩梦一样，可能渗透进了她的监狱情节中。她的第一本书《爱与金合欢》（Love and Acacia）出版于 1958 年，当时她接近三十岁，但她的十四部小说大部分是在她五十、六十和七十多岁时创作的。在此期间，她接受了心理学培训，并在 1980 年获得了精神分析师资格。（她的本科论文是关于罗夏墨迹测验的。）她在生前受到赏识但未被神化，获得过少数几个奖项，包括 1996 年凭借《奥兰达》（Orlanda）获得的梅迪西奖（Prix Médicis），该书讲述了一个女性的假小子倾向从她的心理其余部分分离出来，并跳入一名音乐记者的身体的故事。

迄今为止被翻译成英文的大部分哈普曼作品都围绕着被囚禁感、迷失感和流亡感展开。精神分析的概念——投射、依恋、愿望及其实现——占据了重要地位。哈普曼以惊人的坦率描绘了性幻想及其与写作的关系。在《我从未认识过男人》中，孤独既是一种折磨，也是一个缪斯，叙述者在脑海中编织了一系列色情故事。故事的主角是她最年轻的狱卒，他像他的同僚一样，被禁止与被监禁者互动。（在一次罕见的、狡黠的幽默笔触中，她也不停地盯着他看，告诉另一个女人这是一种反抗，而且她“发明了一些出人意料的东西”。）女孩说，每一次幻想都会产生“一次在我体内爆炸的非凡光芒”。为了追求这种“喷发”，她告诉自己“越来越长且复杂的故事”，试图在智力上胜过她的“内在观众”并保留惊喜元素。她报告说：“我的想象力得到了发展。我必须进行严格的自律。”有时她的一部分想要快进到结局，但另一部分“被倾听的快感所迷住”，则希望叙事能继续下去。随着女孩处理方式的演变，虚构故事本身变得至少与它们的生理效果一样重要，而一系列重复出现的人物变成了“老朋友”。她惆怅地希望，一个足够好的故事可能会产生如此详尽

且生动的朋友，以至于能满足她对连接的渴望。直到她发现了书，她才意识到这些朋友是多么有限。

令人心酸的是，考虑到小说中所有活着的男人都是监禁者，叙述者对传统的男性理想几乎没有敌意。事实上，她的叙述往往充斥着对异性关系的渴望——对于那些丈夫和情人，而她不像那些年长的女性在

地堡，永远不会拥有。“我怎么能认为自己是一个人类，而我只认识三十九个人，而且全部是女性？”她问道。到此时，她不再经历那些爆发，但她仍在构思男人。她写道，当死亡降临时，“我将走最后十步，把这些纸页放在桌上……一个形销骨立的老妇人，她的眼睛将永远望着门，而没有任何一只手会为她闭上眼。”然而，她等待的真的是一个男人，还是某种其他类型的伴侣？这位女性推测，或许她试图通过这部回忆录项目来“创造时间”。她继续写道，她是在为“某个未知的读者”写作，对方会将她的作品接纳进自己的意识之中：“读者与我由此融合，将构成某种活物，那将不再是我，因为我已经死去，也不会是那个读者在融合之前的样子。”这是一种色情幻想，随后演变为将文学创作比作有性生殖的隐喻。写作创造了一种生命，将延续这个女人的遗产——只要有人能领悟它。“最有可能的是没有人会来，”她总结道。尽管哈普曼的小说力量强大，但《我从未认识过男人》中有一种青春期的特质，它对主题的沉思就像一个刚刚发现存在主义的青少年。书中的后启示录设定使其对自我和有限性的冥想变得高尚；叙述者对永恒的追求因其处境而具有一种不可动摇的沉重感。对于那些通过哈普曼忧郁的数字死后生活首次接触她的读者来说，《我们被禁止》将像一次启示般到来。这部短篇集的瑰宝是其中最长的一篇故事《扫帚橱》，这是一出性喜剧，将作者关于艺术永恒的想法揉进了一种更平庸的形式中。故事始于一位步入中年后期的成功小说家在一次出版活动后登上火车。当她的目光落在餐车的一名陌生人身上时，她陷入了一场关于二十世纪二十年代中欧一名英俊陆军军官的幻想。在白日梦中，她是一位年轻美丽的法官妻子，戴着“扣子一直延伸到肘部的长款麂皮手套”，而那名炮兵在治安官舞会上诱惑了她。他们在标题中的那个橱柜里发生了性关系（“我们在掸子之间一起跌倒”）；她在婚姻中被保护得如此之好，以至于有些令人难以置信地，她从未见过阴茎。但她学得很快，很快就开始策划谋杀丈夫，并寻求一名最近被丈夫判处死刑的刺客的帮助。与始终阴郁且偶尔过于严肃的《我从未认识过男人》不同，《扫帚橱》是俏皮的、灵巧的，且非常幽默。但其叙述者遵循着同样的从幻想到虚构创作的演进过程。她的出轨故事最初唤起了被囚禁女孩的补偿性幻想，但随着时间的推移，其重心发生了转移。她越来越投入于配角，在与最初的诱惑几乎无关的场景中倾注大量的关注和精力。在最令人动容的支线情节中，妻子雇来杀死丈夫的刺客出现在丈夫的床边，却不知道他已经在垂死（诊断结果是“急性阑尾炎伴坏死性肠结肠炎”）。在准谋杀者的注视下，自然规律在起作用。“可怜的我们，在生活的混乱中徘徊的小灵魂，”作者用一种可能是丈夫、可能是杀手、也可能是她自己的声音哭喊道。她已经从构思人形性玩具，变成了哀悼一名配角，她的想象共情延伸得如此之远，以至于她不忍心让自己的一个创造物在没有任何仪式的情况下被除掉。

60 《纽约客》，2026年8月10日

《扫帚橱》（The Broom Closet）的叙述者可以声称自己对男性有着第一手的、亲密的了解：她提到了一位丈夫。但她似乎并不特别迷恋这个男人，尽管她显然不像她的另一个分身那样有杀夫的倾向。她对深层连接的能力体现在她的小说中。就像《我，从未识男人》（I Who Have Never Known Men）中的那个孩子一样，她执着于自己的历史影响力，并对自己的文字能否在自己死后留存持悲观态度（尽管这是出于文学风尚而非全球灾难的原因）。“我想被爱，被尊重，被赏识，”她写道，“但我将被遗忘。”她认为，如果运气好，她的一部小说“可能会躺在某个曾孙的书架上，泛黄、干枯，触之即碎……而我曾孙的新女友会打开它，读几行，然后说：‘哇！这种写作风格太过时了。’这将让我被彻底埋葬。”在哈普曼（Harpman）最著名的那部小说中，疏离感或许获得了一种悲剧性的魅力，但在《扫帚橱》中，这种疏离感变得平淡无奇，它是日常的人际差异和困难的结果，而非世界末日。在《我，从未识男人》的某个片段中，叙述者偶然发现了一座被遗弃的房屋，用 BookTok 的话来说，她被所发现的一切“彻底击碎”了：墙壁“覆盖着带有深色光泽的美丽木材”，地毯、画作、花瓶，“一个小雕刻”。那种像博物馆一样的“线条、形状与和谐色彩的交织”让她流下了眼泪。这一场景扩大了叙述者追求的本质：她寻找的不仅仅是一个浪漫伴侣，甚至不是一个能保存她记忆的读者。比起个体的人，她真正渴望的是人们共同创造的东西。她深沉的孤独源于她无法接触人类文化——一套在个人生命结束后依然存在，并将个体与过去和未来联系在一起的共享传统。如果说哈普曼的作品能够跨越她的时代进入我们的时代，也许是因为她意识到了这种存在之涌现属性的脆弱，但依然对其心怀敬意。她的书证明了孤独的个体能够相遇、融合并倍增，从而创造出比他们单独行动时更美丽、更持久的东西。♦

本周更正

来自（俄勒冈州波特兰市）的《威拉米特周报》（Willamette Week）。上周对波特兰州立大学“特朗普学生会”创始人进行的采访（《给 Vologymyr Kolychev 的四个问题》，WW，2016年4月13日）误引了他的对政治对手的描述。他将他们描述为“有抱负的布尔什维克政委”（aspiring Bolshevik commissars），而非“有抱负的胡说八道政委”（aspiring bullshit commissars）。WW 对此错误深表遗憾。 61 --- 艺术世界

异常

费尔菲尔德·波特对世界的奇异且孤立的愿景。 作者：扎卡里·法恩

在诸如《岛屿》（1968）等作品中，波特利用色彩来唤起内在体验。

诗人约翰·阿什贝里在 1983 年曾说，费尔菲尔德·波特“或许是本世纪最重要的美国艺术家”。这句话不能仅从字面意思来理解——阿什贝里和波特是好友——但这是一个诱人的想法。一个技术能力有限、在 20 世纪 50 和 60 年代主要描绘海岸风景和客厅的画家，如何能被视为一名重要的美国艺术家？阿什贝里话中的关键词是“或许”，这是一个小小的逃生口，既承认了这一判断是多么地不可思议，又传达了我们这些钦佩波特却无法总是说清原因的人所感受到的矛盾心理。我认为，如果你在一家杂货店里看到一幅他孤零零的画作，没有签名也没有画框，你会觉得它非常讨喜但平庸。

学生联盟（Students League）的新展览“费尔菲尔德·波特：众所周知之事”拥有理想的选作，足以展示为什么他作为一个整体往往比他的单件作品更出色。波特曾在学生联盟师从托马斯·哈特·本顿——他的同学中就有一个叫杰克逊·波洛克的家伙——在这里观看他的作品，看着学生们背着背包匆匆走过，空气中弥漫着松节油的香味，这种体验感觉很自然且恰到好处。画廊的照明均匀且采用荧光灯，波特展出的 35 幅左右的画作全部集中在一个房间里，将他那些柠檬绿、奶油黄和牛血红的色调浓缩成一次明亮且净化灵魂的爆发。

波特的所有转机都发生在 45 岁左右。在经历了数十年的徘徊且作为画家毫无进展之后，他于 1951 年在伊莱恩·德·库宁的推荐下，受邀担任《艺术新闻》（ARTnews）的评论员。次年，在伊莱恩的丈夫威廉·德·库宁的推荐下，他在蒂博·德·纳吉画廊举办了个人展。画廊主任约翰·伯纳德·迈尔斯在甚至没有看过波特作品的情况下就给了他这次展览机会，而当波特带着六幅静物画和风景画出现时，迈尔斯感到很困惑。在 50 年代，画任何非全速抽象的作品都是一种高效地毁掉职业生涯的方式。但波特的艺术逐渐让迈尔斯产生好感，这种情况并不罕见。让这些画作呼吸一段时间，让它们彼此互动，并与你的想法互动，它们就会与海风和夏日阳光融为一体。

波特是一个异常晚成的人，他最好的作品创作于生命的最后十年，即 60 年代中期到 1975 年。在此之前，他仍在消化对他产生影响的因素。有时他会借鉴一点爱德华·霍珀的风格，尽管笔触更松散——见《风景》（1956）中原野上孤独的房子——或者从马斯登·哈特利那里借用一些笨拙的形状，但主要的障碍是两位法国人：皮埃尔·博纳尔和爱德华·维拉尔。波特在 1938 年芝加哥的一次展览中看到了他们的作品，从此便无法忘怀。像他的前辈一样，波特用平涂的色块和壁纸及家具上跳动的花卉图案来描绘中产阶级的室内场景。问题在于，在他早期的许多作品中，色彩是暗淡的。有时深芥末色或淡绿色会使画作显得沉闷，但通常所有东西都被施加了一种压抑效果，因此在像《门廊上的扶手椅》（1955）这样的作品中，所有的视觉感受都被削弱到了最低限度。

庆幸的是，在 60 年代，灯亮了。一个极端的例子是《橡树》（1969），阳光穿过树枝倾泻在草地上，变成了其自身的放射性生物。在波特的晚期风格中，这类高对比度的作品构成了一个完整的子类别，但我最喜欢的是像《无题（南安普顿工作室外的景色）》（1968）和《阿默斯特校园 No. 1》（1969）这样的作品，它们拥有地图般的斑块状叶簇。直到在看到《阿默斯特》时，我才意识到

费尔菲尔德·波特 / 费尔菲尔德·波特遗产管理委员会提供 / ARS / STEVENS COLLECTION 62 --- 十年前在帕里什艺术博物馆，我才意识到画家可以将色彩作为一种时间顺序的工具。在《无题》中，一排黄绿色的树被如此磷光般地涂在其他图层之上，以至于它们实际上在发出啁啾声：先看这里！ 只有这样，你的目光才能移向砖红色的房子、苍白的天空以及阴影的口袋。这种效果并非为了重现树木，而是为了重现画家自身审美体验的流动。波特认为印象派首先将色彩作为主体性的载体，而波纳尔和뷔亚尔则强化了这种主体性，用一种随心所欲的调色盘来描绘他们的私人生活。但给波特带来额外优势的色彩主义者是威廉·德·库宁。在50年代，当德·库宁开始用宽大的刷墙刷创作那些巨大的、挥砍式的抽象画时，波特说这些作品让人想起某些风景画，其中的色彩“强烈地呈现出它们自身，仿佛每种颜色都被释放出来，得以成为其本身”。色彩不必代表现实，也不必向现实妥协；它们是即时感觉的包裹。波特说他在德·库宁的色调中找到了自己的感受：一抹蓝色表达了缅因州夏日的愉悦；粉红色是他身在海岸线时的感受；温暖色调的和谐则封存了秋天的感觉。他曾将德·库宁对颜料的使用比作“完美的性高潮”。大多数被德·库宁迷住的艺术家都试图像他那样绘画。但波特不知怎么地穿过了抽象主义的针眼，在另一端回到了他自己古怪的写实主义，大量创作关于南安普顿浆洗过的室内场景和彭诺布斯科特湾的图像。展览中有些作品，如《岛屿》（1968）和《前视图》（约1969），你可以看到波特使用了他所谓的德·库宁笔触中的“干速”。在《岛屿》中，有一道极佳的天蓝色笔触，在画作中间附近水平地切开了绿色的灌木（或者是一棵树？）。这单一的笔触暗示了要么水在灌木后面，仅通过叶缝可见点点碎片，要么我们看到的是水在灌木之上的视网膜后像，因为画家在风景和画布之间转动头部。在最左侧还有一个小喷泉，向上喷射，就像德·库宁的《梅里特公园大道》（1959）中垂直喷射的颜料一样。海浪的飞沫看起来不像那样，但感觉起来像那样。优秀的画家很少能成为优秀的评论家，但波特两者兼顾。他的文字在修辞上辛辣，且具有一种罕见的、无术语的诗意。他最异想天开的想法是删掉大约五十年的艺术史，并建议印象派——而非立体主义、超现实主义或任何其他风格爆发——才是抽象表现主义真正的先驱。波特写道，一幅画只要传递艺术家自身对世界的“动力学和视觉感知”，就能获得真实性。这是对他最喜欢的死对头、评论家克莱门特·格林伯格的一次间接抨击，后者的僵化审美方案将抽象表现主义呈现为历史本身的表达，而历史只朝着一个方向前进：从具象和深度走向抽象和平坦。格林伯格代表了波特眼中最大的罪孽——让观念凌驾于体验之上。观念使画家和评论家无法看到摆在他们面前的东西。波特的使命是让人们重新看见。

无论出于什么原因，波特无法捕捉人物。他的肖像画糟糕得近乎滑稽。画家拉里·里弗斯将波特为他画的肖像描述为“扁平且相当空洞”，这一点几乎适用于波特所有的肖像画。（至于滑稽的部分，可以看看他画的弗兰克·奥哈拉，看起来有点像一根从沙发上滑落的萨拉米香肠。）波特在阴影、光线和空气感方面的才华，完全无法转移到身体和面孔上。在《遮阳走廊》（1964）这幅极力想成为杰作的大型群体肖像画中——它包含了一些作者式的点缀，比如左下角的一罐松节油，旨在暗示“画家曾在此处”——波特的家人倒是很有眼光，将其戏称为《四个丑人》。展览中唯一有灵气的肖像画是《吉米与约翰》（1957–58），画的是诗人詹姆斯·舒勒和约翰·阿什贝利。他们的友谊不可见，个性亦然，但他们身体彼此背离的角度，唤起了一种两艘船在开阔海域擦肩而过的感觉。仅仅是这样简单的布局，就让两人之间的距离感显得令人心痛。尽管大多数抽象表现主义者与波特保持距离，但他被纽约画派的诗人所接纳——尤其是阿什贝利、舒勒、奥哈拉和肯尼斯·科赫——这些人比他小近二十岁，将他视为一个具有多种用途的移情对象。对于与他关系最复杂的舒勒来说，波特既是父亲般的人物，又是情人、照顾者、朋友，还是一个相当忧郁、缺乏安全感且需要被鼓励的人。“利益冲突”这个词根本无法描述他们之间发生的交易，因为舒勒在展览评论中推崇波特的画作时，正住在波特位于南安普顿的家中，与波特的妻子和孩子同住，并由波特出钱养活。波特的家族财富来自现今芝加哥环线（Chicago Loop）周边的土地，他一生的大部分时间都依赖信托基金生活。从40年代后期起，他在缅因州的家族私有岛屿大云杉头（Great Spruce Head）和南安普顿那栋阴冷的联邦风格住宅之间往返，并经常在纽约市逗留。一位朋友曾说，他的财富就像他与世界之间的一层“棉花垫”。波特并不否认。根据一些说法，他是个古怪的人。他不懂社交客套。如果他不是完全沉默，就可能会开始激烈地讨论某个话题，然后再次陷入沉默。他有一种疏离的人格，厚厚的墙将他与自我的不同部分以及他人隔离开来，这种感觉不仅存在于肖像画中，也存在于风景画中。无论是《透过房屋眺望》（1961）——一个面对海湾的昏暗室内，还是《室内的一天》（1962）——画中三个坐在大云栅头房屋里的人各自被禁锢在自己的世界中，所有事物和所有人感觉都恰恰地触不可及。有一幅你想第一次看到的风景，或是一个你想交谈却不知为何无法开口的人。波特作品中如此之多的情感都源于这种“卡住”的状态。这是艺术中最难传达的情感之一——那种尚未找到表达方式的情感——但波特掌握了它。♦ 63 --- 电视节目

受害者情结

《愤怒》（Furious），Hulu平台。 作者：INKOO KANG

《愤怒》的第一集以一场地狱般的约会结束。那是曼哈顿的一个深夜，奥利弗（Rob Delaney 饰）是一名富有的中年律师，简直是一个行走的人形“红旗”（危险信号）。在吸食可卡因的间隙，他对着凯瑟琳（Lola Petticrew 饰）喋喋不休——凯瑟琳是他刚搭讪的一名年轻服务员。他向她抱怨前妻没完没了的唠叨如何导致了婚姻的破裂，以及前妻本该对他性成瘾的行为多一些包容。当凯瑟琳倾身准备亲吻他时，他却递给她一份保密协议（N.D.A.）。

令人欣慰的是，这个身材娇小、目光锐利的女人之所以忍受他的胡言乱语，唯一的原因是她计划杀掉他。即便是在强行给他注射芬太尼时，她依然是更令人同情的一方：她解释道，他们第一次发生性关系是在多年前，当时她是一个十五岁的人口贩卖受害者。凯瑟琳记得事后他给她带来了一杯水，于是她现在予以回报，让他喝了几口。在彻底终结他的生命之前，她诱导他重复一句曾帮助她挺过来的话：“我不在现场。”

凯瑟琳对那些参与了她人生中最灾难之夜的男人们展开的杀戮追缉，构成了这部Hulu新犯罪剧的一半内容；另一半则追踪两名女性FBI探员对这些谋杀案的调查，她们逐渐意识到死者之间通过一个恋童网络联系在一起。爱丽丝（Emmy Rossum 饰）是一名从纽约警局（N.Y.P.D.）转任局内新人的侦探，而诺拉（Quincy Tyler Bernstine 饰）则是性犯罪部门的资深人员，两人都意识到这个案件可能是晋升的敲门砖。虽然这两位女性渴望抓获连环杀手，但追捕该网络中像爱泼斯坦那样的亿万富翁头目显得更具诱惑力。在目睹权势人物逃避司法制裁数十年后，诺拉更加决心要将其扳倒，并将凯瑟琳的私刑行为视为通往更大胜利的障碍。然而，考虑到法律体系缓慢的节奏和妥协的优先级，探员们在局内框架下能完成的任务是有限的。

上周首播的《愤怒》最初让人想起2019年Netflix的迷你剧《不可思议》（Unbelievable），该剧讲述了两名女侦探为抓捕一名连环强奸犯而付出的非凡努力。基于真实事件，《不可思议》描绘了一个由男性主导的警察队伍，其中对性侵幸存者的漠视（如果不是公开的敌意）使得捕食者能够找到更多受害者。这部新剧同样展现了一种执法文化，其中对性别暴力的不感兴趣是常态，且警察们在明知对方贩卖未成年少女的情况下依然光顾相关场所。

但与前作不同，《愤怒》中阴森的主题并没有伴随着恭敬的庄重感——爱丽丝和诺拉也不是像《东镇之 the Mare of Easttown》中的女主角那样是仁慈的灯塔（后者在镇上扮演着事实上的社会工作者，帮助那些挣扎在困境中的成员）。在经历了常规的开局后，《愤怒》开始让人感到充满活力且带有令人愉悦的矛盾感：既理智又通俗，既富有同情心又失控。凯瑟琳的故事线唤起了一种狂热的“如果”假设：一名幸存者集齐了必要的鲁莽、谋杀天赋以及假发收藏，以此来实施报复。

本季贯穿着辛辣的幽默，而该剧最大的成就在于它在精通类型的惊悚感与严肃的目的性之间取得了平衡。这种基调的波动补充了剧集的核心主题：生存必然是混乱的。这种共情冲动是《愤怒》创作者伊丽莎白·梅里韦瑟（Elizabeth Meriwether）的标志，她已确立了自己作为一名值得关注的电视作者的地位。她最著名的作品仍是主演为佐伊·德尚奈的……

《愤怒》从一部常规的犯罪剧演变成了某种更具活力之作。

64 插画：KATHERINE LAM

情景喜剧《New Girl》（2011年至2018年播出），梅里韦瑟此后转向了更阴暗的题材。她2022年的迷你剧《The Dropout》讲述了生物技术骗子伊丽莎白·霍姆斯的故事，而去年的剧情喜剧《Dying for Sex》则讲述了一名四期癌症患者在生命最后阶段寻求感官灵魂探索的旅程。这两部剧都围绕着被不寻常欲望驱动的真实女性展开，剧本反映了梅里韦瑟勤勉的研究以及对程序细节的兴趣。她倾向于说教的风格给《Dying for Sex》带来了一种临床般的质感，但在《Furious》中，这一特点反而令人欢迎，因为其中的铺陈为那个阴暗的世界提供了必要的照明。诺拉指导爱丽丝，解释为什么如此多的人口贩卖案件会破裂，如何审讯那些因震惊而出现记忆空白的年轻人，以及从检察官的角度来看，为什么有时威胁一名青少年受害者将承担法律后果是值得的。（诺拉说，那个青少年可能已经在招募其他弱势女孩进入性交易行业，哪怕仅仅是为了减轻自己的工作量。）该剧主张，要充分地将幸存者人性化，就必须抵制那种认为“受苦即善良”的假设。《Furious》有时冒着夸大论点的风险：诺拉沉思道“暴力受害者是最暴力的”，以及“成为受害者只会让你变得更冷酷、更精于算计”，即便是在描述一名连环杀手时，这些话也显得冷酷无情。但当这些观察应用于爱丽丝时，则更具说服力——爱丽丝曾是一名青少年离家出走者，在另一种人生轨迹中，她可能会落到凯瑟琳现在的境地。爱丽丝是该剧的情感重心，她与剧中其他角色之间的关系也具有相应的细微差别。尽管虐待她的前男友马歇尔（杰克·莱西 饰）的再次出现触发了她的创伤后应激障碍（P.T.S.D.）症状，但她对他母亲（曾帮她抚养长大）的感激之情根深蒂固，以至于她试图进行某种形式的和解。马歇尔的出现也使爱丽丝与她以前在警队的搭档丹尼（斯库特·麦克奈里 饰）之间那种“会在一起还是不会”的暧昧动态变得复杂起来，丹尼是纽约警局（N.Y.P.D.）中一个敏感的异类，他陪伴并帮助爱丽丝恢复功能。（梅里韦尔打造那些邋遢但令人心动的男性恋爱对象的天赋，或许是她从《New Girl》时代延续下来的最大特点。）但这部剧的核心是爱丽丝与诺拉之间 tentative 的联盟，尽管两人都敏锐地意识到对方的缺点，但仍被彼此吸引。爱丽丝渴望得到指导，但忍不住注意到诺拉在工作中喝酒的频率；而诺拉在洗手间发现爱丽丝惊恐发作时，怀疑这个新人是否有机会在局里生存下去。两人都在那些积极排挤她们的厌女机构中找到了应对之法。但她们真正建立纽带，是因为作为幸存者，她们能够承认欲望和韧性可能采取的出人意料的形式。在一次下班后的驾车途中，身上带着明显淤青的爱丽丝向诺拉坦白，她会要求约会对象击打她。令她惊讶的是，诺拉毫无波澜。“你以为我从未在激情拥抱中要求别人稍微扇我几巴掌？”年长的女性问道，“你以为我从未让别人在这个皮纳塔（piñata）上敲几下？”该剧在刻画杀手方面则不那么成功，这个角色太像一个电影式的刻意设计：一个性感而诡异的诱惑者，有着创伤引发的情绪波动，以及关于那个困扰她的夜晚选择性的、在叙事上十分方便的失忆。即便是在角色最俗套的时刻——比如她对着熟睡的奥利弗背诵童谣时——佩蒂克鲁的表演依然极具魅力，在极度干练的刚强与自我怀疑的柔软之间流畅切换。但凯瑟琳本质上的孤独使她难以被了解；她很少卸下伪装，她的自我意识充满了漏洞。当她终于找到一个知己时，她以一种令人心碎的随意语气说道：“我的记忆力很烂。是因为我被掐了好多次。”

考虑到这种情况，人们很难不去反对爱丽丝和诺拉逮捕那位亿万富翁的努力——看到他死在凯瑟琳手中反而更令人满足。但是，如果说凯瑟琳让人感觉像个毫无特点的符号，那么她所追寻的那个犯罪小圈子的戏剧化呈现则具有真正的说服力。与爱普斯坦文件中展现出的那种亲密关系截然不同，她的目标人物之间表现出的是恐惧，甚至是轻蔑。每个男人似乎都说服了自己，无论他有什么缺陷，他都不是这个群体中最堕落的成员。凯瑟琳并不区分直接实施者和沉默的旁观者，但她这种全盘清算的追求揭示了一个更微妙的真相：共犯的方式有很多种。 ♦ sullivan + associates 建筑师

马莎葡萄园岛

极致……奢华驳船巡游 FRENCH COUNTRY WATERWAYS, LTD. P.O. Box 2195, Duxbury, MA 02331 800-222-1236 781-934-2454 www.fcwl.com ## 对音乐的热爱。体验奥伯林音乐学院（Oberlin Conservatory）令人振奋的声音——全年欣赏现场演出。KENDAL @ Oberlin 440.775.0094 kao.kendal.org 广告 ## 什么是大创意？小空间有大回报。欲了解更多信息，请联系 NICOLE WESTERLIND nicole_westerlind2@condenast.com 65 --- 当下电影

导演剪辑版

《迷雾营地的青少年性与死》 作者：理查德·布罗迪 (RICHARD BRODY)

当一名导演拍摄关于电影制作的电影时，请密切关注：这是一个信号，表明这部电影无论多么宏大或风格化，它也是极其私人化的，触及了创作者创意驱动力和自我形象的神经中枢。克林特·伊斯特伍德的《白猎人黑心》、索菲亚·科波拉的《在某个地方》以及该类型的最新作品——简·舍恩布伦的《迷雾营地的青少年性与死》皆是如此。舍恩布伦的这部电影并不亚于其前作，而且就其戏剧化、批判和阐明电影体验的多维程度而言，确实是最丰富的一部。

这是舍恩布伦作为编剧兼导演的第三部剧情长片，标志着在之前两部作品基础上的大胆且逻辑必然的进步。在《我们要去世界博览会》(2021) 中，一名青春期少女被卷入一场阴森的在线角色扮演游戏；《我看到了电视荧光》(2024) 讲述的是一群痴迷于类似《吸血鬼猎人巴菲》系列剧集的青少年。同样，《迷雾营地的青少年性与死》也是一个关于媒体消费的故事——它围绕着一个恐怖电影系列展开——但在探讨粉丝体验的同时，它也思考了创造粉丝崇拜对象所需投入的东西，包括创作者最终可能付出的情感代价。其结果是一篇电影宣言，展示了舍恩布伦与艺术的关系以及对创意理想的愿景。

故事很简单：克里斯·威廉姆斯（汉娜·艾因宾德 饰）是一位备受好评的二十九岁独立电影制作人，她被一家制片厂选中，负责重启一个始于 20 世纪 80 年代的砍杀电影系列。该系列由电影《迷雾营地》启动，随后产生了许多续集和衍生剧、一款街机游戏、一本漫画书以及大量周边商品。在那个时代，该系列引发了宗教右翼的抗议，但最近被批评为恐跨性别。克里斯认同自己是酷儿，她的前一部电影包含了一段从浴帘视角重新演绎的《精神病患者》著名谋杀场景，她被雇佣来重新配置前提，以反映当前的审美意识。正如她的经纪人（莎拉·舍曼 饰）所言，制片厂希望她将其拍得“高级，也就是说，觉醒”。

克里斯对这份工作的兴趣不仅仅是职业上的。她从八岁起就痴迷于《迷雾营地》，尤其是第一部中的一个角色——一名叫 Squeak 的青少年营地辅导员。Squeak 由一名叫比利·普雷斯利（阿曼达·菲克斯 饰）的年轻女演员饰演，她拒绝了续集的角色，再也没有出演过其他电影，且完全没有公开露面。在勾勒制片厂重启计划时，克里斯与现在已年过六旬的比利（吉莉安·安德森 饰）取得了联系，后者邀请她前往太平洋西北地区一个偏远的院落，比利在那里过着自我隔离的生活。

为了诱导不情愿的演员签约项目，导演不可避免地展开了一场诱惑之舞，而这场舞演变成了真正的诱惑，其方式被证明在个人和艺术层面上对两名女性都产生了深远影响。基于这个简单的设定，舍恩布伦释放了迸发的想象力和创造力，使这部电影在复杂程度和奢华程度上可与韦斯·安德森的《小行星城》和格蕾塔·格威格的《芭比》相媲美。

来自《迷雾营地》系列的场景作为“戏中戏”出现，细节极其考究。结果是令人愉悦的血腥：一名受害者被从腰部切成两半，双腿依然站立，鲜血喷涌；另一名受害者被长矛刺穿，在系球杆上被震成碎片。但这些场景的拍摄方式如此俏皮，以至于冲击感完全消散了。（我作为一个胆小且厌恶血腥的观众是这么认为的。）

《青少年性与死亡》（Teenage Sex and Death）在原版电影的片场开篇，视角来自那个被称为“小死亡”（Little Death，由杰克·海文饰演）的杀手。这个角色最显著的特征是一个由立方体金属通风口制成的头盔，同心圆正方形的图案遮住了脸庞，并让该角色的呼吸声带有一种独特的沉重感。“瘴气营”（Camp Miasma）及其制作过程的片段成为了克里斯此次旅行的背景故事，并为随后的古怪遭遇奠定了基调。在克里斯入住的酒店，前台接待员 66 [插图：克里斯蒂安·哈默斯塔德] 结果是那些被招募出演《瘴气营第六部》（克里斯在房间里观看了这部电影）的当地人之一；随后揭晓，比利所在的院落——一个前夏令营——正是拍摄《瘴气营》的地点。克里斯在院内徘徊时发现了一栋标有“电影院”的建筑，里面有一台放映机，胶片正好停在《瘴气营》中最令她着迷的一幕——“小死亡”进入房间，而斯奎克（Squeak）正在失去她的初夜。克里斯在观看《第六部》时在笔记本上写下“欲望”二字，正是第一部电影中斯奎克那种欲望与恐惧的交织，使得克里斯与比利的相遇充满了情色张力。克里斯的伴侣玛丽（Mari，由贾斯敏·萨沃伊·布朗饰演）怀疑隐居的比利会像《日落大道》中那个妄想症前明星诺玛·戴斯蒙德，但比利（她很清楚这种类比）幽默、坦率、深刻且极其令人同情。她指出克里斯一直以“学术方式”对待她的项目，并敦促她畅所欲言。克里斯坦白了自己在性方面的禁忌，同时担心这种坦率是不专业的。比利回应说，这些个人揭秘本质上就是工作的一部分，而且她们的合作已经开始了。《瘴气营的青少年性与死亡》的大部分内容是一部经典的双人戏，剧本犀利，为两位主演提供了充足的闪光空间。尽管这部电影具有很强的自我意识，但它充满了温柔与幽默。艾因宾德赋予了克里斯一种等待爆发的压抑知识能量，而安德森饰演的比利则是情感活力与自然、华丽戏剧感的万花筒式展示。电影大胆的灵感之一是给予了大量观看电影的银幕时间，无论是克里斯独自观看，还是她与比利共同观看。每一次观看环节不仅仅是巧妙地通过“戏中戏”唤起《瘴气营》的机会，它们更是被重大惊喜所点缀的戏剧性场景：一次意外的打断、一个尖锐的观察、一个喧闹的笑料、一次宣泄的凝视。这种内置的双重性——观看者与被观看者——赋予了《青少年性与死亡》一种复杂性，而舍恩布伦以超现实、象征性和寓言的方式将其放大。贯穿始终，舍恩布伦沉溺于人工痕迹与现实主义之间模糊的融合。最首要的创新是对“小死亡”视角的唤起，通过一种不寻常的摄像机运动——摇摆且游离，介于平滑与抖动之间——这捕捉到了观众边缘系统的反应，超越了厌恶而进入了诡谲之境。《瘴气营》中表面上具有恐跨性别色彩的元素是，“小死亡”具有性别流动性，是一个曾遭受残酷欺凌的前营员，其杀戮狂欢是替代性的复仇。舍恩布伦是一位在《我看到了电视在发光》（I Saw the TV Glow）中明确探讨跨性别体验的跨性别电影制作人，而在这里，他构思了某种更为激进的东西：一种电影化的跨性别凝视，这种凝视在色调上具有视觉辨识度，同时将遭受的暴力挤压成暴力的幻想。在克里斯与比利共处的时光结束时，她必须与一群制片厂高管进行视频会议，向他们提供

广告咨询请发送电子邮件至 adiosquiries@condemast.com。投稿指南请访问 www.newyorker.com。封面转载请致电 (800) 897-8666，或发送电子邮件至 covers@cartoonbank.。权限及转载请求请致电 (212) 630-5656，或发送电子邮件至 image_licensing@condemast.。未经《纽约客》同意，本期刊的任何部分不得复制。《纽约客》的名称和标志，以及本文中的各种标题和标题，均为 Advance Magazine Publishers Inc. 的商标。如需订阅 Condé Nast 的其他杂志，请访问 www.condemast.。我们偶尔会将订阅者名单提供给经过严格筛选的公司，这些公司提供我们认为读者会感兴趣的产品和服务。如果您不想收到这些优惠和 / 或信息，请告知我们，地址为 P.O. Box 37617, Boone, IA 50037，或致电 (800) 825-2510。《纽约客》不对未经请求的稿件、未经请求的艺术作品（包括但不限于图画、照片和透明胶片）或任何其他未经请求的材料的退回、丢失、损坏或任何其他损害负责。提交稿件、艺术作品或其他材料以供考虑的人员不应发送原件，除非《纽约客》以书面形式明确要求这样做。67 ---

漫画配文大赛

每周，我们都会提供一幅需要配文的漫画。您，即读者，提交配文，我们选出三位入围者，由您投票选出最喜爱的一项。本周由 Lynn Hsu 创作的漫画配文提交截止日期为 8 月 9 日，星期日。7 月 27 日比赛的入围作品如下。我们将于 8 月 24 日和 31 日刊公布获胜者以及本周比赛的入围者。任何 13 岁或以上的人员均可参赛或投票。如需参赛并阅读完整规则，请访问 contest.newyorker.com。

本周比赛

入围作品

“我认为是时候讨论一下这个房间本身了。” Pao Roy，路易斯安那州新奥尔良

“那扇门——他记得所有事情，除了那扇门。” Daniel Leshner，华盛顿州西雅图

“我想激光笔是个糟糕的主意。” Trevor Pritchard，安大略省渥太华

获胜配文

“我明白服务已部分暂停。” Jeff Van Wagenen，康涅狄格州米德尔伯里

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谜题与游戏部门

纵横字谜

一个具有挑战性的谜题。 作者：NATAN LAST

横向

1 暂停的标志 6 作品 10 《契约劳工：反抗 _ 的内部故事》（2017 年出版，荣获 PEN / ESPN 奖） 14 部分预告片的制作者 15 地中海山峰 16 违反规则 17 可能会使用示波器的教室 19 整体 20 对“Quieres mais?”的强调性回答 21 飞快地？ 23 2010 年出版诗集《Juvenilia》的诗人 Chen 24 一位脱口秀演员，有一段关于只有女性才能看到的 Trader Joe's 零食的段子 27 卷发目标（简称） 30 与细剑相关的武器 31 拉斯海马（Ras al-Khaimah）所属地区（简称） 32 “但关于那个已经足够了……” 34 《_ 的塞壬》（库尔特·冯内古特小说） 37 哲学家 Daniel，与 Douglas Hofstadter 共同编辑 1981 年文集《The Mind's I》 38 部长兼倡导者 _ A. King 40 冗长的故事 41 像西班牙的夏日？ 42 短信中的“哦，还有……” 43 三个核苷酸的序列 44 创建《文明》系列电子游戏的 Meier 45 极短篇小说 49 建议（简称） 50 爱管闲事的人 51 浪费 55 山毛榉科成员 57 “只能责怪我自己” 59 激励 60 整洁的 61 马女孩？ 62 斑点 63 “好吧，你说得有道理” 64 笔记本大品牌

纵向

1 咖啡馆供应品 2 “没想到在这里见到你！” 3 1954 年世界大赛中拥有传奇肩后接球动作的巨人 4 “当时间破碎且比例失调时，酸甜之感如何”：莎士比亚 5 巴勒斯坦漫画家 Naji al- 6 最容易感到恼怒的人 7 地图集 8 吞咽（向下） 9 说普什图语和达里语的世界首都 10 某种数字资产（简称） 11 可重复使用的金属容器 12 创作了《纪念 W. B. Yeats》的诗人 13 紧跟在 string 或 tag 之后的词 18 形成一层覆盖物 22 β 衰变的副产物 25 “让我为你详细说明” 26 唯一单音节的美国州名 27 提供 28 创意火花 29 提供支持性注释？ 33 蠓和黑蝇等 35 紧随幕布升起之后 36 奖学金标准 38 美学的致命错误 39 书卷气的 Bridgerton 兄弟姐妹 41 《Le Livre Blanc》作者 Jean 43 壁炉中的残余物 45 冰沙状的葡萄酒饮料 46 边界 47 欺骗性手段 48 Bad Bunny 称呼男朋友的方式 52 感知到 53 文件（例如） 54 神话之河 56 “我的错” 58 六十年代美国参议员，中间名是 Francis 而非 Fitzgerald

上一个谜题的答案：

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THE

AUG. 10, 2026

NEW YORKER

Drooker

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Truro from High Head, 2026, 52 x 48 inches, oil on canvas. © 2026 Mitchell Johnson.

Mitchell Johnson

Twenty-One Years in Truro

Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill, Cape Cod / September 8–20, 2026 Private preview by appointment on September 6 and 7

Digital catalog by request: mitchell.catalog@gmail.com

Follow on Instagram: @mitchell_johnson_artist

Exhibition info: www.mitchelljohnson.com

Notecards available at Amazon.

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THE NEW YORKER

AUGUST 10, 2026

4 GOINGS ON

7 THE TALK OF THE TOWN

Amy Davidson Sorkin on Anthony Fauci's hearing; yesterday's news; the race of the Dan Sullivans; going with the flow; Eric Wareheim's weirdo plants.

OUR FAR-FLUNG CORRESPONDENTS

Alexis Okeowo

12 For Ransom

Inside the kidnapping crisis in Nigeria.

SHOUTS & MURMURS

Larry Doyle

17 Headlines Stupid Onion Editor Rejected

U.S. JOURNAL

Paige Williams

18 Kaboom!

For the Gruccis, fireworks are the family business.

LETTER FROM BEIJING

Evan Osnos

26 The Future, Made in China

Is the U.S. losing the innovation race?

AMERICAN CHRONICLES

Kai Bird

38 The Mentor

with Susan Goldmark

What Roy Cohn taught Donald Trump.

FICTION

Rachel Yoder

48 "The Promise"

THE CRITICS

BOOKS

Anthony Lane

54 Kate McLoughlin's "Silence: A Literary History."

57 Briefly Noted

Katy Waldman

59 The unlikely afterlife of Jacqueline Harpman.

THE ART WORLD

Zachary Fine

62 Fairfield Porter's emotional palette.

ON TELEVISION

Inkoo Kang

64 Elizabeth Meriwether's "Furious."

THE CURRENT CINEMA

Richard Brody

66 "Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma."

POEMS

Jan Wagner

32 "wasps"

Megan Fernandes

50 "Enjambment"

COVER

Eric Drooker

"Outside Art"

DRAWINGS Bruce Eric Kaplan, P. C. Vey, Sam Gross, David McCaw, Matilda Borgström, Juan Astasio, David Rey, Drew Dernavich, Ellis Rosen, Guy Richards Smit, Will McPhail, Roz Chast, Jon Adams, Jared Nangle, Hilary Fitzgerald Campbell SPOTS Matt Willey

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GOINGS ON NEWSLETTER

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CONTRIBUTORS

Kai Bird ("The Mentor," p. 38) is a co-author of "American Scoundrel: Roy Cohn's Dark Journey from Joe McCarthy to Donald Trump," and a co-author of "American Prometheus," a biography of J. Robert Oppenheimer.

Alexis Okeowo ("For Ransom," p. 12), a contributing writer, covers conflict, human rights, and culture. Her most recent book is "Blessings and Disasters: A Story of Alabama."

Rachel Yoder (Fiction, p. 48) is the author of the novel "Nightbitch."

Larry Doyle (Shouts & Murmurs, p. 17) is the author of "I Love You, Beth Cooper," which won the Thurber Prize for American Humor.

Eric Drooker (Cover) is a graphic novelist whose books include "Flood!" and "Naked City," which was recently acquired by the Library of Congress.

Anthony Lane (Books, p. 54), a staff writer, is the author of "Nobody's Perfect: Writings from The New Yorker."

Evan Osnos ("The Future, Made in China," p. 26) is a staff writer who covers politics and foreign affairs. His books include "Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth, and Faith in the New China," which won a National Book Award.

Susan Goldmark ("The Mentor," p. 38) is a researcher and a co-author of "American Scoundrel."

Paige Williams ("Kaboom!," p. 18), a staff writer, is the author of "The Dinosaur Artist" and a recipient of the National Magazine Award for feature writing.

Jon Allsop (The Talk of the Town, p. 9) is a contributing writer at the magazine and the author of "What Is Journalism For?"

Megan Fernandes (Poem, p. 50) is the author of, most recently, the poetry collections "I Do Everything I'm Told" and "Good Boys."

Inkoo Kang (On Television, p. 64), a staff writer, has been a television critic for The New Yorker since 2022.

THE NEW YORKER INTERVIEW

Antonio Banderas on Art, Aging, and the Pope By Helen Rosner

Read this digital-only story on the New Yorker app, the best place to find the latest issue, plus more news, commentary, criticism, and humor.

SIMONE RISOLUTI / VATICAN MEDIA / GETTY

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GOINGS ON

AUGUST 5 – II, 2026

What we're watching, listening to, and doing this week.

Nearly thirty years after its Broadway début, Wendy Wasserstein's "An American Daughter" is being revived, by La Femme Theatre Productions. The play—partly inspired by the failed nominations of Zoë Baird and Kimba Wood for Attorney General, in 1993—concerns a blue-blooded public-health expert (Jean Lichty) whose nomination for Surgeon General is derailed after her husband casually admits on television that she has never answered a jury summons, prompting a national referendum on her fitness for civic life. Long before social media accelerated public pile-ons, Wasserstein recognized how swiftly an accomplished woman's résumé could be recast as a bill of indictment against her character.—Rhoda Feng (Pershing Square Signature Center; in previews, opening Aug. 11.)

ABOUT TOWN

MOVIES | Ebrahim Golestan's drama "Brick and Mirror," from 1965, widely considered the first feature of the Iranian New Wave, turns a local problem—a Tehran taxi-driver finds an abandoned infant in his back seat—into a teeming panorama of city life. The driver brings the baby to friends partying in a night club; his quandary yields existential debate in a police station, a portrait of a courthouse's bureaucratic frenzy, and a heartrending documentary vision of an orphanage. These tumultuous incidents are bound by a daring half-hour-long scene of the driver's erotic overnight reunion with his hard-living girlfriend, who wants to adopt the child. Golestan's blend of harsh realism and visual imagination is, even now, startling.—Richard Brody (Streaming on Criterion Channel.)

DANCE | The ballet dancer Misty Copeland's fight on behalf of Black dancers, who have traditionally been underrepresented in ballet, along with the determination and grace that have characterized her own rise, has arguably transcended the art itself. Now retired from the stage, Copeland moves into the role of mentor and producer. For the Joyce's two-week Ballet Festival, Copeland brings together dancers including Dance Theatre of Harlem's Alexandra Hutchinson and the Paris Opera Ballet's Guillaume Diop (a veritable star). Two programs include a solo from John Taras's "Firebird," José Limón's "Sonata for Two Cellos," and a solo by Bob Fosse—a celebration of the diversity of dance itself.—Marina Hars (Joyce Theatre; Aug. 4-16.)

ART | "Mexican Abstraction: Over a Century of Photography," the title of an excellent show at Throckmorton, is a bit misleading. The images are mostly still-lifes, landscapes, and nature studies, but they're never merely representational. If a few of the pictures—Tina Modotti's telegraph poles, Manuel Álvarez Bravo's optician's sign—have come to define Mexican modernism, the show explores the full range and depth of that style, often with superb vintage prints. Modotti's famous overhead shot of massed workers, in a soft, hazy sepia print, has an unusually subtle power. Some of the most memorable photographs take us into the uncanny. Graciela Iturbide finds a sky so dark with birds that we can practically hear their calls. Bravo zooms in on a skeletal hand—nightmarish, but oddly exquisite, with a thorny ring.—Vince Aletti (Through Sept. 26.)

OFF BROADWAY | In "The Saviors," two altar boys—Paul (Julius Rinzel), grappling with his faith, and Michael (Ivan Howe), with his sexuality—find their friendship unsettled by the arrival of Julian (Stanley Simons), a long-haired drifter who has seemingly freed himself from the constraints of family, church, and ordinary human ties, only to be cornered by his own ruinous desires. The playwright Bubba Weiler, who has spoken of being raised in a "pretty conservative, Catholic atmosphere," gets at the double consciousness of a Catholic atheist. Paul and Michael could be two sides of the same doubting person, and the setting, a Midwestern Catholic church, is both a crucible of assorted boyhood anxieties and, thanks to the gemütlich presence of its music director, Judy (Crystal Finn), in many senses a sanctuary.—Rhoda Feng (Atlantic Theatre Company; through Aug. 15.)

HIP-HOP | In 2016, an open-mike bard turned rapper, going simply by Noname, released the mixtape "Telefone," making good on an early endorsement from a red-hot Chance the Rapper, and the project's raw but cogent poetry heralded her as hip-hop's next great theorist. She has since become one of the past decade's most brilliant lyricists and evenhanded critics, emerging as a social activist and a proponent of pulp and revolutionary Black lit. Her self-released début, "Room 25," from 2018, moved from mere rhetorical triumph into finesse and mastery, and its 2023 follow-up, "Sundial," is her magnum opus, as sharp and focussed as it is compositionally rich. For the tenth anniversary of "Telefone," the rapper returns to the moment when she established that making a name didn't require having one.—Sheldon Pearce (Sony Hall; Aug. 5.)

MOVIES | The Georgian filmmaker Otar Iosseliani has long been a North Star for wistful post-Soviet cinephiles. Metrograph's series "Otar Iosseliani: Fables of Modern Life" will afford New Yorkers a rare opportunity to discover his œuvre of Georgian and French films, meticulously restored in 4K. It is the auteur's early efforts that truly shine. Iosseliani's poetic portraits of life on the Soviet periphery range from neorealist documentation of collective farms to playful snapshots of Tbilisi, with a light touch reminiscent of the French New Wave. "There Once Was a Singing Blackbird" is particularly unmissable: a charismatic young timpanist, taking advantage of a ninety-minute gap between parts mid-performance, leaves his orchestra to run around seducing chic Tbilisi women, wreaking havoc by returning just in time for the finale.—Madeleine Wulfahrt (Aug. 8-16.)

4

THE NEW YORKER, AUGUST 10, 2026

ILLUSTRATION BY ELENI KALORIKOTI

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TABLES FOR TWO

Sanwits

149 First Ave.

I've been worried, a little, that Unapologetic Foods was going soft. Over the past decade or so, the restaurant group more or less detonated the New York dining scene with Adda, Dhamaka, and Semma, whose undiluted takes on Indian cuisine were a jolt to the city's sleepy South Asian culinary landscape. But recent years have brought some subtle shifts—little concessions, maybe, to the normative American palate. Most dismaying was the group's downgrading of the heat scale at Rowdy Rooster, its fast-casual fried-chicken spot, such that the upper limit now offers, roughly, the soothing warmth of an electric heating pad.

The original Rowdy Rooster, a slim East Village storefront, closed earlier this year. In its place is Sanwits, Unapologetic's latest, a sandwich shop overseen by Eric Valdez, the chef-partner of the Filipino restaurant Naks, the group's other non-Indian outpost. Sanwits is Filipino, too—the name is a Tagalog gloss on the word "sandwich"—despite the fact that, as Valdez told me, the Philippines, where he grew up, doesn't really have a sandwich culture to speak of. This is, unapologetically, exciting: with no inherited form to honor or betray, Valdez has room to do whatever he wants, and the menu is a glorious mashup of recognizable American sandwich silhouettes and frank, unhedged Filipino ingredients.

The sandwiches are messy, oozing, saucy, and insistent; what they lack in structural integrity they make up in brain-exploding flavor. A riff on the French dip is built on lechón and slicked with "Vienna-sausage mayonnaise." A take on a cheesesteak draws on calderata, a Filipino beef stew, and comes with gloriously melty Eden cheese, a Velveeta-like product specific to the Philippines. A hint of Rowdy Rooster survives in the fried-chicken sandwich, whose battered chicken thigh is exactly as crackling as it was out of the previous establishment's fryer. But the most exciting thing on the menu is a sandwich made with egg-battered, house-made "spam," piled on toasted white bread with shredded lettuce and a secret sauce made with Filipino banana ketchup. The result tastes, very pleasantly, like a Big Mac on a bender.

Since opening, Sanwits has dropped a few sandwiches, including fried mackerel and a gloriously savory mushroom adobo. I miss the foregone items—especially the mackerel, which I never got to try—but this is what tends to happen at any adventurous restaurant: it opens, it waves its flag around, and then it starts to settle in. Naks has evolved from a tasting-menu-style kamayan to a more casual brasserie, and the place is very much the better for it. Maybe Sanwits will go the same route, moving away from challenging choices and toward pleasing the masses, and maybe that will turn out to suit Valdez—and all of us—just fine. Right now, though, I like it just as it is. (Sandwiches $14–$18.) —Helen Rosner

ON AND OFF THE AVENUE

Gut Check

Like many other women in New York with a smartphone and a shopping problem, I have a thing for shoes, and my Instagram algorithm has adapted accordingly. All day long, my feed serves up a parade of pretty platforms and squishy sandals, beckoning me to part with my savings. I now know (mostly) how to avoid these lures, but a few weeks ago Instagram served me a pair of shoes that I could not manage to look away from—instead, I kept returning to my phone to stare at them, in all their tacky, lurid glory. This has to be some kind of joke, I thought—or maybe an art project? But, no, they were real, and available to buy, for just $69: beige platform sandals, about ten inches high, that are meant to be worn only during one extremely private activity. They were called, simply, "Sht Shoes," from a company named Let Loose, a gut-health brand founded in 2024, by Alexandra Houx Grounds, a willowy blonde who suffered from constant gastric distress and wanted to bring products to market that could address women's tummy issues with a sense of humor. Grounds's first offerings were supplements—digestive enzymes, a constipation-relief lemonade mix—but it is the "Sht Shoes," essentially a squatty potty split in two and made a bit more fashionable, that has sent the company viral. The first batch has already sold out, thanks, at least in part, to TikTok enthusiasts; now they are available only via pre-order. The shoes may be a gimmick, but they are part of a larger trend, in which people are openly talking about (and buying things to augment) their intestinal microbiomes. Synbiotics, fibre bars, colostrum powder, the new best-selling book "You've Been Pooping All Wrong," by Trisha Pasricha—and, now, poop shoes. There's never been a better time to trust your gut.—Rachel Syme

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THE TALK OF THE TOWN

COMMENT WITNESS

About an hour into Dr. Anthony Fauci’s appearance before a Senate committee last week, Senator Ron Johnson, Republican of Wisconsin, expressed skepticism about a passage in Fauci’s personal diary regarding the early days of the coronavirus pandemic. “Did you literally lie to your own diary?” Johnson asked. For a second, Fauci almost seemed to laugh, and there was a glimpse of the public-health official who had charmed much of the country during the pandemic, with his air of amiable competence. But the moment passed. “On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer, based upon my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution,” he said. He repeated that line dozens of times in the course of three hours, looking more sombre and reserved and—at the age of eighty-five—notably older than he had six and a half years ago, when the world first became acquainted with the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

Fauci’s decision to take the Fifth was understandable. The hearing was engineered by Senator Rand Paul, who has accused the doctor of lying about the origins of COVID-19 in order to cover up his own supposed culpability and misdeeds. Fauci, in a brief opening statement, said that the senator had an “unhinged obsession with me,” and had made “slanderous comments.” It was Paul’s office that released Fauci’s diary—more than a thousand pages of notes, articles, and internet memes—which was apparently retrieved from a government computer at the behest of Robert

F. Kennedy, Jr., who now oversees the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, where Fauci worked until 2022. A measure of Paul’s approach is the title he gave the entries: “Tony’s Diary!,” in Barbie-pink script, with a heart dotting the letter “i.”

Fauci led NIAID for thirty-eight years and played a laudable, lifesaving role in combatting both H.I.V./AIDS and COVID-19, but since his retirement he has had to live with not only mockery—President Trump has called him an “idiot,” a “phony,” and a “terrible athlete”—but with death threats. In January, 2025, President Biden preemptively pardoned Fauci for any federal crimes related to his public service during the prior eleven years, citing the possibility of “unjustified and politically motivated prosecutions.” But the pardon wouldn’t protect him from a state prosecution or from any perjury charge that could be drummed up from

his testimony now. In any event, Paul said that he would try to get Fauci charged with contempt of Congress.

Yet Fauci’s silence was a loss. Paul may have come at the matter with theatrics and ill will, but some of his questions, in their most basic forms, are worth exploring, because the debate about where the novel coronavirus came from is ongoing, divisive, and important. One scenario, which Fauci has favored, involves a naturally occurring jump from bats to humans, probably via some other species; another postulates a lab leak, most likely from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, in the Chinese city where COVID-19 first emerged. Some of the Wuhan lab’s work involved developing new variants of coronaviruses. (Embedded in the Fauci–Paul conflict is a genuine dispute over the definition and risks of what is called “gain of function” research.) The institute also received funding from NIAID, via a sub-grant from a nonprofit. According to NIAID, however, the coronaviruses that were the subject of that grant were not closely related to the one that caused the pandemic.

Fauci, in his opening statement, noted that he had testified before or briefed Congress “well over two hundred times” in his long career, including on COVID-19 and its origins. When he was confronted by Paul at a 2021 hearing, Fauci gave as good as he got. He may feel that he doesn’t have much left to say—asked and answered. But he had a unique role in a traumatic mass experience that is still being felt and assessed. Paul isn’t the only one who’d like to hear more.

From the beginning, after all, Fauci was an influential voice in the government

PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY CRISTIAN COUCERO; SOURCE PHOTOGRAPHS FROM GETTY

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response to the pandemic, and in some ways served as its anchor. There are many aspects of the early days that seem surreal now: the mobile morgues in New York City, the daily banging of pots and pans, and the juncture in which Donald Trump treated Fauci as his brainy sidekick. That relationship inevitably turned bad, as the President became impatient with the pandemic and demanded politicized boosterism from Fauci.

If the diary entries are any indication, Fauci, in the midst of the pandemic, also savored his own press coverage and lionization. There are too many mentions of Julia Roberts and of Fauci bobblehead dolls. In the hearing, Senator Josh Hawley, Republican of Missouri, accused Fauci of being on a narcissistic “power trip” (which is the kind of journey that Hawley himself seems to relish). In Fauci’s defense, idolatry is a group effort. Thousands of Americans were buying those bobbleheads, and someone had to pub-

lish the flattering articles he read with pleasure. Particularly after his split with Trump, Fauci became something of a politicized totem, for better and worse.

Despite the near-miracle of the vaccine, which became available in December, 2020, there was much about the pandemic response that was far from perfect, in both blue and red states. Why, for example, wasn’t there an all-government effort to get schools reopened sooner and more consistently? There were reasonable concerns about infection and the impact on teachers and on vulnerable family members. Still, the costs of those closures have become more clear with each passing year.

In the hearing, Senator Gary Peters, Democrat of Michigan, observed that “it’s tempting to turn one person into the scapegoat” in a crisis for which “hundreds of officials” across two Administrations were responsible. Paul and his Republican colleagues did not resist that

temptation. Paul ejected one of Fauci’s lawyers. Senator Bernie Moreno, of Ohio, told a story about a woman who he said had been arrested for watching a middle-school football game, from mostly empty bleachers, without a mask, and punctuated it by snapping at Fauci, “Who the fuck do you think you were for doing that?”

Watching Fauci as he sat listening was a reminder of how little anyone really knew back in 2020. Most of the world was fumbling and scared, and Fauci seemed to have some idea of what to do. But, even acting on the best evidence available, and with the best of intentions, there were times when he, too, must have been guessing. Realizing that truth would be a route toward not only better preparedness going forward but also a more general granting of grace. If Fauci has regrets about the pandemic, he wouldn’t be alone.

—Amy Davidson Sorkin

SAME SHIT DEPT. EXTRA! EXTRA!

The Times has published sixty thousand nine hundred and sixty-some issues, so what are the odds that today’s paper is the one you really want to read? “The news doesn’t change that much,” Aaron Reiss, an aspiring entrepreneur, said one recent morning. “A newspaper costs around four dollars, and it’s the quickest-expiring product in the world. Even milk lasts longer. So I was, like, What if I sell old news? That’s free for me, and it’s still good.”

Reiss was on the corner of Thirty-fourth and Ninth, outside B&H Photo, where he’d just opened a kiosk called the Old News Newsstand. “I came up with this catchphrase I’m very proud of. ‘Old News: Still bad, but cheaper and more predictable,’” he said. His price for an old issue of the Times was three dollars—about twenty-five per cent off. It was a Friday morning (“IRAN AND U.S. ESCALATE STRIKES DESPITE COUNTRIES’ EMPHASIZING PEACE”), and Reiss rolled up a metal grate and

laid out the news for the day, which wasn’t that day’s news but could’ve been. He had a bunch of June Timeses, salvaged from the trash. June 13th: “IN GRAY AREA OF NOT PEACE AND NOT WAR.” June 18th: “TRUMP LASHES OUT AT CRITICS OF DEAL.” June 21st: “STRAIT IS CLOSED.” “It’s the exact same shit,” Reiss said.

Reiss, who wore a button-down, unbuttoned, over a wifebeater, has the job history of the highly educated itinerant class. He’s been a researcher at a design agency, a lecturer at Yale (Urban Studies 3307: Telling Stories with Maps), a journalist, a ceramist, and a hot-chocolate salesman. “I sold out of a pushcart near Seward Park, out of my ceramic cups,” he said. “I sold it for two dollars, very cheap, and I’d say, ‘If you like the cup, keep it for twenty.’”

The newsstand idea was meant to expand his ceramics business. Initially, old news was partially a regulatory workaround: all sidewalk newsstands in the city must sell periodicals. But eventually it became an organizing principle. “Now we sell weird stuff that’s newsstand-related,” Reiss said. There are ceramics and art, plus zines (Several Chairs I Briefly Loved, Vol. 3; Americans Draw America) and unusual snack items—Jordanian chewing gum, Iraqi Cokes, Taiwanese

canned cappuccino. There’s a rotating exhibition of photos from the New York Public Library’s Picture Collection. Reiss’s five-year-old son, Milo, contributed art, on which he’d written “Free 0¢.” “Wrong,” Reiss said. “I charge a dollar.” He has old magazines, too. “I really wanted to have porn,” he said. “So we have old Playboys.” Most customers want cigarettes or lottery tickets, but he’s not selling those. “Those things ruin people’s lives,” he said. “Plus, I would smoke all the cigarettes.” Instead, a friend is developing a scratch-off zine concept, and another friend is writing “loosie” poems, rolled up like cigarettes. He splits the revenue with the artists.

Reiss opened for business. Sales were slow. It was his thirty-ninth birthday, and most of the early foot traffic was friends. His wife, Lizzie Fulton, arrived at the same time as an artist friend named Max Glaser, who’d brought a box full of old nudie mags. “Check this out,” Reiss said. “A huge crate of smut!” He did a little dance. He and his business partner, Sylva Wong, had been cutting pictures from books of erotica and bundling them as “vintage mini smut,” for five dollars. “The way somebody takes a pickaxe to a mountain to turn a big rock into small diamonds, we’re doing the same thing with the smut,” Reiss

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said. The previous day had seen his best sales so far. "I need about seventy dollars to break even," he said. "I think we'll do it today."

Glaser looked skeptical.

"You think my accounting is all fucked up," Reiss said.

"It's really bad," Glaser said.

Reiss opened a ledger, which was just a notebook page listing items beside tally marks. "He won't tell anyone how much he paid for the stand," Fulton said. "And I was, like, 'This actually affects me.'"

Business picked up. Reiss called out, "We got weird shit for weird people!"

A man heading to B&H asked, "Do you have Zyns?"

"We have zines," Reiss said. The man bought a painted ceramic toadstool for ten dollars. "That's how you fucking sell a fucking thing," Reiss said.

The old papers went fast. Tourists love them. "They're on their way out of the city and want an object," Reiss said.

Reiss has his regulars. He stocks kosher snacks for B&H employees. One news vender on Sixth Avenue offered mentoring. "I told him I was selling water for a dollar," Reiss said. "He was, like, 'You're an idiot.' But he sold me some cases at cost."

At the end of the day, Reiss had made a hundred and eighty-two dollars. "I'm in the green!" he said. His friends think that his newsstand is performance art. "This is a literal store," he said. "It's a capitalist endeavor."

At home that evening, Reiss reran the numbers and discovered an error: he'd forgotten about paying the artists. "My current cash position is negative twenty-six dollars and sixteen cents," he reported. "Accounting is an emotional practice."

—Zach Helfand

DEPT. OF NOMENCLATURE

IDENTITY POLITICS

Dan Sullivan doesn't want Dan Sullivan to be the senator for Alaska. Dan Sullivan is already the senator for Alaska and wants to keep it that way. He thinks that Dan Sullivan is trying

"This award goes to the camper who showed up begrudgingly every day because his parents needed somewhere for him to go this week."

to trick voters into thinking that he is Dan Sullivan, as part of a plot to oust Dan Sullivan.

To add some helpful initials: in May, Dan J. Sullivan, a retired teacher in Petersburg, Alaska, filed to run as a Republican against Dan S. Sullivan, the G.O.P. incumbent, in a Senate race that Democrats see as a promising pickup opportunity; the Party's much hyped candidate, Mary Peltola, previously won as Alaska's representative in the House. (The top four candidates in the primary, which is on August 18th, will advance, regardless of party.) Dan S. and his allies claimed that Dan J. was a plant. Among other things, he had made (very small) donations to Peltola in the past, and he had initially asked to appear on the ballot as "Dan S. Sullivan." (A typo, according to Dan J.) Smelling a rat, officials disqualified Dan J. But the courts soon overturned that decision. Dan J. insists that he is running in good faith. Even if he weren't, his lawyer argued, candidates with "un-American and unsavory" goals seek office all the time.

Certainly, candidates have run against namesakes before, and have faced cries of foul play. When J.F.K. first stood for Congress, in 1946, his campaign allegedly induced a Boston janitor named Joe Russo to join a field that also in-

cluded Joe Russo, a popular councilman. More recently, there have been three Bob Fergusons, two Bob Bakers, and two Jerry Garcias (neither of them the late Grateful Dead front man). Sometimes name clashes are clearly coincidental. When Dan S. Sullivan first ran for Senate, in 2014, he appeared on the same ballot as Dan A. Sullivan, the mayor of Anchorage, who was running for lieutenant governor.

In July, a correspondent reached Dan J. Sullivan over Zoom. Dan J. wore glasses, a fraying ball cap, and a light jacket. A pair of banjos and an octave mandolin hung on a wall behind him. (He plays both instruments, plus guitar and fiddle.) It was 7 A.M., and Dan J. had a busy day ahead. His nephew was in town, and they were planning to fish for trout.

Dan J. is a third-generation Dan Sullivan, and one of seven Dans in his family. They use nicknames to tell one another apart. (Dan J. wouldn't disclose his.) Some voters, it seems, could use such an aid now: when Dan J. posted online about an interview he had done with a local public-radio station, a commenter erroneously took him to task for voting to defund public media in the Senate. He is, at least, drawing attention. "I knew that my name recognition would get me immediate

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publicity,” he said. “It’s succeeded beyond my wildest hopes.”

To find out more about the importance of standing out in a crowded field, the correspondent wrote to Dan T. Sullivan, a marketing consultant based in Indiana who specializes in search-engine optimization—the magic art of helping businesses surface on Google. Dan T. replied, almost instantly, that the correspondent had found “THE RIGHT DAN SULLIVAN.” Over the phone, Dan T. said that he regularly fields e-mails meant for assorted other Dan Sullivans: pest-control reports (Ohio), hotel receipts (Florida), the details of a Ferrari test-track experience (the U.K.).

Dan T. said that, typically, in business, “you want to differentiate yourself with your name.” In his own line of work, he could easily be mistaken for a Dan Sullivan who coaches entrepreneurs, or a Danny Sullivan who works at Google.

son who has the same name as me is my representative and is making decisions that I don’t think are necessarily moving our state forward, maybe it hangs on me a little harder than it does other people.”

Recently, Dan J.’s attention was directed to the 1886 governor’s race in Tennessee, where two brothers, Alf and Bob Taylor, ran against each other. A cartoon at the time showed them side by side onstage, “fiddling for votes.” “That really tickled me,” Dan J. said. “If we were going one on one with Dan Sullivan, I’m sure I could beat him in a fiddle contest.”

—Jon Allsop

THE PICTURES

SAME RIVER THRICE

In 1978, a Californian named Robb Moss, then twenty-eight, went on a five-week float trip through the Grand Canyon with a bunch of fellow river rats. As an aspiring filmmaker, Moss brought along two cameras (a synch-sound handheld and a Bolex on a tripod he lashed to the stern of a dory) and later cut the footage, much of it of his friends naked on the sand and stone, into a short documentary called “Riverdogs.” The idea was to memorialize a vanishing Eden and the end of his five years of vagabonding, working on rivers, paying no rent. This trip was a last hurrah. “I considered the film to be like a cave painting,” he said recently. “I was commemorating our life, our deeds, as though it was a hunt.”

Moss was walking along another water course, the Loch, the stream in the Ravine, at the north end of Central Park. He’d just spent a day scouting at Mount Sinai Hospital, for a documentary that he was planning about its neurosurgery department, and he was getting a gulp of greenery before dinner. He is now, at seventy-six, a film professor and former department chair at Harvard, and is a half century (and more than a dozen films) removed from that restless seeker wearing no pants in the Big Ditch. Still, he has a serene aspect that one might guess is the ripening of that rudderless youth—or of what he learned from his

subsequent films about its expiration.

Twenty years after “Riverdogs,” he made “The Same River Twice,” a feature-length update, combining a lot of the 1978 footage with fresh film following five of those riverdogs as they navigate the banalities and indignities of middle age. This film attracted a keen fan base. The past-present juxtapositions—of bodies, circumstances, attitudes, and even film stock—made for a sly and poignant ode to (or lament over) time’s passage. The lives had layers, like the geological strata of the canyon’s walls.

Eight years ago, Moss returned to those waters a third time. His new movie, “The Bend in the River,” again repurposes the old footage and incorporates new material featuring the same friends, now on the crest of old age. The years are not solely unkind.

“The Bend in the River” is being screened at Film Forum this month. Moss would love the trilogy to be shown together. “Each film is about the view from there, which was then the view from here,” he said. (He wouldn’t run them chronologically; he’d show “The Same River Twice,” then “Riverdogs,” then “The Bend in the River.”)

The Ravine, on this evening, was as verdant as the Grand Canyon hundreds of millions of years ago, when it consisted of coastal lowland and swamp. Moss mentioned another film he’d made called “Containment.” “It was about the difficulty of containing nuclear materials for time frames longer than anyone can imagine,” he said. While he was filming, the Fukushima accident occurred, and, two years later, he went to Japan. “Everything was covered in this nuclear dust, a coat of cesium and strontium. It didn’t change the color of the vegetation, but it made the exquisite beauty of it more poignant. That’s what this color green reminds me of.”

When Moss was seventeen, at Palisades High School in Los Angeles, his brother was drafted and sent to Vietnam. Moss graduated early and began travelling, getting as far as Afghanistan before abandoning a vague plan to go to Vietnam to find his brother. Instead, he went to college, at U.C. Berkeley. It was 1968.

“After I graduated, I felt that my job was to work against whatever ambitions I had accrued in my first twenty-two years,” Moss said. “Ambition was the

Dan J. Sullivan and Dan S. Sullivan

If either of the Alaska Dan Sullivans were a client, Dan T. would advise them to emphasize the order in which their names appear on the ballot, to make sure that voters know which is which. On a more philosophical note, he said he’d remind them that “nobody’s one thing. You’re a lot more than what your name is.”

Dan J. Sullivan, on the other hand, said he believes that “your name is your identity, for better or worse.” He acknowledged that this had informed his decision to run against Dan S., but not in a dirty-tricks kind of way. “There’s a visceral tie that you have with someone who shares your name,” he said. “As this per-

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ILLUSTRATIONS BY JOÃO FAZENDA

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handmaiden of the status quo." So began the untethered era, whose end he celebrated in "Riverdogs." With an old summer-camp friend, Barry Wasserman, he hitchhiked across the Sahara, south to north, then visited Paris, where he made his first film, a day-in-the-life piece. "It was that diaristic impulse, the urge to film the things around you. How do you know where you are?"

A lot of his friends were working as river guides then. While hitchhiking in Arizona, he saw a photo of a boat hitting a giant wave, which spurred him to find his way onto a rafting trip with Martin Litton, the great riverman of the Colorado. "I want to do that," Moss thought. So for five years he did, in Mexico, California, Utah, Oregon, Idaho, British Columbia, and the Grand Canyon. "Then it stopped being satisfying enough," he said. "I wasn't learning anything new." Grad school. Marriage. Career. Rent.

Near where the Loch empties into the Harlem Meer, a long-haired child, unaccompanied by an adult, bounded along the bank with a fly rod. "I just caught a nice largemouth!" the kid said. Moss paused to watch, as an oak catkin blew down and nestled in his hair.

—Nick Paumgarten

L.A. POSTCARD

PLANT MAN

A Queensland bottle tree (Brachychiton rupestris) is not something you would typically find in the chaparral of Southern California. The cartoonishly stout tree would be right at home in a Dr. Seuss book, but it is native to the shrublands of Australia. Even so, one recent morning, a flatbed trailer cruised down the I-5 freeway, with two massive bottle trees secured in its truck bed, and pulled up to Serpentine—a plant-design studio (that is, a high-end nursery) in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles, owned by the comedian and filmmaker Eric Wareheim.

Wareheim, who stands well over six feet tall and wears a trim beard and square-framed glasses, raced outside to meet the delivery. "Oh, wow!" he yelled,

seeing the trees, each more than twenty feet tall, with bulbous trunks nearly nine feet in diameter. "This is the absolute holy grail for me."

Wareheim's botanical obsession began as a hobby after his divorce, in 2024. "Gardening is just so therapeutic," he said. Somewhere between his day job of making movies and TV ("Tim and Eric's Billion Dollar Movie," "Master of None") and a side hustle blending wine under a label called Las Jaras, he began collecting plants. Soon, they overwhelmed his house.

"I started having to sell plants because I had no room," he said. So, with a studio manager, Alexis Florio, he rented a loft, and they began potting desert plants in vintage vessels they sourced from around the world. They also shaped the plants into dramatic forms—sometimes by pruning, other times by leaning a plant away from the sun and letting it twist back toward the light.

Eventually, they outgrew the space, and they moved their wares into the loft's parking lot—a wispy fifteen-foot dragon tree ($8,500) that evoked a ballerina mid-jump, a floss-silk tree ($7,500) with five trunks rising from a Willy Guhl saucer like a giant zombie hand coming up through the earth. Word of the oddball plants spread, and commissions rolled in—Martha Stewart, Kelly Wearstler, Flamingo Estate. "Buyers see them as art pieces, not just some green," Wareheim said.

The bottle trees on the flatbed were to be the centerpieces of a celebration of Serpentine's success. Gazing up at them, Wareheim said, "They put them in museums, stadiums, and zoos—that's it." Asked how much each one would go for, he answered, "I don't know. What does it cost for me to spend two years befriending someone?"

That's how long it took him to find the two trees, scouring nurseries all over San Diego County. "The whole game is to find that shape," he said. He discovered this pair growing in the driveway of Hula Tropicals, a plumeria nursery in Bonsall. But the owner didn't want to sell. Like Hollywood, the plant world is about relationships, so Wareheim spent months returning, buying increasingly larger plants, and gaining the owner's trust. Finally, a deal was struck, and the bottle trees were dug up.

During the unloading at Serpentine,

there was a hiccup: Wareheim had wanted to display the Brachychitons in a couple of huge limestone saucers that turned out to be too shallow. Plan B was two cement bowls, but they were too narrow. "So Plan C is the box, right?" Wareheim asked his team, pointing to a container made of what looked like Lincoln Logs. "We cut the box down a little bit to make it look nice for tonight."

A forklift crane rattled to life and hoisted one of the two-ton Brachychitons.

Eric Wareheim

"This is the greatest thing I've ever seen!" Wareheim said, watching the tree glide through the air like Fellini's Jesus over Rome. "Look at that thing!" He stepped closer to the crane operator and said, "I'll drive." The operator cracked a smile. "The guys hate me," Wareheim said. "My humor is so dumb."

The crane maneuvered the tree into position. As it was lowered, team members quickly trimmed its roots so that it would fit inside the container. If they overdid it, they risked shocking—or even killing—the tree. "I can't watch," Wareheim said. It took almost an hour to get the first tree in its box.

By the time guests arrived (Nathan Fielder, Tim Heidecker), the bottle trees were tucked in discreetly among the nursery's dozens of other weirdo plants. "The prevailing theory is, you have to show off your big thing right when you come in. But actually the classy way is to not do that," Wareheim said. "You've got to work to find these. That's the cool way to do it." He priced the trees at fifty thousand dollars apiece.

—Oren Peleg

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OUR FAR-FLUNG CORRESPONDENTS

FOR RANSOM

Thousands have been taken by Nigerian bandits. One man was abducted twice.

BY ALEXIS OKEOWO

Izuchukwu Anyanwu, a university lecturer in Abuja, Nigeria, came home one evening and settled in for a quiet night. It was September, 2023, and he had spent the afternoon playing soccer with friends on the campus of Veritas University, where he taught. He was tired and was running a fever, so he took a shower and had some tea and bread; he also took medicine for malaria, in case he had contracted it. His wife, Immaculata, put their infant daughter to sleep, then went to bed herself. Around midnight, Anyanwu was watching a political-news program on TV when he heard a noise at the outer door of the veranda. It sounded as though someone was trying to break in. There

had been a power outage that night, and he was using a solar-energy system to run the TV. He opened a window but couldn't see who was there. "I was scared," he told me recently. "I started shouting, 'Who is that? Who is that?''

At thirty-eight, Anyanwu is slim and bearded, with a youthful face. He grew up in a small town in the southeast of the country, then went to Veritas, a Catholic university, to get a master's in political theory. He eventually was offered a teaching job, and rented a place in Zuma II, a neighborhood just outside the university's gates where many faculty members live. It's on the northern outskirts of the city in the rocky foot-

hills of some nearby mountains. "I felt safe," he said. "My hope was to build up my academic profile and eventually have my own house here." His daughter would be turning one in February, and the family was planning a big celebration.

As the noises grew louder, Anyanwu tried calling a neighborhood-watch group, then some friends, but the calls didn't connect. His wife woke up, and the two of them screamed out the window for help. Then the intruders broke the locks. "That is when I saw that it was over," he said. Seventeen men entered his house, some wearing camouflage and carrying AK-47s, rocket-propelled-grenade launchers, and machine guns. "They were armed like people going to war," he recalled. They made Anyanwu and Sunday Ujah, a twenty-year-old man who lived with the family and helped with housework, lie on the floor in the sitting room, then demanded that Immaculata show them where the valuables were kept. Anyanwu protested, telling them that he was not a politician and had no money. Since there was little of value, the men took rice, groundnuts, soft drinks, and powdered milk. A few finished Anyanwu's leftover tea and bread.

The men took away Anyanwu's and Ujah's phones, and brought the two to a neighboring house to kidnap a local trader. Then they all set off on foot toward the mountains. The captives carried the stolen food. Anyanwu was still in his house clothes: shorts, a polo shirt, and slippers. They walked through the forest for hours. The area was wild and uninhabited, but the bandits moved through it with practiced ease. "There were those that went ahead of us and then gave signals for us to continue," Anyanwu said. The kidnappers were all Fulani, a Muslim-majority ethnic group whose members live largely in the north of the country. Considering their sophisticated weaponry, he wondered if they were associated with the Islamist militant group Boko Haram, but the men didn't give a name for their group or profess any particular ideology.

They set up camp in a forest near a village called Tunga Maje. Anyanwu knew their location because he saw the address of a local manufacturer on a package of bread that the kidnappers bought. He and the other two hostages were kept in a cave. It was the rainy season, and he had to put leaves on the wet ground to

The kidnappings have become a bizarre cause célèbre for the American right.

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PHOTOGRAPH BY ETINOSA YVONNE

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sleep. He could hear the voices of another group of hostages somewhere in the forest, out of sight. “They kept them apart from us,” he said.

The men asked what each of the hostages did for a living. “They were trying to profile us to know how much they could demand,” Anyanwu said. He tried to downplay his position at the university, but they set a ransom of a hundred and fifty million naira, or about two hundred thousand dollars, to release him and Ujah. “I told them, ‘If I had such an amount, you wouldn’t have been able to access me,’” he said. “You saw the house I was living in.” They eventually agreed to about half that figure. They gave him his phone back to call his family, but he couldn’t remember his wife’s new phone number. He called his uncle, and then his priest. In the days that followed, he called other relatives. While he was on the phone, the kidnappers beat him with machetes, wires, and the butts of their guns, so that his family would know he was in danger. Before each phone call, he would get excited to hear a familiar voice, then remember the brutal beating to come.

After a few weeks, when the bandits saw that he could not raise the money, they relented, settling for a ransom of about six thousand dollars, which his sister brought to a transfer point. But several days passed, and they still didn’t release him and Ujah. The bandits finally told Anyanwu that they had decided his family hadn’t paid enough. The next day, one of the men brought him before the oga, their boss, who said that they would cut off his leg as punishment. The oga asked him to choose which leg to lose. Anyanwu started crying and begged for mercy, saying that he would bleed to death. “But the oga insisted,” he said. He chose the left one.

Kidnapping is now so rampant in Nigeria that it seems as if everyone knows someone who has been taken. People have been kidnapped while driving on interstate roads, while worshipping at church, and while sleeping in their homes. The novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s late father, a professor, was once kidnapped on the road between his home town and the university town where he lived; he was released three days later, after his family paid a ransom.

The mother of the former finance minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala was taken; so were an Anglican archbishop and his wife. At least forty-seven hundred Nigerians were kidnapped between July, 2024, and June, 2025, and more than seven hundred of them were killed, according to the research firm S.B.M. Intelligence. Victims’ families and friends collectively paid more than two and a half billion naira, or about one and a half million dollars, to kidnappers during that time—double the figure from the year before. This study relied on cases reported in the media, meaning that the real total is almost certainly higher. The kidnap-for-ransom industry has become one of the most lucrative in the country.

The crisis began in the nineties, in the Niger Delta. Militant groups had formed there to oppose the exploitation and pollution of their communities by foreign oil companies such as Shell, and they began abducting oil workers and demanding ransoms from the companies as a form of protest. In the two-thousands, criminal gangs in the southeast began emulating the practice—but as a way of making money rather than as an act of resistance. They often seized people from vehicles on busy roads. “People could not go home for Christmas,” Abubakar Siddique Mohammed, the director of a Nigerian think tank called the Centre for Democratic Development Research and Training, told me. The gangs would pay cattle herders in the vast, ungoverned forests of northern Nigeria to hold the hostages until ransoms were paid. “That is how some of them were actually initiated into kidnapping,” Mohammed said.

In 2009, Boko Haram, based in the northeast of the country, began a campaign of guerrilla attacks and suicide bombings, in an effort to establish a caliphate in the region. It declared itself against Western-style education, and began kidnapping children from schools and forcing them to convert to Islam. Fighters raped the girls and married them against their will. In 2014, Boko Haram took almost three hundred girls from a secondary school in Chibok; the whereabouts of some ninety are still unknown. Last November, the group is believed to have kidnapped about three hundred students from a Catholic school, some as young as five.

In the northwest, the practice spread

through less ideological conflicts. There are ongoing disputes in the region between farmers from the Hausa ethnic group and Fulani cattle herders over access to grazing land. Attacks between the communities have displaced thousands of people. Some young herders turned to organized crime. “Initially, they would go to a village, attack, and extract money from the local notables,” Mohammed said. “Then they moved to blocking local highways to seize whatever is in the vehicles. Then they started kidnapping people.” Today, according to a report from the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, some thirty thousand armed Fulani militants operate in Nigeria. Some groups consist of only a couple of dozen people; others, several hundred.

The groups are usually named for their leaders. One of the most brutal is led by Bello Turji, a Fulani man believed to be in his early thirties. Turji uses the language of Fulani liberation; he told a Nigerian newspaper called the Daily Trust that he had “been forced into banditry” because of “a genocide being committed against the Fulani,” and that a group of farmers had stolen a thousand cattle from his family and killed several of his relatives. His group now carries out kidnappings, extortions, and evictions in farming communities. A few years ago, a pseudonymous musician released a song calling Turji a hero, angering many Nigerians. A group led by a man named Ado Aleru, which kidnapped twenty-five schoolgirls last November, has promised to stop its campaign if the government provides alternative means of livelihood for its followers, along with better schools and hospitals and access to clean water. (Turji and Aleru did not respond to requests for comment.)

“When we started our work, they had grievances, and they were eager to discuss them,” Mohammed said of the militant groups. But the ones he sees today “are very dangerous, because they are just criminals.” Young bandits brag about their kidnappings on TikTok. A screenshot from one man’s account shows him in a traditional Fulani tunic and turban, wearing dark sunglasses and flashy rings; he has a stack of cash in one hand and another stack in his mouth—like a nomadic herder who doubles as a rapper. A kidnapping group led by a man named Kachalla Mati also makes money

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from illegal gold mining in the state of Zamfara, and has begun forcing nearby residents to work in the mines. “There are now no-go areas” of the country, Mohammed said. “They have been taken over by bandits, and nobody passes there.”

The government’s efforts to alleviate the crisis have been ineffective. Mike Ejiofor, a former director of the Department of State Services, the country’s domestic-intelligence agency, told me that the police and the military do not have the resources to deal with the situation. “There is inadequate funding,” he said. In 2010, Nigeria awarded a four-hundred-and-seventy-million-dollar contract to a Chinese company to install CCTV cameras around Abuja; there is still not a single working camera, and the money is unaccounted for. A government program called the Safe Schools Initiative was given thirty million dollars in 2014 to provide guards for schools, create security plans for them, and work with the government to develop a rapid-response system for attacks. None of that appears to have been done. Investigators of the program’s implementation found that more than sixteen hundred children have been abducted since its work began. (A government spokesperson said that the initiative is ongoing, but that local compliance levels are unknown.)

Paying a ransom is technically illegal in Nigeria, a crime that carries a minimum prison sentence of fifteen years under the country’s Terrorism Prevention and Prohibition Act. In reality, though, it’s often the only way to get people back alive. Even the government has been accused of secretly paying ransoms for cases that make international news. A former intelligence official told me that the Office of the National Security Adviser has paid ransoms in at least a few high-profile kidnapping cases. (A spokesperson for the Nigerian government maintains that it does not pay ransoms.) Payments are mostly made in cash, with the money routed through multiple middlemen. “No government will openly admit that it has paid ransom to criminals,” the former intelligence official said. “That will serve incentives to the criminals.”

Still, the cycle continues. In 2022, terrorists kidnapped dozens of people from a train between Abuja and Kaduna, and Tukur Mamu, a newspaper publisher, ne-

gotiaated their release. The government is now prosecuting Mamu for coordinating with Boko Haram to demand ransom money from the families and to take a cut for himself. (Mamu denies the charge, and says that the families themselves suggested paying the ransoms.) Ejiofor told me that he, too, was kidnapped, in 2017, while driving across the country. But he would not admit to paying a ransom. “I was just freed,” he said. “In my position as a former official, I don’t encourage payment of ransoms, and I wouldn’t want to be seen as paying a ransom.”

In the forest, Anyanwu placed his left leg on a rock, and the oga told one of the men to get a sharp machete. But after a moment the oga called the man off. “They said my people need to bring the money quickly,” Anyanwu said.

Not long afterward, the group heard drones in the sky and started moving again, perhaps to evade capture by the military. They trekked for two days to a big camp. It looked like a market, with at least three hundred bandits. “They were on motorbikes,” Anyanwu recalled. “They were shouting, firing guns. What scared me the most was the ages I was seeing. You see children who are ten, fourteen. They were the ones busy servicing the guns, assembling them.”

While en route, the bandits had kidnapped several more hostages: two farmers, an elderly school principal, and a man who had met with the group to deliver a ransom for his brother and was ab-

ducted himself. The kidnappers had begun making Ujah fetch water, gather firewood, and carry out other tasks. So, while most of the hostages were chained to one another, Ujah was allowed to roam. One night in December, Anyanwu woke at about 4 A.M. to learn that Ujah and the two farmers had run away. The bandits caught one of the farmers, tied him to a tree, and began beating him. “Blood was gushing from his body,” Anyanwu

recalled. “We pleaded for them to stop.” But Ujah escaped.

Meanwhile, Immaculata, Anyanwu’s wife, was struggling to get enough money for his additional ransom payment. She was going house to house to beg for contributions. By January, Anyanwu was wasting away. His slippers had fallen apart, and his clothes were torn. The hostages ate only white rice, and not every day; the water they drank was dirty. They washed themselves in a river just once or twice a month, without soap. “My skin was peeling off,” Anyanwu said. “The kidnappers were calling me ‘skeleton.’ They would look at me and start laughing.” But, later that month, Anyanwu got his own chance to escape. The hostages were being watched by a bandit who was epileptic, and he had a seizure. They splashed water on his face to revive him. As he came to, they asked him for the keys to their shackles so that they could urinate, and he relented out of gratitude. Once free, they fled in different directions.

Anyanwu ran all night, for nine hours. Finally, he lay down under a tree and slept. When he woke up, he crossed a ravine and saw cigarette butts and human skulls on the ground. “I was scared,” he said. “I didn’t know what to do.” He was determined to make it home for his daughter’s first birthday, on February 4th.

The next morning, he encountered a Fulani herdsman, who let him use his phone to call his wife. Immaculata had just dropped off another ransom payment of about forty-five hundred dollars. The money was lost, but she was glad that he was free. After he hung up, the herdsman made his own call, and, very quickly, four men from a different bandit group arrived with AK-47s. Anyanwu pleaded with them for help. The bandits took him to their camp, where they gave him medicine and food, and expressed sympathy about his long captivity. They seemed kind. “I thought this was the point that they would let me go home,” Anyanwu said. But that night they chained him up and told him to call his wife for another ransom. He was a hostage again.

The violence in Nigeria has become a cause célèbre for the American right. Since Donald Trump’s first term, Christian activist groups, including one called Aid to the Church in Need, have

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been lobbying the U.S. government to do something about the persecution of Nigerian Christians by Islamist groups. They made progress last year, when Riley Moore, a Republican congressman from West Virginia, introduced a resolution condemning violence against Christians in Muslim-majority countries, and Ted Cruz, the senator from Texas, introduced a bill calling for sanctions against Nigeria. Activists also met with Sebastian Gorka, a member of the National Security Council, and other White House officials.

Soon afterward, Trump announced that Islamist terrorists were kidnapping and killing Christians in Nigeria. Celebrities have since joined in. The rapper Nicki Minaj, who has recently taken a political turn to the right, testified before the United Nations about the oppression of Christians. The TV host Bill Maher called the situation an attempted genocide. I recently passed a billboard in Manhattan with the words “END THE GENOCIDE IN NIGERIA,” next to an illustration of a woman holding a baby in front of a burning church. Last Christmas, Trump, with the knowledge of Bola Tinubu, the President of Nigeria, launched an air strike against the Islamic State in Nigeria, a terrorist group; it hit largely empty forest encampments and farmland. A Nigerian newspaper reported that villagers were visiting the site of the bombing to collect metal fragments and then selling them to scrap dealers.

In Nigeria, the air strike prompted confusion. “When the allegation of genocide came, many of us were shocked,” Sunday Dare, the Nigerian President’s special media adviser, said. “We said, ‘Genocide?’” Boko Haram has waged an insurgency for nearly two decades, killing tens of thousands of Nigerians. But in recent years the group has splintered and inspired copycats. Some, such as the Islamic State West Africa Province, take a hard ideological line. Others are motivated more by money than by religion. Most operate in the Muslim-majority north, and most of their victims are Muslims, too, not Christians. Naseer Mu’azu, the security commissioner in Katsina State, told me, “Muslims bear the brunt more than anybody.”

Northern Nigeria has the highest il-

“Better turn back. All the mid-level-executive office space has been reclaimed by the sea.”

literacy rates in the country and twice as much poverty as the south. The entire country is experiencing an economic crisis because of inflation caused by the recent removal of a fuel subsidy. Kidnapping has become an alternative to the formal economy. The bandits’ networks are difficult to identify, in part because they are now so deeply rooted in their communities’ economic life. “You don’t know who is the informant, who is divulging information to the bandits,” Mu’azu said. Katsina State has begun cultivating locals who might provide intelligence, but recruitment remains difficult.

This year, the U.S. sent two hundred military personnel to assist Nigeria in counterterrorism efforts. Trump has launched further strikes in the country. But Sheikh Ahmad Gumi, a Muslim cleric who has acted as a middleman between the government and bandit groups, told me that economic development would be more effective than bombs. “The military approach cannot solve this problem,” he said. “Indiscriminate bombardment is only going to worsen the situation, because we will have innocent casualties. People will start uniting against the United States.”

Muslims bear the brunt of both the kidnappings and the military actions

against the kidnappers. Since 2014, hundreds of people have been killed in Nigerian air strikes intended for bandit groups. In 2023, a bombing accidentally killed eighty-five people during a Muslim religious festival in Kaduna. This past April, a strike killed a hundred civilians in Yobe State, including several children. In May, Trump posted online that U.S. and Nigerian forces had killed a leader of the Islamic State in Nigeria named Abu Bakr al-Mainuki, during a “powerful and deadly strike against ISIS Terrorist Scum in Northwest Nigeria.” Nigerians were perplexed: their government had announced two years before that it had killed Mainuki. The Nigerian government then clarified that the killing in 2024 had been a case of mistaken identity.

Kidnappings in Nigeria target the rich and the poor, the prominent and the unlucky. Last December, Praise Idesimi, a twenty-five-year-old nursing student, was travelling home on a bus from Veritas University for Christmas break. After she’d been on the road for nine hours, men with covered faces, carrying guns, stopped the vehicle and ordered the passengers to get out. “I was so scared,” Idesimi said. “I thought I was going to die.” One of the kidnappers

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cocked his gun at her and accused her of staring at him. Later, the group released some of the children, and the bus driver took them to the main road. He never came back, and she wondered then whether he had been working with the bandits all along.

The kidnappers made the hostages walk through the forest for almost a week, travelling each night for ten hours. During the day, they were tied up and forced to lie on the ground in the sun; they were beaten with sticks. Idesimi's ransom was set at about three thousand dollars. At one point, she and the other hostages tried calling the bus company for help. "They said it was none of their business," Idesimi said. (A manager at the bus company told me, "It is not our business to negotiate with kidnappers. We are not security.") After six days, her family paid her ransom, and she was released.

I visited Idesimi afterward at Veritas. The campus was calm, but on guard. Young people walked freely among the terra-cotta buildings and mango trees, but there were military posts at the gates. The kidnapping crisis "keeps the university tensed up at every moment," Hyacinth Ichoku, the vice-chancellor of Veritas, said. "Students are afraid. Their parents are worried." The university has increased its security: Ichoku said that members of the police, state security services, and local watch groups patrolled the campus. He rarely slept through the night; he usually woke up several times to check in with campus security. I sat with Idesimi in Ichoku's office. She appeared younger than her age, with a soft voice and a thin frame. She was seeing a therapist, but still had nightmares. She was having difficulty keeping up with her living expenses, because her family was in debt after paying her ransom; Ichoku said that he would help arrange some kind of financial assistance.

Nigerians are not always better off when they seek help from the police. Adoyi Omale, a lecturer and a politician who lives in Abuja, was kidnapped from his car while driving out of town with his niece and two builders who were working on his home. "It was broad daylight, at around two o'clock in the afternoon," he recalled. His fam-

ily paid a ransom of about six thousand dollars for the release of Omale and one of the builders. "I went straight to the police," he said. Instead of receiving help, he was given a bill for the money they had spent on the case: getting his niece and the other builder back to Abuja, hiring local vigilantes to look for Omale, holding his car at the station. The total was about twelve hundred dollars. "I just paid them," he said. "I wanted to get myself back to Abuja." (A spokeswoman for the police blamed this on the actions of a rogue officer. "It's wrong," she said, adding, "It's bad enough that we could not stop the kidnapping.")

In January, 2024, Mansoor Al-Kadriyar, a civil servant, was kidnapped with his five daughters from his home in Abuja. "They marched us all out," he said. Kadriyar called his brother, who called the police, and when they arrived there was a shoot-out. But the bandits overpowered the police and took the hostages into the woods. Kadriyar's daughter Nadheerah had been unable to cover her hair with a hijab before they left, which made her feel exposed. Her older sister Nabeeha was the bravest among them; even when the bandits pointed a gun at her, she didn't flinch. Kadriyar agreed to pay a ransom of about sixty thousand dollars, then was released so that he could gather the money.

When he returned to Abuja, he learned that his brother had been killed in the shoot-out. A relative started an online fund-raising campaign for his daughters' ransom. But a week passed, and they still didn't have enough money. The bandits then called to say that they had killed Nabeeha, in punishment. "It was a calamity," Kadriyar said.

After Nabeeha's death, more donations came in, and the family paid the ransom. Kadriyar's remaining daughters were released. "We were celebrating, we were thanking God," he said. He grieved for his daughter and brother, but tried to focus on his gratitude that the rest of them had survived. When I visited the family, Nadheerah could joke darkly about her ordeal. "Before it happened, I was trying to lose weight," she said. "So I was kind of happy that I was walking. I was getting my steps in." Kadriyar had since moved his family

to an apartment in a more secure part of Abuja, but it was expensive. "We are not finding life easy," he said.

On February 4, 2024, the day of his daughter's birthday, Anyanwu's captors released him. Local motorbike-taxi drivers had brought money and phone cards from his sister, along with food, power banks, solar panels, and two new motorcycles. One of the drivers dropped Anyanwu off at the nearest highway, and his sister picked him up and took him to a hotel. The next day, he went to the hospital to be evaluated, then finally returned home. His wife cried when she saw him. She, too, had lost weight. "I couldn't recognize my wife. My baby didn't know me," he said. Immaculata told me, "My life was shattered. I was traumatized and very depressed. But I didn't give up."

Kidnappings in Nigeria have continued unabated. In Kogi State, bandits recently raided an orphanage and took twenty-three children hostage. In Katsina State, a retired military general and his wife were kidnapped from their car; the general later died in captivity. More than eleven hundred people were kidnapped in northern Nigeria in the first three months of 2026, according to Amnesty International.

Earlier this year, I visited Anyanwu and his wife at their home in Abuja. Their bungalow had modest furniture, and sunlight filled the sitting room. Anyanwu marvelled at the beauty of Immaculata, who was wearing a leopard-print dress and a matching headband. They seemed protective of each other: she stayed close as Anyanwu and I talked, keeping her eyes on him. "We are still not feeling comfortable," he said. "The incident is always with us."

He was looking for academic opportunities abroad. If they had had the means, he said, they would have left the country as soon as he was released from the hospital. But they had to pay back the money they had borrowed for the three ransoms. "There was no institutional support, nothing," Anyanwu said. "The support I got was from my friends, the school, of course, family, and the church." These days, he can't fall asleep until after midnight—the time when the bandits broke into his house. Before his abduction, Anyanwu had heard of people being kidnapped, but had not thought much about it. He said, "I never knew that it could happen to me." ♦

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SHOUTS & MURMURS

HEADLINES STUPID ONION EDITOR REJECTED

BY LARRY DOYLE

College Grad Escapes Vicious Learning Cycle

Date Lectures Man On Racist History Of “Going Dutch”

Man Laughs Just Right Amount at Job Interview

Boyfriend Saving First “I Love You” For Emergency

Woman Insists On Proposal Do-Over Just Because He Forgot Ring, Her Name

Groom Sees Omen In Bride’s Grammy Leaving Teeth In His Beer

Honeymoon Ruined By Too Much “Lovey-Dovey” Stuff

Man’s Socks, Underwear, Favorite Shirt Lost in Dryer

Married Man Still Able to Drink at Collegiate Level

New Father Who Witnessed Miracle of Birth Not Tapping That Again

Man Loses Job Over Handful of Benign Remarks

Santa Expands List to Include Naughty, Nice, and Too Nice

Sloppy Eater Dog’s New Best Friend

Trad Wives Give Better Blow Jobs, Experts Say

Second Baby Redder Than First, Dad Observes From Chair

Sister-in-Law Keeps Harping On Toilet Incident

Man Cave Established In Car in Driveway

Husband Furious Wife Won’t Let Him Swap Out Free-Sex-Pass Celebrity Who Got Old

Honey-Do Jar Bursts Into Flames

Man Did Not Drink Too Often Much

Tooth Fairy Just Forgot, O.K.?

Son Saying “Dad” With Less Conviction These Days

Dad Abdicates Marriage, Mom Vows Changes Around Here

Divorced Man’s Trusty Pick-Up Bar Now a Chicken Place

Late-Night Cheese Snack Not Cheese, E.R. Doctors Determine

All Man’s Old College Girlfriends Are Lesbians Now

Ex-Wife Dating Probable Mobster, Pedophile

Daughter Doesn’t Wait Until Marriage To Change Surname

Divorced Man Shocked to Discover Cunnilingus Mandatory All of a Sudden

Man Fired Because Boss’s Kid Also a Retard

Man’s Life Not Worth Living, Goes On Anyway

Onion Rejects Funny Man’s 10,000th Headline

Ex-Wife Finds Man’s Death Hilarious ♦

LUCI GUTIERREZ

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U.S. JOURNAL

KABOOM!

Fireworks by Grucci's empire of explosions.

BY PAIGE WILLIAMS

A few days before the Fourth of July, I was on the rooftop of a casino in Las Vegas, where I ran into the head electrician of the Eisenhower Theatre at the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts, which is in Washington, D.C. The electrician, Thomas Benya, who is also a licensed pyrotechnician, had come to Vegas with a swarm of other pyrotechnicians, to set up, and set off, what was being billed as the nation's largest fireworks show. Back in D.C., President Donald Trump was claiming that his show, around the National Mall, would be bigger, and that he would be giving a "really long" speech. Trump had been trying to muscle his name onto the Kennedy Center, and then, amid a series of staff departures and cancellations by performers, closed the place down for a "comprehensive revitalization project"; Benya, who enjoys "building art with people," and who has worked at the

Kennedy Center for twenty years, since he was eighteen, told me, "It's been traumatic." Vegas seemed unlikely to offer respite. A molten-gold "TRUMP" tower loomed over the north end of the Strip.

Three hundred and twenty-nine thousand visitors were in town, to celebrate America's two-hundred-and-fiftieth birthday, and all of them were on my elevator. It was a million degrees outside. On a different rooftop, on another day, a gloved woman whose T-shirt read "AS REAL AS IT GETS" paused while loading orange-strobe fireworks shells into three-inch mortars and told me, "When you've been around one hundred and twenty and above, this doesn't even feel like anything." The best sweaty person I saw in Vegas was an older woman with up-swept black hair and bangs, wearing a lime-green fake chrysanthemum as plump as a grapefruit tucked behind

her right ear, and carrying a Spanish fan. This was at a coffee shop in the Arts District, miles from the Strip. At the next table was a woman who also had black bangs, plus lip piercings and a tattoo on both wrists. She was engrossed in a book called "Fool's Errand," a fantasy novel about an assassin named FitzChivalry Farseer who, per a quick Google, has abandoned "self-imposed exile to rescue a missing prince and navigate perilous political waters." The woman wore an "Invader Zim" T-shirt: "DOOM! DOOM! DOOM! DOOM! DOOM! DOOM! DOOM!"

Belowground was the Vegas Loop—Elon Musk's idea. The Loop is a privately funded system of one-way tunnels designed to ferry passengers, in self-driving Teslas, among nine destinations, primarily the Las Vegas Convention Center, which is the size of eighty football fields. One of Musk's enterprises, the Boring Company, has been operating the tunnels since 2021. A local professor of public policy has called the Loop "the biggest, most absurd transit scam I have ever heard of." ProPublica uncovered ominous gaps in oversight, saying that because the Loop "receives no federal funding, it is exempt from the kinds of exhaustive governmental vetting and environmental analyses" often demanded of such proj-

For America's 250th, Grucci fired dozens of shows, including one that covered the entire three-and-a-half-mile Vegas Strip.

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PHOTOGRAPH BY SPENCER LOWELL

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ects. In other subterranean tunnels—storm drains, really—humans were living. It was monsoon season. Up top, you cook; down below, you drown.

The Strip provided distracting saturations of red-white-and-blue. The Sphere transmogrified into an enormous American-flag beach ball. Gift shops sold bedazzled Stars and Stripes tumblers. I saw a woman in a sequined American-flag minidress, a man in American-flag shorts overalls. There were American-flag stilettos, cowboy hats, handbags. Topgolf was offering a “Let Freedom Swing” discount of 17.76 per cent. One casino was selling a cocktail called the Firecracker, which cost an ahistorical nineteen dollars. A G.M.C. Terrain was roaming around with its windows chalked in advertisements for “Peptides” and “IV Hydration,” suggesting that there’s a cure for everything.

A cure for mortality, in imperial China, was thought to be an alchemical mixture of sulfur, charcoal, and potassium nitrate—later known as gunpowder, or black powder. It did not work. But, when burned, the mixture went BANG! It could be stuffed into the hollow center of bamboo stems, which were already used to scare off evil spirits and mythical “mountain men,” because the joints popped when thrown onto a fire. According to the historian John Withington, “It is said that for centuries, no self-respecting Chinese traveller would leave home without a stash of natural bamboo firecrackers.”

Modulating the mixture produces different effects. More potassium nitrate sustains a longer burn; more sulfur quickens the explosion. Someone eventually thought to add metals, which yield color: sodium, for yellow; strontium, for red; barium, for green; aluminum or magnesium, for white. Copper chloride breaks up quickly under high heat and washes out—bluish. Adding titanium produces a crackly effect. Iron shavings render gold. Today, various combinations are packed into cardboard spheres or cylinders—shells—along with fuses coated in a flammable slurry, then sealed inside kraft paper and shot from fibreglass mortars. Modernity has relieved humans of the added danger of approaching fireworks with a flaming torch or a lit cigar:

professional displays are fired by electric current.

Shells are rigged to burn, and blow, in a specific manner. They can be made to go POW, poof, boom, BOOM, BOOM!, BOOMBOOM, whoosh, CRACK, ffffffff, fssssssssssss, EEEEEeeeeee. Finales go BOOMBOOM-BOOMBOOMBOOM. One kind of firework sounds as though the sky just emptied its digital trash. Visual effects have their own names—chrysanthemum, peony, willow, palm. A falling-leaves effect looks like an enormous, invisible bucket of glitter just tipped. Crossettes fly apart like a cluster of struck billiard balls. A fireworks show’s designer considers, in this order: theme, venue, budget, playlist. Setting fireworks to music has been compared to “scoring characters in a ballet—some are very robust and baroque-like, and some are very delicate, soft.” The difference between a ten-thousand-dollar show and one that costs much more involves product quality, pacing, duration, density, and degree of difficulty. It’s generally more complicated to make fireworks scale the Washington Monument than it is to, say, shoot them off a barge on a lake. The downsides of fireworks—trash, smoke, wildfire, dog trauma—are something that the average spectator pushes out of mind.

Fireworks shows happen continually in Vegas. A couple of nights before the Fourth, I stood in a parking lot at the Palace Station casino, waiting for one to begin. A father in a Bud Light T-shirt took selfies with his small son; a security guard told people to stop leaning against his Range Rover. At nine o’clock, we heard a distant whining. A cloud of dust rose in a gravel lot nearby, and a fleet of drones could be seen lifting in unison. Suddenly, in the sky—colored lights! In the shape of a giant lottery drum! It was like a spaceship, and it seemed close enough to reach up and touch. The drum rolled, and a green ball of light with the number 5 appeared beside it. The ball turned red, and the 5 turned to 4. Yellow (3), blue (2), back to green (1)—POW! POW-POW! Fireworks erupted in the black void next to the lotto drum—green poof, gold poof, silver spangles, white comets. Drones, which can be equipped with lights and programmed

to precise G.P.S. coördinates, are meant to enhance, not necessarily replace, fireworks; they can even be equipped with fireworks. Would it have ruined the experience for spectators to have known that drone operators were using computers, not joysticks; and that pyrotechnicians, also using laptops, were sending thousands of lines of code via a radio transmission called F.S.K., frequency-shift keying, which sounds like AOL dial-up, to tell the fireworks when and where to go off?

The drone pilots—Nebraskans—worked for a company called Fantasy Drone Shows. Their leader, Scott Buss, a pyrotechnician and also a pilot, managed retail stores before moving to drones. Drones, he said, let him “tell stories in the sky”—a hand of blackjack, a giant margarita—but they don’t tickle our monkey brain with their odor, or their concussive jolts. Buss enjoys drones; he loves fireworks—“the feel of it all.”

The writer George Plimpton, a founder and the longtime editor of The Paris Review, considered fireworks the “eighth art,” and he was obsessed with them. As part of the research for his book “Fireworks: A History and Celebration,” which was published in 1984, he discovered an industry periodical with the slogan “He who hath once smelt the smoke is ne’er agin free.” He interviewed a reverend in Minnesota who, having merged “his hobby with his clerical work,” had become known as the “blaster pastor.” The pastor explained to Plimpton that, during outdoor sermons, “I might say, ‘… and thus is the way of the Lord.’ Boom!”

When Queen Elizabeth I reigned, from 1558 to 1603, she created a Fire Master of England position. Colonialist empires used fireworks to “overawe local people” and attempt to control them, Withington, the historian, notes in his recent book, “A History of Fireworks.” Pyrotechnics have been performed at Versailles, the pyramids of Giza, Tiananmen Square, the White House. They have been launched from mountains, riverbanks, bridges, medieval ramparts, cathedrals. Fireworks herald the World Cup, the Olympics, inaugurations, weddings, railroad openings, royal matrimony, saints, the Saints,

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the spring equinox, eclipses, the New Year, the Day of the Dead, the beginning of summer, the end of it. Peter the Great designed a display that “celebrated the treaty and final peace after twenty-one years of war with Charles XII of Sweden,” Plimpton wrote, adding, “Apparently, he simply loved noise.” America’s founding is inextricable from fireworks; John Adams sent a letter to his wife on July 3, 1776, predicting that the nation’s independence would be “solemnized” with, among other things, “Illuminations.” Two hundred and fifty years later, this is taken to heart—relentlessly. Americans spent an estimated two and a half billion dollars on fireworks this year, and that’s just the backyard stuff.

Fireworks shells are measured in diameter—one inch, three inches, four, twelve. Pyrotechnicians, and the designers of professional fireworks shows, decide which shells to use based on what a venue can physically and legally bear. In Las Vegas, Benya, the Kennedy Center electrician, and his colleagues were working a rooftop whose rubberized membrane could withstand only one-inchers, which can still take off a human hand. Plimpton always insisted on lighting his own. Fireworks spoke to him—the juxtaposition of “flamboyant colors” and “that fine fringe of dan-

danger.” His summer parties in the Hamptons never failed to feature pyrotechnics. A guest once sued him, for eleven million dollars, over a burned arm. At one party, Norman Mailer wanted to light a shell. “He had his bourbon drink in a blue glass, really more a vase, the sort of receptacle one usually finds in the back of a kitchen cabinet when everything else in the house, even the plastic cups, has been commandeered,” Plimpton wrote. “He held the drink in one hand, safe out behind him, and he approached the fuse” with a railroad flare, lighting a six-incher that weighed about eight pounds. It “came out almost instantaneously,” and the surprise “toppled Norman into a complete backward somersalt through the sawgrass. Astonishingly, the blue vase remained upright as he pinwheeled around it; not a drop of bourbon splashed out. He got up and took a sip and asked if he could do another. ‘Do you have anything slightly larger?’”

Fireworks have magical names—Red Silk, Monkey Child. Plimpton used to say that when he retired he wanted a job naming fireworks, and he wanted his cremated remains to be launched as fireworks. He was about to begin his memoirs when he died suddenly, in his sleep, at his family’s apartment, on the Upper East Side. This happened on

September 25, 2003, and he was seventy-six. The ashes waited. In 2005, his close friend Hunter S. Thompson, another writer who loved fireworks, died; the actor Johnny Depp, who had played Thompson in a movie, fired Thompson’s cremains from a cannon near Aspen. Invited guests included Jack Nicholson, Sean Penn, and Senators George McGovern and John Kerry. A neighbor told the Times, “I’ll always remember where I was when Hunter was blown into the heavens.”

On July 4th of the next year, at Gardiner’s Bay, in the Hamptons, Plimpton went up in his favorite firework, a Japanese Kamuro, which is also “known as the Boy’s Haircut, or Japanese Willow—a golden cascade of light that hangs there for a moment, shimmering, before winking off into the darkness,” his son, Taylor, later wrote. Taylor had packed the shells himself.

Fireworks by Grucci was Plimpton’s preferred pyro provider. That’s who Benya was working for on the casino roof in Las Vegas. The Gruccis have been in the business for six generations, since 1850, first in Bari, Italy, on the Adriatic Sea, and later in Bellport, New York, on the South Shore of Long Island. Grucci forebears immigrated through Ellis Island. It has been said that they “came here, basically, with a shoebox with some formulas in it, and a dream to be in the United States.”

Felix Grucci, Sr., opened a small factory in Bellport in 1929. During the Great Depression, fireworks shows went dark, and Grucci found a side job playing drums in a band. Later, to diversify, Grucci took a U.S. military contract manufacturing training simulators that mimicked an atomic bomb. In the early seventies, his adult children, Butch, Donna, and Jimmy, started running the fireworks company. Jimmy liked trying new things. The Gruccis were among the first to fire shows using computers and electronics. Jimmy was said to have invented an effect called the split comet, which multiplies as it blows apart. In 1979, he insisted that the Gruccis travel to Monte Carlo to compete in an invitation-only fireworks competition. They won. The Gruccis started to be referred to as the First Family of Fireworks, an honorific that,

“What if nobody wants your papers?”

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to this day, can be found on the company logo.

The Gruccis were spending Thanksgiving weekend of 1983 making final preparations for Christmas and New Year's Eve shows when an explosion levelled their factory in Bellport. The ground shook for twenty miles. Locals immediately figured Russian bombs—the end of the world. Felix was at the factory but somehow was not injured. Jimmy and a nineteen-year-old cousin, Donna Gruber, were killed. Plimpton, who was close with the Gruccis, got a phone call and was in Bellport within hours, talking his way past police barricades and onto a "tortured" landscape, which reminded him of photos of trench battles in the First World War. Butch told Plimpton that pyrotechnicians never quite stop thinking about the worst that can happen: "You live with it every day, sort of like knowing that nuclear weapons are pointed at you." Then he said, "When it really happens, it's nothing like what you thought. I had an idea the sound would be deep and kind of awesome, like being inside a wave, but it was different. It was a ripping and tearing sound, high and piercing, almost a kind of shriek."

A member of the Pyrotechnics Guild International wondered if the explosion had been caused by spontaneous combustion. "It was awful to consider," Plimpton wrote. "A single shell, packed in amid its fellows, slowly, in the darkness of the warehouse, changing its internal composition until now, a deadly instrument, it awaited some delicate shift of atmospheric pressure, or a certain degree of humidity, to be triggered into that first puff of smoke." Another theory was arson. A town had grown up around the once rural factory's location, and certain neighbors had been pushing for Grucci to relocate, which is eventually what happened. The cause of the explosion was never revealed, if ever it was known.

A eulogy for Jimmy Grucci was delivered by Plimpton, whose vibe had been theatrical since at least his Hasty Pudding days. (When Plimpton met his first wife, at P. J. Clarke's, he was wearing a cape.) A double descendant of prominent Mayflower families, he spoke in an accent that Taylor has described as "old New England, old New

"Establish an absolute and unquestionable rule over the entire kingdom and you'll never work a day in your life."

York, tinged with a hint of King's College King's English. "You might imagine how it sounded, then, when Plimpton noted, to a crowd of mourners, that Jimmy's after-dinner 'recreation' was to 'watch tapes of his favorite Grucci fireworks shows on the great curved extra-sized television screen at the foot of his bed,' and that his alarm clock was that same television, set to 'the climactic moment of the Tchaikovsky 1812 Overture as played outdoors by Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops.' During performances, Plimpton said, Jimmy often threw in extra shells, 'to give an audience just a bit more than what was necessary.'"

Jimmy Grucci had a son, Phil, who was a freshman at Long Island University at the time of the explosion. Phil had been going to Grucci shows with his family since he was a boy, and he remembered spectators crowding around his grandfather on the Coney Island boardwalk, to congratulate and praise him after each finale. "That's very addictive," he once said. Plimpton called

Phil "Philly"—"Phil-lay!" They climbed the Brooklyn Bridge together, to work on its centennial show. Phil remembers Plimpton sitting beside him during performances, gazing skyward and banging him gleefully on the knee, and shouting, "Go! Go! Go!" Phil-lay later oversaw the packing of Plimpton's ashes into the Kamuros.

Fireworks by Grucci survived the Bellport explosion, in part because, the following year, the developer Steve Wynn hired the company for the opening of a new tower at the Golden Nugget, in Las Vegas. The Gruccis have performed the big shows in Vegas ever since. They went on to fire the Statue of Liberty centennial, several Olympic Games, World's Fairs, dozens of New Year's Eve millennium shows, the Inaugurations of Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Donald Trump. "I've had people say, 'I can't believe you're shooting fireworks for that guy!'" Phil told me. "I say, 'We are a bipartisan fireworks company.'" (Barack Obama skipped fireworks at his Inaugurations.)

Phil and his wife, Debra, who wears

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a “Grucci” necklace studded with tiny, tasteful diamonds, have two children, Lauren and Christopher, who are in their thirties. Along with a cousin, Corey, they are the next generation of Fireworks by Grucci. All are licensed pyrotechnicians. Lauren’s first show was at Pearl Harbor. A photographer, she documents the performances that her father and brother put on. Chris works shows and is also a program manager for Pyrotechnique by Grucci, the defense-contracting side of the business, which still makes training simulators for the military: now hand grenades, and the kinds of groundbursts that a soldier might encounter via a trip wire. His wife, Lemonia, who goes by Lena, was the company’s H.R. director until she decided to spend more time at home with their daughter, Siena, who was born two years ago—two days after the Fourth of July, to Phil’s feigned dismay. Gruccis aren’t required to work in the family business, but they usually do. Phil told me, “We get hooked on it in the womb—hear the noise in the background, come out ready to go.”

In 2006, Wynn took the Gruccis to Macau, to fire an opening for the first of his properties in Asia. “He always said, ‘I’ll give you the building, you give me the razzmatazz,’” Phil told me. Two years later, the hospitality magnate Jerry Inzerillo hired the Gruccis for the opening of the man-made archipelago Palm Jumeirah, in Dubai. Plans for Grucci shows—even those performed in the U.S.—now come from engineers and designers in Dubai, where Grucci has an office. Phil expects the Middle East to overtake the U.S. soon as the largest over-all market. “They’re not about razzmatazz—they’re about big,” he said.

Saudi Arabia alone has a “gigatourism” goal of attracting a hundred and fifty million annual visitors by 2030, through U.F.C. fights, Formula 1 races, theme parks. “Something beyond oil,” as Phil put it. Fireworks shows for certain events have giga-budgets, though it is hard to get a dollar amount. Millions? I pressed Phil. “Oh, yeah,” he said. The bigger the budget, the better the “opportunity to go outside of

the box.” The Gruccis have fired the Burj Khalifa, the planet’s tallest building, which stands just over half a mile high, in Dubai; a UNESCO World Heritage site made of clay, in Saudi Arabia; and Al Marjan Island, another man-made archipelago, in the emirate of Ras al-Khaimah.

For years, Grucci held the record for having made and fired the largest aerial shell—sixty inches. Phil showed me a replica at one of his company’s warehouses; it looked like a mutant Christmas ornament. That record was broken in 2020, in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. Such records require feats of engineering. The Steamboat Springs shell contained three hundred and eighty comets and

had been wrapped in fifty-one miles of gummed paper by a machine built specifically for that purpose. The shell weighed two thousand seven hundred and ninety-seven pounds and was shot out of a custom-made mortar, on a mountaintop. The lift had to be powerful enough to blast the massive orb into the sky, and the shell had to explode at just the right moment, without raining flaming debris. The Gruccis have been commissioned to break that record on New Year’s Eve, in Dubai, with a sixty-six-inch shell, and they have already been hired to plan for seventy inches, in 2027. Phil told me, “The Middle East—particularly the U.A.E. and Saudi Arabia—are very, very energized by world records.”

The Gruccis import their fireworks already assembled, largely from Italy and Spain. The Italians are respected fireworks-makers from way back, and the Spanish city of Valencia has long been known for its pyrotechnics festivals. “You want flawless, perfect stuff? Go to Japan. It’s like getting a diamond,” Chris told me one morning, in Las Vegas. Grucci also imports from China—but less, these days. “It’s just too expensive,” he said. (Tariffs.)

The imports come through Pyrotechnique by Grucci, which is based out of the Radford Army Ammunition Plant, near Virginia Tech. The plant was built during the Second World War,

to manufacture propellants for rockets and other artillery. During the coronavirus pandemic, when fireworks shows were cancelled, the company surged staff to Radford, where most Grucci operations now take place. Chris moved there from Bellport. He and Lena, whose family is from Greece, got married in Roanoke, which had the closest Greek Orthodox Church they could find. Phil marked the occasion with a fireworks tribute. The hotel hosting the reception allowed this only after a demonstration and with the assurance that the Gruccis would not shoot off anything that generated close sparks. The hotel, which is on the National Register of Historic Places, had nearly burned down before.

Chris prefers the rote stability of defense manufacturing to the logistical chaos of fireworks shows, which can get derailed by anything from high wind to a fumbled permit. A couple of weeks before the Fourth, I met him and his father at the Radford plant, a complex that occupies nearly seven thousand acres straddling the New River. I had to clear three security checkpoints to get in. Parts of the property appeared unused and overgrown, with signs that read “Welcome to First Rolled Powder” and “Increment Weigh House.” There were steel chutes and silos and rusted railroad tracks and gas pumps, and objects that looked like intergalactic lug nuts. A contractor, B.A.E. Systems, now runs the plant and leases workspace to thirteen commercial tenants. As a Grucci assistant and I passed a Northrop Grumman building, the assistant said, “I don’t know what goes on in there. I try to be careful with my curiosity.”

Grucci’s main office was a prefabricated building set among long, low-slung, flat-roofed structures that called to mind old-timey chicken houses, with open bays. The buildings were color-coded. Blue trim meant no explosives; red meant the obvious. A safety official named Scott handed me a fire-resistant lab coat, goggles, and a pair of black clothpapers designed to discharge static electricity. Some of the buildings had specialty flooring and lighting, and maximum-occupancy rules. In one, Scott had me step onto a machine that resembled a scale, with a needle indicator that moved from red to green, measuring the conductivity of the shoes.

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My needle stayed in the red—my feet were too dry, potential friction. Scott directed me to remove the shoes and spritz the bottom of my socks with water from the kind of bottle that you'd use to mist a houseplant. I put the shoes back on and tried the scale again. The needle shot into the green.

Chris walked me to a building where workers were using automated machinery to drop black powder and pulverized aluminum into cardboard tubes, to make the hand-grenade and ground-burst simulators. The tubes reminded me of the inside of a roll of toilet paper. The grenade simulators are designed to build muscle memory in soldiers: pull the pin, throw it, take cover, don't just stand there and watch.

In a room smelling of cornstarch, Chris showed me where workers coat cotton twine in a black-powder slurry, to make fusing called "quick match." In an X-ray area, an employee was running explosives samples through a machine that printed out moisture levels on a diagnostic slip that looked like a receipt. Then we watched a team leader named Paul tape fuses to cardboard tubes, venting each with two tiny holes made by a corncob holder.

We passed through an area where the tsssssssssss of compressed air was so loud that one employee wore earplugs. She was attaching whistles to simulators—some can be made to sound like incoming missiles—and sealing them with glue. Near a building marked "Prime & Ferrule," an employee named Jimmy handed Chris a small container in which he'd been test-mixing an oily amalgam of black powder, camphor, and acetone. I took a sniff—nail-polish remover, times a thousand. Jimmy laughed and said, "It'll clear you out."

I got into a Chevy Suburban, license plate "GRUCCI," and rode with Phil to a vast, open field where a large buck likes to sleep in the cool sand beneath a pole barn and groundhogs could be seen scampering off into the weeds. Four Grucci employees, led by a young crew chief named Alyson, were ending their workday by test-firing one last hand grenade and one last groundburst simulator. They placed the grenade on a catapult and operated it from within a three-sided safety hut, via a rope threaded through a window. "It's al-

most like 'Looney Tunes'—go in your little bunker and pull the rope," Alyson told me.

The grenade fell just short of the sandpit and blew up—it passed. An employee named Gary placed the ground-burst simulator upright on a metal stand and attached the rope, which they let me pull. BANG! went the simulator, leaving shredded cardboard and a plume of smoke.

Grucci fireworks are stored in magazines, which in Radford are cement-block structures hidden by earthen berms and heavy timber. The magazines are well spaced, in case one blows. Phil drove me to one that looked deserted. Three employees were inside, pulling boxes for a July 4th show in Yonkers. Product was organized by effect. As I was looking at a box labelled "Letter shell 'P' White," Phil said, "We have pretty much every letter in the alphabet."

The fireworks and equipment for Vegas had already gone out. The logistics were being managed in another Grucci facility—part office, part warehouse—in nearby Dublin. When I met Phil there, trucks were coming and going, filled with mortars and modular panels. The office's main corridor

was lined with large framed photos of Grucci shows. Phil and I stopped in front of a shot of the grand reopening of the Palms, a Las Vegas casino: two high-rise towers that, dressed in fireworks, evoked brightly feathered birds. Phil said, "I get inspired by the architecture of the structures that we work with. How do we emphasize it with fireworks without overwhelming what we're there to honor?" He had envisioned comets coming off the top of the buildings, twenty-foot "fountains" out front, and multicolored mines running up and down the sides, spewing horizontally, like fixed wings. "Then the question is: How do you attach the mines horizontally? How do you make them equidistant? These windows don't open," he said, pointing, "so the only way you can do that is rappel down the side, or lower cables that have preloaded rigging. And then you have to keep it off the building, so you don't damage the building." The Palms show had required a twenty-person crew and four days of setup. "All of the logistics and the production comes together for that ten- or fifteen- or twenty-minute performance," he said. "And the audience roars—hopefully."

Grucci's director of operations, Brenda Albano, oversees logistics for

"This data center is set aside for storing accidental screenshots of your phone's home screen."

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a couple of hundred shows per year. Phil said, “It’s like moving a small army around.” There are permits to secure, protocols to finalize. Barges don’t magically cross state lines. Trucks need to be routed, drivers hired. Albano, a native Virginian, has been with the company for twenty-seven years. She started out on the defense side. Before that, she sewed toes onto socks at a factory. She prefers fireworks. Like a lot of Grucci employees, she is also a licensed pyrotechnician. If she were a firework, she would be a flying fish—in constant motion. Phil would be a hornet swarm—all over the place. Chris would be a fountain—steady burning, grounded. Albano is too restless to sit at a desk; she stands. She keeps Skittles and a Costco-size jar of Mt. Olive dill pickles in her office, alongside reflective vests and a book called “Hazardous Materials, Substances & Waste Compliance Guide.” A decorative woodblock on her bookshelf reads “BUT DID YOU DOCUMENT IT?” She told me, “I am bossy, and I’m demanding, and I’m loud, and I don’t like lazy people.”

Grucci employs more than two hundred people full time. Some who transfer from the defense side can’t handle the pace in fireworks, which also has hundreds of part-time pyrotechnicians. Full-timers commit with the understanding that no one takes vacation between May 1st and July 15th, and that they may be asked to leave for Las Vegas the day after Christmas, as Chris Grucci does, to prepare for the New Year’s Eve show.

Ahead of July 4th, Albano was running near-constant check-ins with staff, while also managing an ailing dog and meeting with the fire marshal, to get cleared for incoming storage pods. I was sitting in on one of her conference calls when someone broke the bad news that Andrew Warby, a chief pyrotechnician who’d been hired to work Vegas, was in the hospital—he’d just fractured a foot while jogging. “Is that rooftop wheelchair accessible?” someone on the call said. Warby, a native Australian who lives in Dallas, showed up in Vegas in a medical boot. By the time I met him, on the roof of a casino called Sunset Station, he’d tossed the boot—it was slowing him down. Limping, he

cheerily told me, “Show must go on!,” as he’s surely said to the media a thousand times before.

The Gruccis have many clients in Las Vegas. They had produced the fireworks that accompanied the drone show at Palace Station. For the Fourth, they were putting on several shows out in the Las Vegas Valley, and the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority had hired them to fire the entire three-and-a-half-mile Strip. Pyrotechnicians were assigned to the rooftops of the Aria, Caesars Palace, the Fontainebleau, the MGM Grand, Planet Hollywood, Resorts World, the Strat, Treasure Island, and the Venetian. Designers and engineers in Dubai had sent bespoke site plans. Joe Sedlock, a chief pyrotechnician from Columbus, Ohio—who would almost work for free, because hearing a crowd’s reaction “is like Christmas morning”—showed me color-coded schematics of mortar racks, fallout areas, safety distances, products, and firing times, down to the millisecond. Forty comets, fired from different locations and at a seventy-degree angle, yield what? “A nice, pretty cross,” Sedlock said, adding, “We can fill the sky—sort of paint it.” He was scheduled to fire the MGM Grand, whose twenty-eight-page site plan involved, by my count, at least two thousand five hundred and eighty-one effects: “RED RING W/CRACKLING PISTIL,” “TIME RAIN TO GOLD,” “SUPER CRACKLE (SALUTE).” The over-all technical director, Oscar Lopez, whose day job entails managing events at Resorts World, hustled crews carefully among setups and sites. Just inside the roof door at Resorts World, where the crew included Benya, Lopez had used a black marker to trace the outline of his large shoes, and to write “CELL SIGNAL,” on the cement floor. Stepping into his footprints, he told me, “This is the only place where I can make a phone call.”

Large patches of duvetyn, a fire-resistant fabric, had been taped to the Resorts World roof. Benya and other pyrotechnicians were wiring up hundreds of racks of comets—which resembled opaque, oversized test tubes—affixing them to plywood slabs and placing them on the duvetyn. The wiring contained copper, which can short. Benya told me, “It doesn’t matter if it’s this eighteen-gauge wire carrying twelve

volts or a six-aught cable carrying four hundred and eighty—you gotta respect it, you gotta be careful with it, you gotta terminate it properly.”

In the operation’s command center, Room 38029 in the Masquerade Tower of the Rio, large curved windows overlooked the entire Strip and an eastern sweep of valley. A computer monitor showed real-time weather conditions, including wind speed. Dedicated binders held schedules and protocols—fallout frontages, spotter locations—counting down to “SHOWTIME!,” 21:00 hours. Music: “Born in the U.S.A.” (Springsteen), “Waking Up in Vegas” (Katy Perry), “Viva Las Vegas” (Elvis). Chris had conducted a dress rehearsal, to work out kinks in the variously assigned rooftop laptops and firing systems. F.S.K. code fuzzed from a speaker. “That is the underlying heartbeat of everything,” he said.

Just before 21:00, a security guard escorted me and a couple of others to the roof of the Rio. Below us, on the terrace of a lounge called VooDoo, several dozen people were dancing, drinks in hand, in front of a live band. An older man kept trying to make a “U.S.A.” chant happen. Precisely at nine, we heard—shhhh-prrrrrrooo BOOM. Fireworks appeared simultaneously above all nine Strip locations. Everybody on the VooDoo terrace watched through lifted phones.

The show was so spread out that it felt less personal and powerful than the Palace Station performance, the one with the drones. An even cooler sight, I thought, was in the valley, where lesser shows played out ceaselessly and, from where we stood, silently—a diorama of glitter and spark. The entire landscape seemed alive.

Grucci made its name on finales—when the tempo picks up and the reports intensify. This show ended after eight minutes and four seconds. A few people at the VooDoo went, “Woooooo!” The Las Vegas Review-Journal’s live stream captured spectators saying, “Look at ‘em all!,” and “Las Vegas sure knows how to do fireworks, huh?” The written comments were less favorable: “extremely boring,” “highly disappointed.” That’s show biz. As the smoke drifted off, the VooDoo band came back on and Jimi Hendrixed “The Star-Spangled Banner.” Nobody seemed to mind that it wasn’t the real thing. ♦

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LETTER FROM BEIJING

THE FUTURE, MADE IN CHINA

Beijing is competing with the U.S. for tech supremacy. Who wins will have huge political implications.

BY EVAN OSNOS

Kai-Fu Lee, the C.E.O. of the artificial-intelligence company 01.AI, lives in a mirrored high-rise in Beijing, near a procession of landmarks that emperors considered the center of the cosmos. Lee takes early meetings at a nearby hotel that could be in any country, except that the room service is delivered by robots painted in the livery of butlers and maids. State propaganda hails these robots as emblems of China's ascent; in the hallway, most people sidestep them with the kind of indifference usually reserved for a Roomba.

Over breakfast one recent morning, Lee, wearing a white polo shirt and rimless glasses, spoke about the future with an air of sanguine curiosity. He

was born in Taiwan in 1961 and built his career by following the moving frontier of opportunity. He got a degree in computer science from Columbia in the eighties and went on to Carnegie Mellon to study the fledgling field of A.I.—which he described back then as a “most promising science” that would be “men’s final step to understand themselves.” He ran speech recognition at Apple, and in 1992 appeared on “Good Morning America” to show off a prototype computer that used voice commands to record the news on a VCR. (The host, Joan Lunden, marvelled, “It’s almost going to be like a friend.”) During a stint at Microsoft, he recalls, he urged Bill Gates to buy an ambitious startup called Google, but Gates

declined. Lee later became the head of Google in China.

Lee moved to investing in 2009, and planned to focus on both China and the United States, but eventually he closed his American office. “It’s two different universes now,” he told me. The countries have diverged not only over such long-standing issues as trade, Taiwan, human rights, and espionage but also, increasingly, over the politics of technology. As Lee has noted, the Obama Administration released the federal government’s first major plan for the A.I. age in 2016, but it barely registered: it came out a few days after the “Access Hollywood” tape detonated in the Presidential campaign. When Donald Trump took office, he scrapped the plan and entrusted A.I.

As Trump cut research funds, China took what one investor calls an “all-hands-on-deck approach to national innovation.”

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strategy largely to Silicon Valley. When China's government issued its own A.I. plan, soon afterward, it was dense with turgid Communist Party jargon, but it also laid out a vast industrial policy, covering applications ranging from agriculture to policing, that promised "major breakthroughs" by 2025 and "world leading" status by 2030. Lee called it an "all-hands-on-deck approach to national innovation."

For a long time, China looked west for visions of the future. These days, it favors its own. The Chinese car company BYD recently surpassed Tesla as the world's largest maker of electric vehicles. A popular clip shows Tesla's C.E.O., Elon Musk, being asked in 2011 about competition from BYD, which was then known mainly for a boxy, undersized sedan; Musk laughed and said, "Have you seen their car?" Fifteen years later, China has more than a hundred automakers, competing for customers with such extravagant features as in-car karaoke, mechanical foot massagers, and video headlights that can project drive-in movies.

Lee, whose social-media posts have attracted more than fifty million followers, has a striking forecast for the two countries in which he has prospered. In

his book "AI Superpowers," published in 2018, he predicts a "new world order" with "waves of technology that will soon wash over the global economy and tilt the geopolitical landscape toward China." That kind of prophecy suits the official mood in Beijing, where Xi Jinping, the President and the General Secretary of the Communist Party, calls technology the "main battlefield of international competition" and bluntly asserts that "the East is rising, and the West is declining."

In July, the Chinese firm Moonshot released an A.I. model that performed comparably to its American competitors, at a fraction of the cost. Microchip stocks plunged, on fears that China will dominate A.I., much as it now dominates hardware. China produces at least seventy per cent of the world's drones, electric vehicles, lithium-ion batteries, and solar cells. It deploys more industrial robots than the rest of the world combined, and, in medicine, it has surpassed the United States in the number of registered clinical trials. Its shipbuilding capacity is roughly two hundred times that of the U.S., and some observers in Washington worry that American stockpiles of munitions would

not match China's in a war over Taiwan.

Both countries are uneasily preoccupied with their trajectory these days. While the U.S. worries about whether it can continue a century of dominance, China is eager to restore its historical eminence, after two hundred years of what the Party sees as anomalous poverty. Zhou Bo, a retired senior colonel in the People's Liberation Army who is now a fellow at Tsinghua University, told me, "Common sense says countries rise and fall in cycles." But Americans, in his view, have lost that historical awareness. "They have been so strong for so long that every American believes, 'I'm a member of the strongest nation on earth,'" he said. The Chinese are no less convinced of their ascendancy. A European diplomat who has attended meetings with Xi and his advisers told me, "They're feeling like the champions of the world. They think they can contend with anybody."

A decade ago, few people in Beijing would have predicted that China would challenge the U.S. anytime soon. China's decades-long economic boom was slowing, and the government's choke

ILLUSTRATION BY CLEON PETERSON

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“The cookies are mediocre, but they have the longest line in the city.”

hold on free thought was sending ambitious people abroad. In those days, an American in China who raised the merits of the two countries was likely to have a catechistic exchange. You’d note that China was growing powerful. Your acquaintance would reply, “Not as powerful as America.”

The Chinese establishment has abandoned that view in stages. When Brexit was approved, in 2016, the West seemed to be turning inward. The fight over COVID-19 vaccines provided a signal that the U.S. was splintering; the storming of the Capitol offered another. After Trump returned to the White House, his Administration declared, “The days of the United States propping up the entire world order like Atlas are over.” His aide Stephen Miller spoke instead of an international order “governed by force,” adding, “These are the iron laws of the world that have existed since the beginning of time.”

In Beijing, a think tank at Renmin University recently published an assessment titled “Thank Trump,” which wryly hailed his efforts to hasten the “twilight

of an empire,” by undermining America’s alliances, civil service, scientific institutions, and democratic credibility. In the past two years, the international approval rating of the U.S. has dropped nearly forty points, according to a worldwide survey by the Alliance of Democracies; in multiple polls, China now rates higher than the U.S.

For China, America’s retreat comes just as decades of state investment, industrial policy, and diplomatic planning are paying off. It would be foolhardy to entirely trust China’s official statistics; as the economist Gao Shanwen once told an audience in D.C., the official growth rate “will always be around five per cent.” But the change is plainly visible. In two decades, China has gone from producing about half as much electricity as the U.S. to generating more than twice as much, at far lower prices; in 2023, it installed more solar power than America has installed in its entire history. Meanwhile, Trump reembraced fossil fuels, in what the historian Timothy Snyder called “superpower suicide in perhaps the most basic form.”

Trump has promised for years that he would stop China from “raping our country” through unfair trade practices. On “Liberation Day,” in April, 2025, he unveiled a program of sweeping tariffs. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent predicted that Beijing would quickly submit, saying that his counterparts were “playing with a pair of twos.” Instead, China retaliated by restricting exports of rare earths and high-powered magnets. Within weeks, Ford was forced to suspend production of Explorers at its plant in Chicago, and automakers were pleading for a deal. Since then, China has not only retained its position as the world’s largest trading nation; it also achieved a record trade surplus of $1.2 trillion, as it redirected its exports away from the U.S. In 2001, four out of five countries traded more with America than with China. By 2023, the map had reversed: seven in ten trade more with China.

For the moment, China’s rulers have avoided overtly antagonizing America, because they believe that, even in decline, it remains uniquely dangerous. After Trump’s interventions in Venezuela and Iran, and his threats to Canada and Greenland, the Beijing Daily, a Communist Party mouthpiece, wrote that the U.S. was “dragging the world back to a dark age of plunder and division through superior military might.” But that bluster obscures a colder calculation: Chinese leaders believe that Trump’s struggle to dominate the world is actually aiding China.

Rush Doshi, a professor at Georgetown and a China specialist at the Council on Foreign Relations, sees in Trump’s pursuit of territorial control a recurring historical error. In the eighteenth century, while Russia fixated on conquering Eurasia, Britain developed the steam engine; in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, while Europeans fought over Africa, Americans mastered the assembly line. Today, while the U.S. tries to govern Venezuela and hobble Iran and Cuba, “China is focussed on winning the technologies of the future,” Doshi said. If the U.S. were to lose the competition over the next wave of industries—including A.I., biotech, and robotics—as it lost the ones over solar panels, batteries, and electric vehicles, “it would irreversibly change the balance of power.”

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What kind of world does China imagine? A preview of sorts is provided by its Belt and Road Initiative, which since 2013 has directed about a trillion dollars into scores of countries, building highways, hospitals, mines, ports, and “smart cities” equipped with Chinese technology. To China, Doshi said, “autocracies are considered perfectly legitimate, and technology is used to strengthen them. China increasingly says to autocrats, ‘Would you like to stay in power? I can help you with that.’” In Nepal, where newly installed facial-recognition systems have been deployed against activists, a photograph from a security headquarters showed a wall of video feeds above a sign that read “With Compliments of the Ministry of Public Security of China.”

But the clearest indication of Beijing’s global vision may be the current state of China itself. “A country tends to create an external order that looks a lot like its internal order,” Doshi said. “China doesn’t want you to think too hard about what its ascendance will mean for the world. They want to show you the edge of the future. They have two messages they want to sell everybody. One is ‘We are inevitable.’ And the other one is ‘Don’t worry.’”

Beijing is quieter than when I lived there, from 2005 to 2013. The vehicles, many of which are electric now, move silently through the streets, and in any case the residents have fewer reasons to go out; China has the world’s busiest e-commerce market, and there isn’t much that can’t be delivered on the back of a scooter. All day long, people scan each other’s QR codes to swap cash on such digital-payment systems as WeChat and Alipay, feeding the algorithms an ever more intricate portrait of their movements and preferences.

There is an awkward serenity to life in the capital of a high-tech, one-party state. “This is one of the safest places in the world, if you’re not a dissident,” the European diplomat told me. More than a decade into Xi Jinping’s campaign to remove unwelcome figures from the Party, the military, and the business elite, the purges have circled back to the highest ranks. (People used to say that the purges evoked an old Chinese saying, “Kill the chickens to scare the monkeys.”)

Now they say that Xi is just killing the monkeys.) One gets oddly accustomed to vanishing acquaintances. Since charges can stay secret for years, a person may simply “disappear into thin air,” the diplomat said, adding that it is regarded as a by-product of social maintenance. “The big priority here is the Party machine. People come second.”

China’s leaders have long believed that technology can help the state overcome the disorder of human affairs. Xi, who has borrowed Stalin’s image of ideological tools as “engineers of the human soul,” has expanded the government’s reach into private life, in the name of promoting “civilized” behavior. In the southern city of Guangzhou, A.I. is helping discipline residents who fail to separate food waste from regular trash, by posting their photos to the “exposure station,” a digital screen near trash bins. Other cities use similar systems to expose litterers, jaywalkers, and spitters.

Businesses are taking up the effort, too. At an expo of A.I.-enabled products in Beijing, I came upon a tall white kiosk made by Langxin, a company that applies A.I. to psychology. The machine was marked “Emotion Recognition Training Enhancement System.” I stood in front of a camera for an assessment of “micro-gestures” in my face, and the screen produced a pie chart labelled “Positive and Negative Proportions.” It informed me that I possess 76.67 per cent positive emotion and 23.33 per cent negative emotion. My negative feelings, it turned out, included 13.33 per cent fear and 6.67 per cent rage.

Langxin markets similar products for teachers, including the Comprehensive Risk Early Warning system, which scans students for signs of disruptive behavior; by combining data from classes, dormitories, spending, and psychological records, it assigns each pupil an “alert” level of red, yellow, or blue. Police have more powerful options. At a trade fair in Beijing, another company marketed software that scans vital signs from a distance and purports to make a personality assessment in fifteen seconds, including emotional stability and “behavioral tendencies.”

A.I. has rapidly settled into Chinese work and life. People in China often regard technology with less wariness than Americans do, because living standards

have improved so dramatically in the computing era. In the nineteen-seventies, more than seventy per cent of the population worked in agriculture; today, that figure is less than twenty-five per cent. Kai-Fu Lee, the investor, suggested that the Chinese had also been culturally primed for this kind of technology. For Americans, “always listening is a scary thing,” he said. In China, cameras already cover just about every square inch of occupied space. Lee touted new software from his company which allows him to record every office meeting and analyze the audio with such prompts as “Of the projects I think are going well, which ones really aren’t?” The software also tracks verbal commitments in a log called the Promise Ledger, so that staff can be held accountable during performance reviews. I asked if his recordings made anyone less willing to take on commitments. “There is perhaps some chilling effect,” he said. “But in China not so much, because people always assume the boss is powerful and has a right to listen.” He added, “It’s a self-selection process. Those who don’t like it won’t join my company.”

On the south side of Beijing, I visited China’s most famous auto plant—the Hyperfactory, a campus the size of a hundred soccer fields that was built in fourteen months. It belongs to Xiaomi, a company that made its name selling smartphones and household goods, such as electric toothbrushes and frying pans, before entering the car business.

In the lobby, I found a delegation of Chinese visitors unfurling a hammer-and-sickle flag for a group portrait. Beyond them was a busy Starbucks counter. Suspended from wires overhead, a sports car was poised as if racing around a Möbius strip, meant to evoke the unending pursuit of improvement.

A guide herded us onto golf carts and drove us into a cavernous site, with so few visible workers that one could be forgiven for thinking that it was a national holiday. The cars are built by some seven hundred robots, packed together in intricate, choreographed formations controlled by thick bundles of wires. Fresh parts arrive aboard a hundred and twenty-seven autonomous carts, which bleat “Make way!” at humans who wander into their path. According

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to the company, a finished car rolls off the line every seventy-six seconds.

At the end of the tour, I was directed to a track, where a driver waited in a bright-yellow Xiaomi SU7 Ultra. I climbed into the passenger seat. He smiled, said, “Three, two, one,” and jammed the pedal down. I hadn’t focussed on the details of what we were doing, which was probably a mistake.

The car burst forward with the kind of momentum one rarely experiences without jet propulsion. As I learned later, the SU7 Ultra has 1,548 horsepower and goes from zero to sixty in less than two seconds, faster than a Ferrari. I was pressed into my seat, and a wave of queasiness surged in my chest. As we rounded a curve and

burst down a straightaway, I kept my eyes on the horizon and wondered if my life-insurance policy was in order. The driver gamely offered another lap, but I waved it off.

It is not an accident that the factory was built within easy reach of Beijing’s luxury-hotel district, rather than in the hinterlands. It is an attraction for foreigners, and for lucky locals who win a lottery to visit. Travel companies have been leading “tech tours” of China’s most impressive industrial sites, offering rides on what they hype as “the world’s fastest train,” access to “A.I. glasses,” and coffee breaks during which you can watch “a drone descend with your latte.” A succession of Western influencers, investors, and commentators have duly posted awestruck images of bridges and train stations, feeding into such genres as “infrastructure porn” and “Chinamaxing.” Their perceptions are shaped by relentless marketing and propaganda. On the afternoon that I toured the Hyperfactory, the robots were stalled for “adjustments,” but the guide rarely paused for more than a few seconds before pointing out the seven-hundred-ton die-casting machine, or the rapid-fire X-ray system that tests whether a cast is a minute fraction off spec. But there are real strengths along with the hype. Jim Farley, the C.E.O. of Ford, recently visited car factories in China and described its automotive progress as “the most humbling thing I’ve ever seen.”

Chinese leaders seem to be betting that, by speeding toward the future, they can outrun the mistakes of the recent past. Across the country, cities are punctuated by lanweilou, or “rotten tail” buildings—concrete shells of unfinished towers and villas, whose developers ran out of money. For years, local officials encouraged excess construction because it financed infrastructure, boosted growth,

and earned them promotions. Developers sold homes to the public before they were even built. But the property market started to collapse in 2021—eventually slashing sales of new housing by half—and China was left with an estimated ninety million empty homes, enough to house the population of Russia. After bank-

rupt developers abandoned the rotten-tail buildings, a few of the scrappiest buyers made do—they moved into the unfinished shells and took to cooking over coal stoves and hauling water up the stairs.

China now contains a series of parallel economies: alongside the wreckage of the property crash and the thriving hive of new technologies, there are legions of university graduates who trained for traditional white-collar jobs but entered a labor market increasingly geared toward high-tech manufacturing. (The official rate of youth unemployment rose above twenty-one per cent before the government changed the way it reports the figure.) A study of Chinese public opinion published last year by researchers at Stanford and Harvard offered a rare in-depth look at local attitudes and found a pronounced swing “from optimism to pessimism.” The share of citizens who expect their standard of living to improve has dropped to about twenty-eight per cent, roughly half of what it was earlier this century. Xu Zhiyuan, an influential writer, has called this “a profoundly confused era,” marked by “an economic downturn, the uncertainty of international geopolitics and the enormous impact of A.I. all at once.” Last fall, government censors launched a campaign against “excessively pessimistic sentiment” online, including comments such as “Hard work is useless.”

One morning, I wandered over to the house where I used to live in Beijing

jing and was surprised to find the front door wide open. The place was vacant, but people were bustling in and out. By chance, I had arrived as rental agents were taking photos, hoping to find a tenant and collect a commission. I was struck by the number of agents competing over a two-bedroom rental—a totem of the hyper-competition that prevails in China’s industries.

A real-estate agent in a gray windbreaker approached me, carrying a scooter helmet. He was sorry to learn that I was not a potential customer, but eager to chat. He spoke English with the earnest formality of someone who has worked hard to learn a language that he rarely has the chance to use. He had adopted the name John, and he peppered his comments with English aphorisms. When I asked how business was going, he said, “Hard, but every coin has two sides.”

He was candid about the strains of his profession. The truth was, he hadn’t earned a commission in four months. A lot of real-estate agents were bankrupt. “Under twenty per cent are earning money,” he said. John was forty-seven and divorced, with a daughter in college. His father and his older sister were helping him pay for food. “It sucks for me at my age,” he said. “I still want to find love, but it’s really difficult.” He had gone on dates, but nothing had worked out. “I think one reason is I don’t have enough money,” he said. “If I’m a tycoon, they would want to communicate with me.” Hoping to reassure him, I said that he seemed to have a good heart. John smiled and straightened up. He had another aphorism at hand: “Life is not easy, but we don’t know what will happen tomorrow.”

China’s desire to engineer the future has long been entwined with its anxiety about the West. In 1872, during the Qing dynasty, Governor-General Li Hongzhang wrote bitterly of a change “not seen in three thousand years”: Westerners, relying on their “advanced guns, cannons, and steamships, have been able to run rampant on Chinese soil.” China had started casting iron a millennium or so before Europe, but it had grown complacent. Now, he declared, it was time to “learn the superior skills of the barbarians in order to control the barbarians.”

But the empire resisted efforts to

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modernize, and China's reformers fled into exile. In 1902, one of the leaders of the reform effort, Liang Qichao, published "The Future of New China," a novel that imagined the country decades later, with a constitution, a parliament, and such technological prestige that students flocked there from abroad. When Mao Zedong came to power in 1949, he had other ideas. "Politics and technology must be unified," he declared. It was a disastrous union: Mao's Great Leap Forward, a delusional attempt to vault China past Britain in just fifteen years, produced the worst famine in history, killing an estimated forty-five million people.

Beginning in the late seventies, the illusion of social engineering created another disaster. The Party adopted the goal of reaching annual incomes of eight hundred to a thousand dollars per capita. To get there, it reasoned, it would have to manage the growth of the population. A Chinese rocket scientist named Song Jian helped lead a mission to chart the right path using the nation's most advanced computers. He and his team concluded that the "key to the entire problem" was to limit each family to one child. It was a radical idea, but Song and the group were persuasive; they presented their findings in printed graphs and figures, when many experts were still working by abacus and pocket calculator.

Susan Greenhalgh, an anthropologist and the author of "Just One Child," writes that the engineers were "enclosing everything in a black box that got labeled 'science,'" though the policy rested on unexamined political judgments about the role of government, the sanctity of the human body, and the boundaries of private life. It was also wrong. As Greenhalgh wrote, the engineers had stitched together patchy data and extrapolated it to two decimal points with false precision. Most of all, they were accustomed to dealing with inanimate objects, rather than the mess of human society, and they dismissed warnings from social scientists about the consequences: rapid population aging, labor and military shortages, and the brutal necessities of enforcing the law.

In the next thirty-five years, the one-child policy led to the sterilization of nearly two hundred million citizens and to more than three hundred million

abortions. By the time China dropped the policy, in 2015, it had also produced an economic fiasco, shrinking the pool of available workers and acculturating the country to single-child families. The number of children born in China has fallen by almost two-thirds since 1987. Last year, there were fewer than eight million births—resulting in the lowest rate since records began, in 1949. Though America's birth rate has also fallen, to 1.6 births per woman in 2024, China's problem is much more severe. Its fertility rate is now one birth per woman.

To reverse the decline, China has offered child-care coverage, tax breaks, housing incentives, and fertility-treatment subsidies. None of it has worked. Maternity wards and kindergartens are closing. Emma Zang, a Yale sociologist who studies fertility patterns, visited China last year and was startled that young people often asked why she had decided to have children. She concluded that "the real barrier is not the cost of raising children. Rather, it is the conviction that parenthood no longer makes sense in a future that feels uncertain and unworthy of investment."

None of these repercussions have shaken the Party's belief in the transformative power of engineering. In

the past decade, Xi has taken to describing the historical moment with a pointed phrase: "great changes unseen in a century." He is echoing 1872, but with a difference. Back then, the "unseen" changes were the new strengths of the West; today, Xi is calling to exploit the West's weaknesses.

In 1978, just as Deng Xiaoping was setting China on the course of reforms, an aspiring scientist named Yi Rao started college. Chinese science was severely underfunded in those years; even the disposable plastic tips on the end of pipettes were nearly impossible for lab workers to get. But Rao knew Chinese scientists in the U.S., who agreed to scrounge them from the trash and send them back. "We could use them many more times," Rao said.

Chinese leaders were determined to "catch up with and surpass" advanced countries in science, and three things mattered above all: talent, money, and infrastructure. To train talent, they sent students abroad; within a decade, the number of Chinese students in the U.S. had grown tenfold. In 1985, Rao moved to San Francisco to study neuroscience and noted that an ordinary kitchen counter was made of better material

"Dearest, It has now been a fortnight since one of our smoke alarms started intermittently keeping. A battery is low. Tensions are high. I fear we may never figure out which one it is. Patience is wearing thin. . . ."

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“than any research bench in China,” he said. “How could I imagine I’d ever come back?”

But in the mid-two-thousands, when he was a professor at Northwestern, he was offered a job as the dean of Peking University’s School of Life Sciences. China was luring scientists back with patriotic appeals and the promise of transforming the nation’s scientific prospects. Rao agreed, but he had limited expectations. He recalls that nobody at the university had even published a paper in a top international scientific journal. Professors gave jobs to poorly qualified friends and protégés, and academic fraud was common. Chinese biotech produced little more than cheap generic drugs.

Rao took over, and replaced required courses in botany and zoology with genetics and molecular biology. A turning point arrived in 2015, when China began overhauling its drug-safety laws to meet international standards, allowing local biotech companies to get lucrative foreign contracts. Scientific talent had started to return, drawn by generous lab funding and signing bonuses that could exceed a hundred and fifty thousand dollars.

Then tensions with the U.S. exploded. In 2018, Trump started a trade war, and his Department of Justice created the China Initiative, to root out espionage and trade theft, which targeted more than a hundred scientists and others of Chinese descent. In ways that outsiders did not fully appreciate, Trump tipped the balance of an internal Chinese political debate. The private sector was ascendant, and the influential billionaire Jack Ma was arguing that a university education was overrated. “He said, basically, intellectuals don’t produce anything,” Rao told me. “China’s economy has done well by copying from the West, so why should we put more funding into original research? But, once Trump came in, that side completely collapsed.” In 2020, the Party’s Central Committee established “scientific and technological self-reliance” as a paramount goal, and last year funding for exploratory basic research hit a record seven per cent of the nation’s R. & D. budget.

The effects were startling. By 2024, China had outstripped the U.S. in the number of clinical trials. (Recruiting

WASPS

how starkly clear you hear them gnawing at the wood of lawn chairs near the awning all day in august or july, and not much longer, till beneath their pincers every bit of fiber is ground down, and the entire piece of furnishing was never there. birds sing, birds will have sung; wind came, wind went on; a gloom weighs on the west lit up by nothing but their fragile nests: like bright white lanterns or like swelled-up sails below the roof ridge, boiled out tomcat skulls, like paper moons, some froth, a sea-spray guidon. a buzzing, humming sound above the empty garden.

—Jan Wagner

(Translated, from the German, by David Keplinger.)

test subjects there can take less than half the time, and trials cost an estimated forty per cent less.) That fall, an experimental cancer drug from the Chinese firm Akeso outperformed Keytruda, a gold-standard therapy made by the American pharma giant Merck.

Early this year, after the Trump Administration slashed funding to American federal and academic scientific studies, the Chinese government announced another ten-per-cent increase in funding for science and technology. China has overtaken both the U.S. and the European Union in publishing influential research papers, measured by how often they are cited by others. Chinese biotech firms now generate nearly a third of the world’s new drug candidates, almost matching the U.S. “People in Washington are worried that biotech is the next E.V.s,” an American executive told me. “We’ve scared all of this fucking talent back to China. If you look at the guys who are doing this, they used to work for Western pharma giants, or they were running a top university department somewhere.”

A report by researchers at Princeton, Harvard, and M.I.T. identified almost twenty thousand scientists of Chinese descent who left America between 2010 and 2021. The Canadian scholar David Zweig, who has studied the exodus, told me that at Westlake University, a new Chinese research institute, “there are approximately a hundred new labs set

up by returnees, and probably eighty per cent of them are from the United States.” He said, “First, it was because they felt alienated. Then the money dried up.”

I visited Yi Rao recently, and met him on the top floor of an academic complex, in a corner office overlooking a lake. He showed me a lab filled with world-class equipment available to student researchers. “I have to keep telling them what luxury they are living in,” he said.

I asked Rao about the effects of Trump’s cuts to science. “It’s very stupid,” he said. “Invention doesn’t come out of the blue.” He gave an example: if the U.S. reduces funding for cancer research, “it would now be natural that China might invent a cancer vaccine before the U.S.”

Rao is candid about the enduring problems facing Chinese science and tech. For instance, China has never mastered the ultra-precise manufacturing required for commercial jet engines or the highest-performing microchips. He dismisses thirty per cent of the country’s biology papers as “garbage,” and says that another fifty per cent represent incremental findings, rather than “zero to one” breakthroughs. For now, he says, China excels mostly in the progress from “two to a hundred,” but he thinks that the standard will improve. If China becomes known as the place that develops cancer cures, things will

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be different in a fundamental way. "The current world order was built by a group of geniuses, mainly in the U.S., who hailed from Europe," Rao said. "If Trump had maintained the order effectively, China would find it very hard to get through. Trump really helped us."

Many of Beijing's tech companies are in the Zhongguancun district, a cluster of office complexes set on land that, during the imperial era, served as a burial ground for palace eunuchs. For a generation, Zhongguancun has evolved with each passing fashion in tech. These days, advertisements for A.I. products are rapidly replacing washed-out ads for the metaverse.

People who have worked in both China and Silicon Valley tend to comment on the similarities: the belief in rapid change, the power of engineers, the odds to humanity that mask impatience with actual humans. At a Peet's Coffee in Zhongguancun, full of twenty-somethings wearing AirPods, it would be easy for a visitor from Palo Alto to feel at home. The big difference between the two countries' A.I. hubs is in how people talk about their intentions. American engineers tend to focus on the transformative potential of reaching artificial general intelligence, and on the utopian (or dystopian) cascade that could follow. Chinese tech firms have more imminent goals; they have less capital and less computing power, owing partly to American export controls on the most advanced chips, so they focus largely on pushing products into everyday commerce. Last year, the Chinese startup DeepSeek released an A.I. model that stunned Silicon Valley. Critics attributed its success to smuggled chips and opaque financing, and OpenAI accused it of cribbing from better models. Chinese observers noted that DeepSeek worked well, and for far less money.

At AInnovation, a firm that integrates A.I. into traditional factories, I met the chief technology officer, Fan Li, who was plucked out of a coal-mining city by a government program for prodigies. He worked at Microsoft and Amazon before returning to China in 2021 to join its A.I. boom. Li walked me over to a machine marked "AI Screw Inspection Equipment." Inside, tiny screws whizzed along a production line

as high-resolution cameras scanned them for microscopic problems. Those which passed the test slipped down a chute marked "Good Product." (It called to mind a slogan from the Cultural Revolution which urged each comrade to be a "rustless screw in the revolutionary machine.") Before A.I., the factory needed humans to check the screws, which, Li said, was "not efficient." Now those humans could be replaced.

China's factories still make plenty of cheap toys and shoes, but the country has also made a technological leap. Investments in factory automation and robotics have allowed goods to be produced so cheaply that U.S. tariffs mostly don't matter; even with the fees piled on top, prices are still low.

On a screen, Li pulled up an intricate diagram of a factory for the Tsingtao Brewery, one of his customers. He typed in a prompt: "Have they achieved their energy-saving goal in the past year? If not, why?" It's a deceptively simple question. Not only do you need to know past performance and future goals—"you need to dig deeper into each production line, each machine," he said. After a moment, the system flashed a message: "We have successfully retrieved energy-consumption data, causes of anomalies, and recommended actions for four devices." It noted that "anomalies" were lurking in a pasteurizer and a malt mill, and told us what to do: Look for wet malt or jams at the mill; investigate steam and pump behavior in the pasteurizer. Li said, "It

might have taken a human three hours to do the whole process. Now you can finish it in minutes."

China is not immune to fears that A.I. will cause sweeping job losses and social upheaval. Kai-Fu Lee warned in his book that "A.I. risks creating a twenty-first-century caste system." But he predicted that job losses would create more turmoil in the U.S. than in

China, because a larger share of American workers hold white-collar jobs. I asked what he made of the news that college graduates in the U.S. were booing commencement speakers who touted A.I. Lee said, "The American way is very understandable. But the Chinese way will cause a proliferation of talent, usage, data—until something horrible happens. Then things might change. But people forget things in the age of social media."

Li, of AInnovation, hears from people who are more worried about the risk. Over sandwiches in a conference room, he told me that he has a fifteen-year-old son, and fellow-parents often ask, What should our kids study? "I ask myself the same question," he said. In recent years, China has sharply scaled back undergraduate majors deemed obsolete, including many in the humanities, while introducing programs in fields like embodied intelligence. Many universities have opened A.I. programs. But, Li said, "three years from now, when my son goes to college, artificial intelligence may not even be a major anymore." Even the people who work on A.I. can't keep up with technology that is changing "probably ten times faster than ten years ago," Li said. "The closer you get to the ecosystem, the more you know the details and what's coming, and you become a little bit concerned."

Cutting down on the need for humans is one way that the Chinese government can make up for its shrinking workforce. Another way is robots. In 2024, China deployed nine industrial robots for every one installed in the United States. The competition between man and machine has even spread to pop culture. In early 2025, Beijing inaugurated a half-marathon that pitted robots against humans, and the humans won easily, as many of the robots overheated. But, a year later, a bright-red humanoid—swinging a pair of spindly arms for balance—beat all twelve thousand human competitors and broke the world record. There was another sprawling display of robotics expertise at the Spring Festival Gala, the most watched television event of the year. Humanoids marched, backflipped, and twirled nunchucks; robotic pandas gambolled. Some Chinese viewers sensed a loss. As one

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reportedly wrote online, “We are looking for humans amid all the robots.” But the government’s goal was to build confidence in the onrush of tomorrow. The head of one of the robotics companies told a reporter that he’d felt intense pressure to “deliver a performance that was significantly better than last year’s.”

Choreographed spectacle is easier, in some sense, than contending with the messiness of the workday world. The humanoids on Chinese television were beautifully synchronized, but if something had gone off script—an errant foot, a human who missed a cue—the machines could have turned into a heap of tangled, waving limbs. In Li’s office, I watched two employees demonstrate preliminary work that they hope will equip robots to retrieve objects from factory supply closets. One shuffled a selection of bottles, cans, and snacks, while the other, wearing a virtual-reality headset and holding a tracking device in each hand, guided a small yellow humanoid as it haltingly picked up everyday objects. The exercise looked bafflingly difficult.

Robots have improved more slowly than expected, Li said. “ChatGPT was successful because it consumed almost every word ever written in the world,” he told me. “There are many tasks people want robots to do, but we don’t have enough data.” At a nearby table, a pair of slender metallic arms was folding and refolding a blue T-shirt. In tech circles, folding laundry is sometimes called the “holy grail of robotics,” because of both the intricacy of the challenge and the public enthusiasm if it works. Li said, “We’re looking at two metrics: how fast the robot can finish the job—thirty seconds, one minute—and the failure rate.” The failures stemmed from randomness. “You can put the clothes on the table in many ways,” Li said. “The shape is different each time.”

On my way out, I visited a convenience store off the lobby. The counter was staffed by a humanoid robot with a shiny silver face and powerful arms. To its left, sausages revolved on chrome rollers; to its right, a human attendant in a brightly colored uniform looked patient and quizzical. The robot’s manufacturer, Galbot, had an office in the building, and, like so much that I was

seeing, the machine seemed to have been installed for both functionality and P.R. value. It greeted me merrily in Mandarin: “I can help you find products, grab some sausages or drinks, or tell you a corny joke to lighten the mood.”

As I took a moment to contemplate the scene, the robot urged me along: “What items do you need?” Other customers were filling in behind me, and, before I could reply, the robot added, “You look a little tired.” I was tired, in fact; I had been trooping from one meeting to another. Before I could ask how the robot had acquired such sensitivity, it posed another question: “Would you like me to grab you a bottle of Vitality Water Balance or fragrant pomelo jasmine tea, to help you recover?”

I chose a sausage instead. “I’ll get it for you right away!” the robot said, and maneuvered its left arm into the display case. But the sausage slipped from its grip and plopped back into formation, alongside the others revolving lazily between rollers. The robot hadn’t noticed the mishap; it withdrew its arm, deposited the nonexistent cargo in front of me, and announced, “Remember to check out on the left!” The attendant laughed nervously and waved off the request for payment.

I wandered for a while in Zhongguancun. It was a hot afternoon, and a group of delivery drivers had gathered to smoke in the shade of an overpass. As the economy has slowed, more than two hundred million Chinese people have joined the gig economy. Among them are some twenty million delivery drivers, who have become the most visible symbols of the new era.

In 2018, a young man named Hu Anyan found work in Beijing as a courier, after stints as a convenience-store clerk, a bicycle salesman, and a security guard. A typical day involved eleven hours of deliveries, but the shifts were longer when e-commerce sites ran promotions and order volumes spiked. “We still had to deliver all of the day’s packages before we clocked out, which often meant fifteen or sixteen hours,” he told me. Hu stayed vigilant for obstacles that he could not control—buildings with slow elevators, locked gates where he had to wait for a resident to let him in. To reach his goal of about forty dollars

a day, he had to make a delivery every four minutes. Stopping to pee cost him about two minutes, so he drank as little water as possible.

Some employers were better than others, but they shared a culture of the algorithmic era. As one stern boss told Hu, the “platform tells you the deliveries you must make!” and “There’s nothing special about you.” It bothered Hu, but he realized that the boss, too, was “actually just another cog in the machine.” Over time, life in service of the algorithm altered his sense of human affairs. He began to resent colleagues and see their struggles in zero-sum terms. “A few veteran employees will hold on to the easier routes for a long time, while the rookies, who get stuck with the harder ones, often just quit and get replaced,” he told me. He became “more impatient and anxious,” but what unnerved him most was a creeping numbness. After learning one day that an elderly customer had waited nearly three hours at a market for him, Hu felt no sympathy. “Under normal circumstances, I’d feel guilty,” he said. “But at that moment I still had a whole load of packages to deliver, and I couldn’t stop for him, even for five minutes.”

Hu lasted twenty months as a delivery driver. Then he quit and described his experiences in a plainspoken memoir, “I Deliver Parcels in Beijing.” The book became an unlikely best-seller and inspired other recent Chinese memoirs of precarity, including “I Drive a Taxi in Shanghai” and “My Mother Works as a Cleaner.”

But, in China, the precarity is never confined to those at the bottom. In March, authorities abruptly barred the two founders of an A.I. startup called Manus from leaving the country. They had made a deal to sell their company to Meta, the American social-media giant, for two billion dollars, and the Chinese government wasn’t happy. It was a chilling message to other A.I. firms that some humans were too valuable to the nation to be allowed to leave.

For years, China’s rising power has rested on a fragile balance of economic freedom and political control, in what early Party reformers called the “bird-cage economy”—airy enough to allow enterprises to thrive, but not capacious enough to sacrifice power. That arrange-

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ment has rarely looked more tenuous. Gary Rieschel, an American investor with deep experience in China, told an audience last year that Xi was trying to “tether” the “goose that laid the golden egg of China’s extraordinary rise.” Rieschel added, “In case you don’t know, geese don’t like to be tethered.” He said, “The critical question becomes, Can this Beijing leadership effectively balance the delicate relationship between control and dynamism?”

In Robert Kagan’s book “The World America Made,” he enumerates a succession of global powers, all of which were convinced of their own durability: “There has been an Egyptian order, a Roman order, a Greek order, an Islamic order, a Mogul order, an Ottoman order, and many others.” Each was born of particular, often fragile circumstances. The American order, Kagan wrote in 2012, would endure “until some yet to be determined moment.”

That moment seems to have arrived. Mark Leonard, the director of the European Council on Foreign Relations, told me that the international system the U.S. constructed after the Second World War—and ran, often to its benefit—is “definitely dead and beyond redemption.” He said that Trump’s dismantling of the country’s alliances signalled the end of the “willingness of the American public to play the role America has played for most of the last eight decades.”

But America’s diminished stature does not necessarily clear a path for China. Few people these days are enthusiastic about the prospect of a world dominated by either superpower. In Europe, views of Beijing have hardened since the late twenty-tens, when its envoys experimented with a combative style known as “wolf warrior” diplomacy. After a Swedish prize for persecuted writers was awarded to a Hong Kong dissident, a Chinese ambassador said, “We treat our friends with fine wine, but for our enemies we’ve got shotguns.”

More recently, European anxiety has centered on the economics of trade. As China has devoted itself to dominating global tech manufacturing, it has taken to producing far more than its domestic economy demands—electric vehicles, solar energy, batteries, wind turbines,

“Ninety pounds? Really?”

basic chemicals. In theory, that kind of overcapacity should lead factories to close and the surge to subside. But China’s government has kept pushing firms to produce, partly out of fear that rising unemployment could fuel unrest. The surplus gets exported, often at prices low enough to undercut the industrial economy in other countries. “It’s systemic, not accidental,” Joerg Wuttke, a former head of the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China, told me.

The fear in Europe is increasingly urgent. Volkswagen is considering eliminating as many as a hundred thousand jobs and closing four plants, the biggest cut in the history of the global auto industry. Leonard told me that resentment of China’s industrial policy has reached “a fever pitch, particularly in Germany, where there is a sense that China is doubling down on policies leading to the deindustrialization of Europe.” He added, “The big fear is that Baden-Württemberg”—the home of Mercedes-Benz—“will turn into Detroit.” European politicians, he said, privately describe a feeling of simultaneous assault from Washington, Beijing, and Moscow, and are “waking up to a world where they have to protect themselves from all the big powers.”

The responses under discussion have the flavor of emergency improvisation: blocking Chinese firms from building factories or bidding on lucrative con-

tracts, imposing severe tariffs on steel and chemicals, even suspending technology patents—an approach known in aggregate as the “trade bazooka.” Some economists argue that Europe could compete more effectively by modernizing. But the feeling of hardening up extends beyond trade. Germany has committed to as much as a trillion dollars in new spending on arms and infrastructure. Wuttke said, “Trump is severing ties, imposing tariffs left and right. The Chinese are not moving. So the decision is not ‘Beijing or Washington.’ It is building ties with Jakarta and Delhi, and with other countries.”

Chinese officials often warn against a lawless world in which “the weak are meat for the strong.” But the Party’s own tactics are uncompromising, both at home and abroad. Nicholas Burns, a former U.S. Ambassador to China, told me, “China always says, ‘The U.S. government is too pugilistic.’ That’s their rhetorical veneer. The reality is they are competing tooth and nail behind the scenes.” Last year, Trump pressured Panama to strip the control of two significant ports from a Hong Kong-based company and give it to an American-led consortium. In the dispute, China reportedly warned foreign executives against “illegal activities that harm the interests of Chinese companies.” Such warnings are dangerous to ignore. International businesspeople drawn into

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"Remember when everyone was, like, really into bronze?"

geopolitical disputes have been barred from leaving China. The message, the European diplomat told me, is "We are a great power, and we will retaliate against anyone who hurts our rights or interests." Behind this is the undisputed rule of the Chinese Communist Party.

Yet China is not rushing to re-create the international order that has recently frayed. Since 1949, Beijing has signed only two formal alliances—with North Korea and the Soviet Union—and both proved costly. Patricia Kim, an expert at the Brookings Institution, calls Beijing's posture a "China first" strategy. "China is happy to put out statements, but it has no interest in stepping in as a crisis manager," she told me. "It wants greater influence, but it also wants to avoid responsibilities." Chinese leaders view "the burdens of U.S. global leadership as a source of American overextension and decline," she said, "and they have no interest in emulating this model."

Zhou Bo, the retired People's Liberation Army officer, made a similar point from a different perspective. "The Trump Administration has walked away from sixty-six international organiza-

tions," he told me. "This is a big gap that China simply cannot close."

The likely successor to the American order, then, is not a Chinese order so much as what Leonard calls a period of "un-order": a jungle in which every country hedges, arms, subsidizes, hoards, and searches for choke points to exploit. In the words of Suisheng Zhao, a China scholar at the University of Denver, it is the makings of a "twenty-first-century Hobbesian struggle of all against all."

During the Cold War, as futurists on both sides of the Iron Curtain plotted to control the direction of history, another group coalesced around a more modest idea. Mankind 2000, as it called itself, was made up of European survivors of fascism who were wary of both Communist determinism and American hubris. They warned that man could be "absorbed by his machine" and declared, "The future belongs to all of us, not only to small oligarchic groups."

Spend enough time in Beijing and Washington these days and the rivalry

looks less like a clash of competing systems than like a race between small oligarchic groups—tight circles of men with immense power over everyone else's future. In China, Xi is trying to bend technology toward obedience and growth. In America, Trump and his allies in Silicon Valley have put the development of A.I. ahead of concerns about its risks. "We have to grow that baby and let that baby thrive," Trump said, unveiling an A.I. strategy in 2025. "We can't stop it with foolish rules."

In this view, regulation, safety testing, liability, and labor protections are all indulgences that a superpower can no longer afford. David Sacks, an investor and a former White House A.I. czar, recently warned that creating "an F.D.A. for A.I." could mean losing to China. This is an old political maneuver. In 1988, when Japanese carmakers were ascendant, Ronald Reagan's Transportation Secretary derided stricter fuel-economy standards as a "competitive disadvantage" against "the Asians." A year later, under pressure from Wall Street, Bill Clinton repealed the separation between commercial and investment banking, saying that it would help America "compete in global financial markets." That decision was later identified as one of the causes of the Great Recession.

China can, indeed, build with a speed that Americans regard with awe and despair. In the 2025 book "Breakneck," Dan Wang, a research fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution, popularized an image of the rivalry between the two countries as a contest between an engineering state and a lawyerly society. In fact, the book is subtler than this formulation suggests. (Wang had considered calling it "Move Fast and Break People," but his publisher intervened.) Wang explored the macroeconomic effects of the one-child policy—which, he told me, have become even more concerning since the book came out. Though China can produce "strong outcomes in science and technology," its internal problems are profound, he said. "Shanghai is pretty amazing. It may even be one of the top-three great cities of the world. But how can China be a great civilization if almost no one wants to have kids?" He added, "Young Chinese especially are gripped by this serene discontent. People don't have

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that great a hope about an economic boom that basically will elude everyone outside of a few folks working in A.I. or finance."

The engineering state can churn out an electric car every seventy-six seconds, but that carries you only so far if people are so alienated that they decline to bring children into the future being built for them. The Party wants A.I. entrepreneurs who can dazzle the world, but it also wants the power to decide where they can go and what they can become.

The U.S. has a different weakness. So far, the dystopian uses of technology have come less from government facial-recognition systems than from a handful of ultrapowerful companies that exploit data to increase their control over people's lives: insurers that use A.I. to decide which treatments to cover; retailers that deploy "surveillance pricing" to raise costs according to a customer's location, habits, and urgency. But the distinction is eroding, as private defense contractors help merge domestic law enforcement, immigration, and national security into an interlocking apparatus. Even in areas where machines may genuinely make life better, the decisions are being made in secrecy. Waymo reports better safety records than human drivers, but autonomous-vehicle companies have resisted public scrutiny. When Senator Ed Markey asked seven major companies how often remote human operators had to guide vehicles through difficult situations, they refused to answer, with several citing "confidential business information."

The more centralized the system, the further an error can travel. In March, when Baidu, which operates self-driving taxis in more than a dozen Chinese cities, suffered an outage, cars halted on busy highways. We are almost certainly better off without humans at the wheel of cars and trucks, but history warns that we should not let engineers make these decisions alone. The country best equipped to help its people will not be the one that simply races to insinuate A.I. into every aspect of civic life; more likely, it will be the one that shields decisions about deployment from the distortions of ideology and corruption, that finds ways to distribute both the rewards and the losses

from A.I., and that makes people feel they have a voice in their future.

America is not functioning well these days, but its political system, by design, gives the public more power to fix problems—if they choose to fix them. As Wuttke put it, "The United States has a knack of going down in flames and then rejuvenating. China does not." The advantage might go to the side that can face its problems most candidly. "You can live in an alternate reality in China, in Russia, or in the United States," he said. "That is always a dangerous proposition, because you might miss the signals of history coming your way."

One afternoon in Beijing, when I found myself with a free hour, I scanned the QR code on a bike share and rode across town, savoring the fresh air. I nearly got creamed by a couple of delivery drivers, but it was a joy to be someplace where I could be free of real-time feedback on my micro-gestures.

For all the assertive calculations and predictions that I'd been served during my interviews, I couldn't shake the feeling that the future is too opaque to predict, let alone to ordain to multiple decimal places. Young Chinese people, like young Americans, are partaking in a new fad for fortune-telling. People are going out for drinks and astrology readings, or using astrology apps. (In Chinese, the term for "fortune-telling" shares a character with the term for "algorithm.")

Beijing has had fortune-tellers for centuries, though the Party opposes what it calls "feudal superstitious activities" and periodically cracks down on them. They always filter back, quietly resuming work in neighborhoods near Buddhist and Confucian temples. I was connected to a man in his early seventies whom I'll call Master Sun. He wasn't around all the time—fortune-tellers are gig workers—but he agreed to meet, and arrived wearing an old-fashioned blue padded jacket and a jade necklace. He was walking beside his bike, with a basket on the front and plastic wrap still protecting the frame, like a sofa guarded against spillage.

Master Sun's office was a block away, and as we walked he asked how I knew Mandarin. I used to live in China, but I'm American, I said. "America is a powerful country," he told me.

"China is also powerful," I replied.

"Not as good as America," he said.

We reached his office, tucked behind a convenience store. On his desk, he had a small shrine, with a ceramic Buddha, an incense burner, three gourds, and a chocolate bar. He studied the lines on my palm, gave me some bronze coins to toss, asked for my birth date, and began calculating on a pad of paper. Watching him work felt faintly radical; he had found a way to survive with dignity against both the Communist Party and the age of algorithms. After a while, he looked over the top of his glasses and told me, "Your fortune says you have a noble destiny."

I liked the sound of that. It reminded me of the jolt of pleasure when ChatGPT applauds your question. I asked, "I want to raise my children well and give them a bright future. What should I do?"

Master Sun thought for a moment and said, "You should give them great wisdom. That's more important than giving them money. Make sure they study well. With that, wealth will come."

This was kind, though I wasn't sure anyone knows the answer anymore. Finally, Master Sun pulled out a stack of folded red cardboard slips

and asked me to pick three. He looked at them and announced, "You're destined for either political power or great wealth!" I decided to wrap it up while I was still feeling at least 76.67 per cent positive.

But then he paused and held up one of my three slips. It was labelled "Joy Knocks at the Door." He

said that it was the luckiest slip in the deck, and he offered advice: "You should spend a little money to protect that good luck."

Oh? I asked. How much?

"Six hundred and sixty yuan," he said—about ninety-seven dollars.

I wasn't going to argue with the fortune-teller. He accepted multiple payment platforms. We took out our phones and I sent him the money. ♦

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AMERICAN CHRONICLES

THE MENTOR

How Roy Cohn taught Donald Trump everything.

WITH SUSAN GOLDMARK

When President Donald Trump’s first Attorney General, Jeff Sessions, recused himself from a federal investigation into ties between the Trump campaign and Russia, in 2017, the President was angry. “Where’s my Roy Cohn?” he yelled. But Roy Cohn—an American scoundrel and the lawyer who helped send Julius and Ethel Rosenberg to the electric chair, aided Senator Joseph McCarthy in implementing the Red Scare, and showed Trump the ropes in the real-estate business—was long gone.

Trump and Cohn had met forty-four years earlier, in 1973. The New York Post gossip columnist Cindy Adams later reported that her old friend Cohn had introduced her to his new protégé at a dinner party soon after. Trump was not yet thirty, and an ambitious outer-borough real-estate developer. In her column, Adams wrote that Cohn told her, “One day this kid is going to own New York.” Cohn, who was a closeted gay man, was invariably attracted to what could be called über-Gentiles—tall, fair-haired, blue-eyed. “Roy loved to surround himself with attractive straight men,” Robert S. Cohen, a divorce lawyer who’d worked for him in the sixties, observed. Trump—blond, six feet three—fit the bill.

The scene of their first encounter was Le Club, a private dining venue at 416 East Fifty-fifth Street, half a block from the East River. Cohn was a member. Opened on New Year’s Eve, in 1960, Le Club occupied a small white stucco house; a brass plaque reading “Members Only” was its only signage. The place had an international, jet-set atmosphere. Igor Cassini, a former society columnist for the Hearst papers and the brother of Oleg Cassini, Jacqueline Kennedy’s favorite couturier,

“Ignore the rules, do what you want to do, don’t leave a paper trail,” the reporter David

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Cay Johnston said, listing the lessons Cohn taught Trump. "And if somebody gets onto you, rat out other people to save yourself."

PHOTOGRAPH BY MARY ELLEN MARK

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was the chairman of Le Club's board. "It was the sort of place where you were likely to see a wealthy seventy-five-year-old guy walk in with three blondes from Sweden," Trump wrote in his 1987 book, "The Art of the Deal." In a few years, Trump would boast about being "a director" of Le Club, but in 1973 he was living in a rent-controlled studio at 196 East Seventy-fifth Street. The "dark, dingy little apartment," as Trump described it, had a view of a water tank. His father, Fred Trump, had named him president of the Trump Management Corporation in 1971. The company owned thousands of rental units in Queens and Brooklyn, but the younger Trump was eager to expand the family empire into Manhattan. He wanted, he wrote, to be "a city guy instead of a kid from the boroughs." He had joined Le Club because he thought it could help him make inroads into Manhattan society. Trump was having dinner there one evening when he spotted Cohn at a nearby table.

In "The Art of the Deal," Trump recalls their meeting, a description that is likely embellished. He claims that, after he got introduced to Cohn, Trump told him, "I don't like lawyers. I think all they do is delay deals, instead of making deals, and every answer they give you is no, and they are always looking to settle instead of fight." He continues, "I'm just not built that way. I'd rather fight than fold, because as soon as you fold once, you get the reputation of being a folder."

In an interview with us last year, Trump relayed a different version of the meeting, claiming that it had been Cohn who'd initiated the conversation. "I was doing very well, I guess people were reading a lot about me," he said. "I remember it very vividly—he was with a whole group of guys, and he came over, he wanted to introduce himself." Trump went on, "He said, 'Maybe we'll do some business—if you ever have a case. I'd love to work with you.' I remember that he didn't have cards. He wasn't

a card person. But I called him up."

It's more plausible that Trump, then a virtual unknown, introduced himself to Cohn and nervously explained that he needed some legal advice. In "The Art of the Deal," he describes their conversation: "The government has just filed suit against our company . . . saying that we discriminated against blacks," Trump told Cohn, and asked, "What do you think I should do?"

"Tell them to go to hell and fight the thing in court and let them prove that you discriminated," Cohn snapped. Trump thought that this was splendid advice.

It wasn't long before Cohn began introducing Trump around town. "I got to know everybody," Trump said. In November, 1973, Cohn invited his new protégé to a black-tie dinner at the Biltmore Hotel to celebrate his twenty-fifth anniversary as a practicing attorney. (The event doubled as a fund-raiser for the Cardinal Spellman foundation and the American Jewish League Against Communism.) Cohn's friend William F. Buckley, Jr., paid tribute to him in a speech: "Roy Cohn is a man who has triumphed over his tormentors, and he deserves the credit we are here to give him so enthusiastically." A congratulatory letter from President Richard Nixon was read to the guests, who included the State Supreme Court justice John M. Murtagh and the mayor-elect Abraham Beame. Trump was enthralled. He craved these connections, and he knew that, in Cohn, he had found the kind of tough lawyer he needed to fight the government's discrimination charges.

Trump's father, Fred, appears to have had a long history of racism. On Memorial Day, 1927, when Fred was twenty-one, he was arrested for refusing to disperse during a violent confrontation between police and a band of white-hooded Klansmen in Queens; he was released shortly after. (It's unclear what role he played in the riot.) Almost thirty years later, a tenant living in one of Fred's first major developments, the Beach Haven apartment complex, in Brooklyn, was so disturbed by the racial discrimination he observed from the management that he wrote a song about it. The song was called "Old Man Trump." The tenant was Woody Guthrie.

"Not only are we denying you tenure—we're closing your department and setting the entire university on fire just to be safe."

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I suppose that Old Man Trump knows just how much racial hate He stirred up in that bloodpot of human hearts . . . Beach Haven is Trump's Tower Where no Black folks come to roam

By 1973, when Trump met Cohn, the evidence that Fred's company had discriminated against Black people seemed undeniable. According to the Justice Department filing, thirty-nine Trump-owned apartment buildings had systematically barred Black people from renting. The Feds had found four Trump superintendents or rental agents will- ing to confirm that applications were coded by race; the forms would be marked by a large capital "C" to indi- cate that the applicants were "colored." One Trump employee described the policy to an F.B.I. agent: "Fred Trump told me not to rent to Blacks. He also wanted me to get rid of the Blacks that were in the building by telling them cheap housing was available to them at only five hundred dollars down pay- ment, which Trump would offer to pay himself." These activities would have been a clear violation of the 1968 Fair Housing Act.

The Feds would have been satisfied had the Trumps merely signed a con- sent decree, agreeing to integrate their approximately fifteen thousand units; there would have been no fine and no admission of guilt. But Cohn encour- aged Trump to reject the decree, and to assert that the Feds were pressuring the company to rent to "welfare recip- ients." Exasperated, the Justice Depart- ment filed a formal discrimination suit, whereupon Cohn countersued the gov- ernment for defamation, seeking a hun- dred million dollars in damages. Cohn and Trump held a press conference at the New York Hilton to announce their suit. Steven Brill, the founder of The American Lawyer, later said that he had been stunned that any reporters had shown up: "You couldn't get through your second day of law school without knowing it was a totally bogus lawsuit."

The stunt, a show of bravado, dom- inated local headlines, but, a month later, a federal judge dismissed the Trumps' suit as frivolous, scolding Cohn that he was "wasting time and paper." Trump and Cohn refused to back down, and they refused to engage with the accusa-

tions of racism. A friend of Cohn's told us that, in private, Cohn routinely re- ferred to Black people as "the Schvartze," a slur he'd picked up from his mother, Dora, and that on at least one occasion he was heard using the N-word. Trump always said that he was color-blind and that his only criterion for tenants was the income of the male head of house- hold: "We don't generally include the wife's income. We like to see it for the male in the family."

Cohn dragged out the litigation for twenty months. He attacked the credibility of the govern- ment's key witness, a for- mer Trump employee, claiming that he had been coerced by a "Gestapo-like interrogation." He also filed an affida- vit charging that F.B.I. agents had been acting like "stormtroopers." The judge reprimanded Cohn for his statements, which he described as "utterly without foundation." Cohn quickly retracted his remark about stormtroopers. "I have never brought a charge against the F.B.I. in my life. I have personal reasons why I haven't, and I never would," he said, alluding to his close friendship with the former F.B.I. director J. Edgar Hoover. "My relationship [to the F.B.I.] is much too close." But these digres- sions were great theatre, with Cohn as the ringmaster. The circus antics served to delay the proceedings further.

One day, in court, Cohn filed a con- tempt motion against a junior member of the prosecution's team, Donna F. Goldstein. He claimed that Goldstein had been calling up prospective wit- nesses at 4 A.M. and threatening to have them jailed if they didn't testify against Trump. Had this been true, Goldstein could have been disbarred. The accusa- tion was serious enough that the judge halted the main case to hold a hearing to rule on the contempt motion. On the day of the hearing, according to a young trial attorney who was present, Cohn stood up in court and said, "Your Honor, the girl!—Goldstein—"made a mistake, and, if she promises not to do this again, I will withdraw the motion."

The trial attorney was struck by how deferential the judge was to Cohn. On another occasion, this attorney watched

as Trump's deposition was being taken. Cohn took the lawyer aside and told him, "Leave Donald alone. He's going to be big one day."

Reflecting on the suit later, in "The Art of the Deal," Trump writes, "The idea of settling drove me crazy." But that's exactly what he did, finally sign- ing, in June, 1975, virtually the same con-

sent decree that he could have signed in 1973. He agreed to initiate a program that required him to adver- tise his rentals in Black- owned newspapers and to list vacancies with the New York Urban League, a civil- rights organization. He paid no fines and made no ad- mission of guilt. The Jus- tice Department, however,

described the decree as "one of the most far-reaching ever negotiated." A head- line in the Black-owned New York Am- sterdam News proclaimed, "MINORI- TIES WIN HOUSING SUIT," and the accompanying story alerted readers that "qualified Blacks and Puerto Ricans now have the opportunity to rent apart- ments owned by Trump Management."

Trump and Cohn nevertheless de- clared victory. Winning, Cohn was fond of saying, was not enough—people needed to know about it. And in the coming years Trump repeatedly claimed that he had won the case.

Three years later, the Feds declared the Trumps to be in contempt of the consent decree, alleging continuing dis- crimination. Cohn told reporters that the new charges were a "rehash," with- out "the slightest merit." (He had pre- viously called the government's case "a spit in the ocean.") But the matter fiz- zled, and the Trumps never admitted wrongdoing. The lesson Trump took from Cohn was that the facts could al- ways be drowned out by strident coun- terclaims. Trump never incurred any fi- nancial consequences for his alleged discriminatory practices.

By then, Trump had moved on to the bigger playing field of Man- hattan real estate. He had already learned a lot from Cohn. "I was very young, and Roy was a very political guy," Trump later told the Times' Maggie Haber- man. "A different kind of guy." Trump

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was astonished to see Cohn's name in the tabloids several times a week. Cohn taught him that the pyrotechnics of publicity were more important than the law. What counted was controlling the narrative.

"Roy was a master of situational immorality," Sam Roberts, who covered city politics for the Daily News in the seventies, told Matt Tyrnauer, the director of the documentary "Where's My Roy Cohn?" "He had rules about how to exercise power. . . . You would always try to goad your enemies into being the worst they possibly could be and then turn that against them, so that Roy Cohn would actually look like the good guy, which he virtually never was."

Cohn taught Trump not to worry about what other people thought of him. "He would just make light of the fact that people in the family just didn't care about him," David Marcus, whose father was Cohn's cousin, told Tyrnauer. Trump, Marcus said, manifested a different kind of narcissism, "a narcissism combined with insecurity. But in Roy it was a total security in who he was, except for the fact that he didn't want people knowing in public he was gay."

Trump viewed Cohn as a means to meeting influential people. One of the worlds that Cohn initiated him into was Studio 54, whose owners were clients. Trump attended Cohn's fifty-second birthday party at the night club. The comedian Joey Adams (Cindy Adams's husband) served as m.c.; one of his regular gag lines was "If you're indicted, you're invited." Marcus recalled being at Studio 54 with both Trump and Cohn. "Roy's eyes were glued to Trump. . . . He watched everything Trump did." Trump sometimes wandered downstairs to check out the semiprivate V.I.P. rooms. "I saw things happening there that to this day I have never seen again," he told the writer Timothy L. O'Brien. "I would watch supermodels getting screwed, well-known supermodels getting screwed on a bench in the middle of the room."

Until the early seventies, Trump had been basically an errand boy, collecting rents for his demanding, imperious father. It was not a glamorous job. But Trump was deeply ambitious, and he understood that, in the world of commercial real estate, he needed government tax abatements, zoning excep-

exceptions, and friendly city regulators in order to make profitable deals. Cohn was a fixer who could pave the way.

That same year, Cohn had played a key role in the election of the city's new mayor, Abraham Beame, whom Cohn had known since he was a young man. By 1973, as the city comptroller, he was running for the Party's mayoral nomination. His leading opponent was the Bronx congressman Mario Biaggi. Cohn leaked a story to the Times that Biaggi had pleaded the Fifth the year before when questioned by a federal grand jury, and the controversy helped sink Biaggi's candidacy. Beame was sworn in as New York's first Jewish mayor in early 1974, and Cohn became a trusted adviser. Although Cohn had earned a reputation as a right-wing attack dog for his work with McCarthy, he was now a powerful figure in the Democratic Party clubhouse.

Three weeks after Beame's inauguration, according to the Village Voice journalist Wayne Barrett, Trump was trying to persuade Ned Eichler, a businessman who managed some of Penn Central railroad's properties in Manhattan, to partner with him on a real-estate deal in midtown. Eichler asked Trump for proof that he had the political connections to obtain the necessary zoning permits.

"What kind of proof?" Trump asked. Eichler replied that he'd want to talk to the Mayor, to make sure he was on board.

"When do you want to see him?" Trump asked.

"Tomorrow at 2 P.M.," Eichler said. Trump told Eichler that his limousine would pick him up at one-thirty. The next afternoon, Trump met his new business partner in the Mayor's office. He'd brought along his father, who had contributed to Beame's campaign. The Trumps quickly briefed the Mayor on the deal and why it would benefit the city, and then the five-foot-two Beame stood, reached his arms up to pat the shoulders of the two Trumps, and said, "Whatever Donald and Fred want, they have my complete backing."

Fred may have made a phone call to City Hall, but it's far more likely that Cohn orchestrated the meeting. He would be Trump's legal counsel and fixer on all his Manhattan deals for the remainder of the seventies. In 1975, Trump and Cohn were focussing on a property

owned by Penn Central, which was going bankrupt: the dilapidated Commodore Hotel, at East Forty-second Street, adjacent to Grand Central Terminal.

When it was built, in 1919, the hotel was one of the most colossal structures of its kind in New York. The Commodore had been named after Cornelius (the Commodore) Vanderbilt, the railway tycoon who had built Grand Central, in 1871. But by the nineteen-seventies the establishment had become a symbol of the city's financial squalor. The decrepit hotel was barely operating. Half its rooms were empty. Homeless people squatted on the ground floor. A massage parlor occupied one of its storefronts. It was an embarrassing eyesore.

Mayor Beame was eager to sell the hotel to a suitable developer, but there were few prospects. New York was on the brink of bankruptcy, and the Republican-controlled federal government was not sympathetic. After one of the Mayor's visits to Washington, D.C., President Gerald Ford made it clear that no federal money would be forthcoming for a bailout. The Daily News reported the President's rebuff with a front-page headline: "FORD TO CITY: DROP DEAD."

Trump was the only developer who showed serious interest in taking on the Commodore. But many in the real-estate business were dubious; they regarded Trump as a blowhard. One banker told the Times that Trump was "overrated" and "totally obnoxious."

Trump could be disarmingly frank about his ambitions. Michael Bailkin, who ran Beame's Office of Lower Manhattan Development, began meeting with Trump to discuss the possible deal. After several sessions in a Third Avenue bar, Bailkin blurted out, "You're a very shallow person." Trump replied, "Of course. That's one of my strengths. I never pretend to be anything else."

During the negotiations, it became clear that Trump was having trouble persuading a bank to lend him the seventy million dollars he needed to renovate the hotel. The banks would make the loan only if the city awarded the developer a tax abatement.

Bailkin came up with a novel solution: the Commodore would be given to a municipal agency, making it tax exempt, and Trump would lease it from the agency and develop it. Trump paid

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a rock-bottom ten million dollars to acquire the rights to lease the property, and he was given an extraordinary forty-year tax abatement, saving him approximately four million dollars a year in property taxes. He would pay a nominal annual “rent,” starting at two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.

Completing the deal took two years, and it was Cohn who finalized the details. He’d approached his good friend Deputy Mayor Stanley M. (Bugsy) Friedman with a proposition. Friedman was already a silent business partner of Cohn’s, having arranged for him to lease a half-dozen city-owned parking lots that generated thousands of dollars a week. The parking operation was funnelled through shell companies Cohn operated from his home, and he reported far less revenue than he was earning. In effect, he was regularly stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from New York.

Friedman played a pivotal role in Trump’s Commodore deal, casting the deciding vote in its favor at a 1976 Board of Estimate meeting. He was thus in a position to get the tax abatement approved, days before the Beame administration gave way to Mayor Ed Koch’s regime. In turn, Friedman secured for himself a major perk in return for securing the tax break: a lifetime appointment as chairman of the city’s Water Board, a position that paid twenty-five thousand dollars a year and included the use of a chauffeured limousine. In addition, Cohn invited Friedman to become a partner at his law firm, Saxe, Bacon & Bolan, and gave Friedman his own spacious office. The Wall Street Journal, in its coverage of the Commodore story, called Trump’s unprecedented abatement “the tax deal of the century.”

In September, 1980, the hotel reopened as the Grand Hyatt. Trump had gutted the Commodore, replacing its brick exterior with bronze-tinted glass and steel. The new hotel had fourteen hundred rooms, a shiny ballroom, and convention facilities.

The Commodore deal was always controversial. Some wondered how a young and inexperienced developer had managed to get such good terms. “Donald Trump runs with the same clique that continues to manipulate things behind the scenes in this city,” the city councilman Henry J. Stern told the

Cohn: “If the charge is that Donald is unsophisticated, they are in some ways right.”

Times, calling the deal “a sweetheart contract.” Stern went on, “Roy Cohn is his lawyer. He throws around a lot of money in political campaigns.” In response, Cohn told the paper, “Donald wishes he didn’t have to give money to politicians, but he knows it’s part of the game.”

Cohn also encouraged Trump’s flair for finding the spotlight. “He is tall, lean and blond, with dazzling white teeth, and he looks ever so much like Robert Redford” read the opening lines of a fawning Times profile of Trump, written by Judy Klemesrud and published in November, 1976. “He rides around town in a chauffeured silver Cadillac with his initials, DJT, on the plates. He dates slinky fashion models, belongs to the most elegant clubs and, at only 30 years of age, estimates that he is worth ‘more than $200 million.’”

Trump had made a close study of Cohn, from the vanity license plates to the chunky car phone he had installed in his limo. But it was all gloss. Trump

was not worth two hundred million dollars. In 1977, he paid $42,386 in taxes on an income of $118,530. In 1978, his salary, less than a hundred thousand a year, was paid by his father.

Another thing Cohn taught Trump was that he should always avoid a paper trail. Cohn, Trump said, “did not take notes.” And he didn’t want other people taking notes about what he said, either. Trump learned from Cohn to conduct business over the phone.

Wayne Barrett saw Cohn’s stamp all over Trump. “Both of them are attack dogs,” he said. Trump responded to that characterization in a 2016 interview with the Washington Post: “Well, I don’t see myself as an attack dog. I see myself as somebody that’s made a lot of money and done a great job and put a lot of people to work, but I don’t see myself as an attack dog unless I’m attacked.”

Trump and Cohn talked on the phone constantly. “Donald calls me fifteen to twenty times a day,” Cohn told Marie Brenner, the journalist. “He is

GUY DELORT / GETTY

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always asking, 'What is the status of this . . . and that?'

Another trait Trump picked up from Cohn was being cavalier about paying bills. Cohn never had a credit card, and he once said that he'd regularly leave his house 'without two cents in my pocket.' He ignored the small invoices that piled up on his desk. The trial attorney who worked with Cohn recalled seeing a letter from one of his vendors. 'Dear Roy,' the vender wrote. 'I'm still waiting for a payment of $10,000.' Cohn scribbled in reply, 'Dear Louie—Fuck you, Roy.' In 1976, Cohn's law firm was in arrears on bills for office furniture, stationery, travel agents, and locksmith and telegraphic services. It owed $10,121.92 on expenses related to a company plane.

'He would go to restaurants,' Pamela Newhouse Mensch, Cohn's friend, said, 'and he just ran a tab. I never saw him actually pay. He just didn't care.' By the seventies, Cohn had a reputation, as the Voice put it, 'as a celebrity cheapskate and flimflammer.' One creditor told a reporter, 'He lives like a millionaire, buys like a millionaire, and pays like a pauper.'

In 1976, the I.R.S. insisted that Cohn owed three hundred and seventy thousand dollars in back taxes. He had been under audit for seventeen years. In 1978, he accused the I.R.S. of engaging in a 'vendetta.' By 1985, the I.R.S. claimed that Cohn owed more than three million dollars. Cohn flaunted his insolence about taxes, once writing an article in Parade titled 'You Can Beat the IRS.' 'I am an expert on the subject,' he wrote, and even offered tips on how to hide income from the Feds. 'Keep one step ahead of them. If there is a problem, change bank accounts so they can't grab your funds by knowing from your records where you bank.' He tried to put the I.R.S. off the scent by opening accounts with tiny deposits in rural Connecticut.

Lawsuits from creditors left Cohn's assets untouched because his houses, Rolls-Royce, plane, and yacht were leased or held in the name of shell companies. For a time, in the late seventies, the deed to his town house on East Sixty-eighth Street was mysteriously

put in the name of his firm's office manager, Jerry Howard.

'All I own are the clothes on my back and some personal possessions,' Cohn said. 'I have no assets. I want no assets, and I need no assets. My parents are dead. I am not married, I have no kids. I don't need an estate. If anything happens to me, the law firm has a one-million-dollar policy on my life.'

Steven Brill noticed that, during the 2016 Presidential campaign, Trump sounded just like Cohn, using the same idioms and tough-guy language—'If you wanna know the truth' or 'That I can tell you.' Whenever Cohn was about to tell a big lie, Brill recalled, he'd preface it with the phrase 'to be absolutely frank.' Cohn also taught Trump to talk off the cuff, according to Roger Stone,

a friend of Cohn's who met Trump in 1979. 'Trump's greatest art form would have to be his ability to improvise,' Stone said to Tyrnauer. 'This is a man who is working without a net. . . . And he uses the tactics and the strategy of Roy Cohn to be in your face, to attack, to drive the argument.' He continued, 'Politics is about who dominates the dialogue.'

Trump admired Cohn's snarling deportment. Not long after they met, he put a signed photograph of Cohn in his office, and, whenever in-person negotiations with adversaries became tense, he would point to the photo and say, 'Would you rather deal with him?' Cohn inspired fear. 'The mere sending of a letter from Roy Cohn has saved us a lot of money,' Trump told the writer Ken Auletta, who profiled Cohn for Esquire in 1978. 'When people know that Roy is involved, they'd rather not get involved in the lawsuits.' On the other hand, Trump learned that, in an actual courtroom, Cohn had a tendency to wing it. 'He could go into a case without any notes,' Trump wrote in 'The Art of the Deal.' 'When he was prepared, he was brilliant and almost unbeatable. However, he wasn't always prepared.' Trump claimed that he would interrogate Cohn before every court date. 'If he wasn't prepared, I'd push for a postponement,' Trump said.

He didn't mind that Cohn was controversial. In an interview last year, Trump

told us, 'He was a wonderful lawyer. He did a very good job.' The President went on, 'Other people probably would say that they weren't happy with him. But that's the way life goes, right?'

In 1976, Trump started dating Ivana Zelníčková Winklmayr, a twenty-seven-year-old model from Czechoslovakia. They had met at Maxwell's Plum, a stained-glass-encrusted Upper East Side singles bar. In a 2016 interview with the New York Post, Ivana described meeting 'this tall blond guy with blue eyes. He said, 'I'm Donald Trump, and I see you're looking for a table. I can help you.' I look at my friends and said, 'The good news is, we're going to get a table real fast. The bad news is, this guy is going to be sitting with us.' The next morning, Trump sent a hundred roses to Ivana's hotel. A fast-tracked courtship followed, with dinners at Le Club, '21,' and Tavern on the Green. After five months of dating, Trump broached marriage, on a ski trip in Aspen. (For years, he would brag, falsely, that Ivana had been an alternate for the Czech Olympic ski team.) Back in New York, Trump bought a three-carat diamond engagement ring from Tiffany's. But, when he called Cohn to tell him the news, his friend discouraged him. 'You're better off not married,' Cohn insisted. 'I don't know why you want to do this.'

Trump pushed ahead with his engagement, but he did allow Cohn to sell him on getting a prenuptial agreement. An early version of the contract, drafted by Cohn, included a clause providing Ivana with a cash bonus for each child she bore, and another required her to return any gifts from her husband if they divorced. When Ivana saw the draft, she was shocked, and threatened to walk. Trump struck the offending clauses and blamed Cohn for having crafted them. New language was inserted to explicitly provide that, in the event of a divorce, Ivana could retain her clothing and any personal gifts from Trump and others. She got a hundred-thousand-dollar 'rainy day' fund deposited in her personal savings account. But Cohn prevailed when it came to potential alimony; the final agreement stipulated that, if the couple divorced before nine years of marriage, Ivana would receive only thirty thousand dollars a year. The

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agreement read: "Under no circumstances will Ivana ever be possessed of or attempt to lay claim to any of Donald's holdings or interest in his family business interests."

The prenup was shockingly one-sided. "Donald has explained to Ivana and Ivana warrants that she is aware that Donald's standard of living and lifestyle are neither opulent nor extravagant in that neither he nor the companies in which he has an interest own yachts, planes or the usual appurtenances generally connected with large and substantial businesses," one part of the document reads. "Ivana acknowledges that she is familiar with the fact that Donald's standard of living is basically simple and will continue to be so after the marriage herein contemplated."

Ivana signed the prenup, a decision she regretted in 1990, when the couple split. (The divorce was granted on the ground of "cruel and inhuman treatment.") Her lawyer for the prenup, Lawrence H. Levner, was also Cohn's lawyer, handpicked by him to represent his client's future wife. According to Christine Seymour, the switchboard operator at Cohn's firm, who listened in on conversations, "Larry was a bozo. Roy wouldn't have hired him to referee a dog show. . . . Larry was just there because Roy could control him." Cohn had served his client well. He knew, he acknowledged later, that, by definition, such agreements protect the wealthier spouse: "You are stripping a spouse of a marital right."

The couple married in April, 1977, in a Manhattan church ceremony presided over by Norman Vincent Peale, the radio personality and best-selling author of "The Power of Positive Thinking." The pews were filled with Fred Trump's business and political associates, including Mayor Beame and Cohn. Afterward, Cohn attended the reception at the 21 Club, where he served as toastmaster. The next morning, the newlyweds flew to Acapulco for a quick honeymoon before returning so that Trump could continue his negotiations over the Commodore.

Even before the Grand Hyatt project was completed, Trump began to put together a deal to erect what would become his most emblematic building: Trump Tower. He had his eye

on the old Bonwit Teller department store at Fifth Avenue and Fifty-sixth Street. After learning that the store was struggling financially, he acquired a lease on the space and then started negotiating to purchase the air rights above the neighboring building that housed Tiffany & Co.

Trump's aspirations were large. He had in mind a mixed-use skyscraper that would house luxury apartments above and offices and shops on the lower floors. In 1980, he brought Cohn into the project to help him obtain the building permits and zoning exceptions. That spring, crews began demolishing the Bonwit Teller building, a beloved landmark designed by Whitney Warren and Charles Wetmore, the architects of Grand Central Terminal, and soon Trump found himself embroiled in a series of controversies. For one thing, after preservationists sounded an alarm about the demolition, Trump had promised to save a pair of Art Deco bas-relief friezes and a large nickel-plated grille, situated over the store's entrance, and to donate them to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Despite this pledge, the sculptures were jackhammered into rubble. A story about the fracas in New York magazine showed Trump utilizing several P.R. tactics learned from Cohn. He called the smashed friezes "worthless" and crowed that the bad publicity had been a windfall: "The morning after the story hit the front pages of the Times, I must have gotten two dozen calls from people who wanted apartments in Trump

Tower. It was fantastic promotion."

Trump also got into trouble for hiring more than two hundred undocumented Polish laborers to handle the demolition. (They were employed by a firm called Kaszycki and Sons, which mainly did window washing.) Trump paid them substandard wages, and their working conditions were appalling. When the workers threatened to halt the project, Trump called in Cohn, who arranged to hire a different crew from House Wreckers Union Local 95, which was under the control of one of his mobster clients. (Several of the Polish workers sued, and, fifteen years later, Trump paid $1.4 million to settle the case.)

When construction started on Trump Tower, Cohn directed Trump to the mafioso Anthony (Fat Tony) Salerno, an important player in what was known as the Concrete Club, a syndicate that controlled the pouring of cement in Manhattan. This was critical to Trump's project because his architects had persuaded him to build the skyscraper with a concrete skeleton nearly devoid of steel bars. Trump hired S&A Concrete, which was jointly owned by Salerno, the underboss of the Genovese crime family, and Paul Castellano, the boss of the Gambino clan, who would be gunned down at Sparks Steak House, in 1985. When unionized cement workers went on strike in the summer of 1982, the workers at Trump Tower continued to pour cement. "They were unbelievably good contractors in terms of doing the work," Trump later told the Wall Street Journal. "But a lot of them were

"Brian, you cannot fall in love every time they take their glasses off."

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R. CUS

supposedly associated with the mob."

Not only did Cohn keep the cement flowing at Trump Tower; he also orchestrated the early sales of its unbuilt luxury apartments. His client Robert J. Hopkins, a Lucchese crime family associate, bought two apartments on the fifty-ninth and sixtieth floors for $1.6 million. Such sales helped to create the buzz that enabled Trump to sell the other two hundred and sixty units.

Additionally, when, in 1981, Mayor Koch denied Trump a critical tax abatement for the project, Trump brought in Cohn to get the decision reversed. Trump had expected to qualify for a 421-A tax exemption because his tower was improving the neighborhood and increasing the assessed value of the site. But the law in question, from 1971, had been designed to encourage developers to build low- and middle-income housing.

ing. The expected abatement was worth millions of dollars and would have been held for ten years. Koch believed that tax breaks of that magnitude should not be used to subsidize luxury apartments. When Trump learned that the tax break had been nixed, he phoned the Mayor's housing commissioner, Anthony Gliedman, in a rage and warned him, "I want you to know that I am a very rich and powerful person in this town and there is a reason I got that way. I will never forget what you did."

In April, 1981, Cohn filed an appeal before the New York State Supreme Court. More than a year later, the court ruled 7-0 that the Koch administration should reconsider Trump's application. But Trump was turned down once more. Relentless, Cohn refiled the appeal and went through the whole process again. This time, they got a different result.

"My lawyer, Roy Cohn, did a brilliant job," Trump writes in "The Art of the Deal," "arguing before seven justices without so much as a note." In December, 1982, the Appellate Division of the State Supreme Court ordered the city to give Trump the abatement. Cohn gleefully told the Times, "A lot of people have been sitting back, afraid to build until this thing was settled. It is a shot in the arm for their proposed buildings." The appeals-court decision was written by Judge Sol M. Wachtler, a Rockefeller Republican. The Koch administration appealed the decision once more, but, in 1984, the state's highest court ruled in Trump's favor.

Koch was annoyed, and he later referred to Trump as "piggy, piggy, piggy." In return, Trump called him a moron. The Mayor, he said, was "extremely nasty, mean-spirited, and very vicious, an extremely disloyal human being."

But Trump had got what he needed. He sent Cohn an effusive thank-you note. "Needless to say, your representation of me with regards to the Trump Tower case was brilliant," he wrote. "Everyone scoffed at our pursuit of this difficult victory saying that 'it could never be won.' The skeptics . . . never saw Roy Cohn in action. . . . Great job! Thanks, See you soon, Donald." Cohn framed the note and put it on his office wall.

Cohn treasured his relationship with Trump. "Dear Donald, Happy Birthday," he wrote in a letter one June, in the late seventies. "As I look back over our close personal and professional relationship over so many years, the memories are among the high points of my life. With all the daily frustrations and unappreciative people we help, you have been a meaningful exception. You have never said no, never failed to be completely supportive, and [have been] the best morale builder I've ever known. Your encouragement and kindness mean more to me than any amount of money—and I will always be proud to be on your team." The note was written on Cohn's personal stationery, imprinted with a scowling caricature of himself.

Cohn claimed that he never asked Trump, whom he liked to call the "young genius, builder, and developer," to pay him for the legal work he did. But Trump apparently paid him anyway. "I've never

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sent him a bill in my life," Cohn told the journalist Peter Manso, in 1980. "But there is no check that he has ever sent me that isn't higher than the amount for which I would have billed him." Cohn's relative, David Marcus, believed that Cohn had a genuine affection for Trump: "Roy, I think, really felt this sort of pride of ownership in Trump," Marcus told Tyrnauer. "He'd created Trump. He had saved Trump from ruin after they met. And he felt this odd attraction to him until the end."

Cohn recognized that Trump was vulgar and uncouth, but the younger man's unembarrassed openness about his shallowness was disarming. "If the charge is that Donald is unsophisticated, they are in some ways right," Cohn said. "If you go with Donald to see an art collection, he's not that interested. He'd rather look out the windows at buildings."

Trump regarded Cohn as a highly entertaining friend. "I got a kick out of Roy Cohn," Trump later told the Washington Post. Just as Trump kept a photo of Cohn in his office, Cohn treasured a shot of Trump that hung on his office wall. It was signed "To Roy, My greatest friend, Donald."

Trump liked to draw a contrast between Cohn and all the "respectable" guys who made their careers "boasting about their uncompromising integrity ... [but] don't think twice about stabbing a friend in the back if the friend has become a problem." He occasionally dropped by Cohn's town house, where Saxe, Bacon & Bolan was based, so he witnessed firsthand some of the chaos in the firm's operations. "He was a man who did a lot of socializing with judges. He liked a lot of judges," Trump told us, speaking about Cohn. "He was a very complex person. He was a very brilliant guy in so many different ways. He was also somebody that got himself into a lot of trouble."

Cohn lived a secret life, hooking up regularly with gay hustlers. Trump was almost certainly aware of this. "Roy had a whole crazy deal going," he told the Washington Post. In an interview with us, Trump said, "He enjoyed life. He's a different kind of a guy, but he enjoyed life." Trump went on, "A lot of people didn't know he was gay until toward the end." (When Cohn was dying of AIDS,

Trump fell out of daily touch with him. But just before Cohn's death, in 1986, Trump invited him to a dinner party at Mar-a-Lago. Afterward, Trump reportedly ordered his staff to "fumigate" the dishware and cutlery.)

Cohn always understood that, in dealing with Trump, a degree of obsequiousness was required. Trump could be demanding. As the years went by, Cohn functioned less as a mentor than as a fixer, having to dip into his favor bank to take care of Trump's needs. In 1983, Cohn used his many connections in Ronald Reagan's White House to engineer the elevation of Maryanne Trump Barry, Trump's sister, to a federal judgeship. But the Cohn favor bank was nonideological. He didn't care about Maryanne's qualifications. He knew nothing about her politics or legal experience. He just knew that she was Trump's sister.

Trump's father had reared him to have cutthroat ambition. But Cohn taught him tactics. The Times reporter David Cay Johnston told Tyrnauer that Cohn had instructed Trump to "ignore the rules, do what you want to do, don't leave a paper trail, don't keep a calendar, never do things in writing, and, if somebody gets onto you, rat out other people to save yourself. Delay, delay, delay, cause grand juries have a limited time, and you can run out the clock. And call in the news media. Make up a fantastic story. We're just honest businessmen who are being attacked by these corrupt New

York City police, or F.B.I. agents, or especially the corrupt and heartless I.R.S. agents. And that'll be the news story. It'll put the government on the defensive." Cohn's rules became Trump's rules.

In the spring of 1984, GQ put the thirty-eight-year-old real-estate developer on its cover and ran a story by Graydon Carter, with the cover line "Success: How Sweet It Is." The

profile opened with Cohn calling Trump one morning with a problem. He needed a hotel room for a client that night: "What's up? Who? Sorry, Roy, I think the Grand Hyatt is full," Trump says. "But how about the Barbizon? Hold on. Let me find out." A moment later: "Okay, I think we can book him into the Barbizon. Only for you, Roy."

Carter captures the young Trump's greed and bravado. "About the only thing that gives away this striver from an outer borough are his cuff links: huge mollusks of gold and stone the size of half-dollars," Carter wrote. The piece makes Trump seem vacuous. "Did you ever pass Trump Tower at night and see the way it glows?" Trump asks. "It almost glows in the dark. That's because I used real bronze. If you get imitations, it doesn't look the same. It looks like nothing." In the profile, Carter notes that Trump has hands that are "small and neatly groomed," an observation that would nettle Trump for decades, even into his Presidency.

Cohn was of New York, but he deeply resented New York's intellectuals, its universities, and its elite law firms. Trump has always felt the same resentment. "I'll never have the good will of the establishment, the taste-makers of New York," Trump said, in 1990. Another time, he remarked, "I love the poorly educated." As Cohn did before him, Trump likes to frame his anti-establishment politics of resentment as empathy for the working class. For both men, that was a charade, yet Trump learned how to effectively deploy the sentiment at campaign rallies.

"He had a lot of respect for me," Trump told us, of Cohn. "He said, 'You're going to be President someday. If you want to.'" He added, "He said that many times." According to Vanity Fair, the day after Trump was elected to the Presidency in November, 2016, Roger Stone reached him by telephone to congratulate him. "Mr. President," Stone said. "Oh, please, call me Donald," Trump replied. And then Trump remarked, in a pensive tone, "Wouldn't Roy love to see this moment? Boy, do we miss him." ♦

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FICTION

48

PHOTOGRAPH BY ELIZA BOURNER

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From the kitchen table, it was all sunlight and haze. Through the sliding glass door, the morning mist burned off the green waves of corn. A low red veal barn, far beyond, marked the place where the land rose up, then turned to trees. The girl named Birdie diligently spooned raisin bran into her mouth, cold milk dribbling down her chin, and, against her will, thought of her visit to the veal barn the day before, the tug of the calf's tongue on the mauve nipple of the bottle, the white formula sloshing inside.

After breakfast, she had a stomach ache and sat by the living-room window, watching cars pass at irregular intervals, listening for the growl of motors as they approached, roared, faded away. She went to the cupboard next to the brick fireplace and tapped each wrinkled storybook spine. She rubbed the beige carpet threads with her fingers as she looked at the pictures of a bird, a dog, a loud machine. Are you my mother? the story kept asking.

The day before, she had fed a calf with her much older cousin, Angie, a beautiful girl who smiled when she said sad things and was engaged to be married when the leaves turned red. That was how she'd put it to Birdie, as she showed her how to hold the bottle against the calf's tugs. Angie lived on the family farm, just down the hill from their aunts' and grandmother's place, where Birdie was staying. The veal barn had a smell Birdie had never smelled anywhere else—antiseptic, then sweet like a flower and rotten like manure. It reminded her of being in a clean hospital where everyone was dying or already dead, though she'd never been in such a place.

Birdie had found the calves darling, so darling her chest hurt. She liked to rub the rough swirls of hair between their eyes. They tried to lick her wrist when she did this. Their noses and the inside of their ears and their long tongue muscles were delightfully pink, the color of a crayon. Each baby wore a collar with a chain and had a messy bed of straw. Once Birdie and her cousin were back outside, the air hung green and full. She had to walk all the way around the cornfield and along Market Avenue, up the hill, to get back to her aunts' place. She would have preferred to go home to her mother and father, but they weren't there.

At the fireplace's dark mouth sat a small black iron, heavy as a bowling ball, impossibly heavy. She touched the chain-metal curtain gathered at the fireplace's edges, and her fingers came away soot black. She rubbed them on her skirt, ruining its pretty. She picked up an empty ostrich egg, put one eye to the small hole on one end, then quickly set the shell back down, repulsed.

After the living room, Birdie wandered to the dining room, where she was cast into an underwater light, the sun sifting through the plants arranged by the long window. A white lace cloth covered the dining table, and a stiff piece of plastic covered the lace. She climbed onto a chair and reached for the bowl at the center of the table. She took the cluster of purple grapes from it, touched each sticky plastic fruit, then took the too yellow banana in her hands and bit it gently, enough to leave a few small marks. She knocked it lightly against the table to hear the hollow inside.

In the kitchen, her aunt Rebecca kneaded dough on the floured counter. Birdie sat at the little table by the sliding glass door and watched her work the dough forward and back, her shirt-sleeves rolled above her elbows, an apron covering her denim skirt. Rebecca wore her simple weekday covering over her hair, which had been pulled back in a ponytail, then braided and pinned up on the back of her head. On Sundays, she wore the lacy covering the girl preferred but put her hair in a simple bun, because that was more godly. Rebecca asked a question in Pennsylvania Dutch, then laughed and tried again: "Birdie, do you want some bread?" Well, of course she wanted some bread. Her aunt gave her a warm piece with margarine melting at the center. "For goodness' sake, Birdie, wash your hands. And it's better not to mess with the fireplace." Rebecca unfolded a little metal stool for her and placed it in front of the kitchen sink.

As Birdie ate her bread at the table, she watched her grandmother carry a blue bucket from the shed to the garden, where she and Birdie's other aunt, Miriam, worked in worshipful ways, bowing down to weed in their flapping skirts. Miriam wore a navy-blue task jacket to ward off the loose chill of the morning. Grandma's white cardigan bloomed like a daisy against the green.

Birdie tried to understand her grandma's beige shoes, stiff with a thick sole. Her grandmother left them on a little rug outside the door when she came in from her work. Birdie was still sitting at the table, with just a few crumbs on her plate. The sun was high in the sky now, and, despite Miriam's smile as she slid the glass door open, the girl's chest was full of crying. Her parents had gone to Indiana to visit old friends, other Mennonites they'd volunteered with in Africa. Her older brother and sister were staying with classmates, but she was still so small. It had been easier to leave her with her aunts and grandma at the house on Market Avenue than to take her on the long drive. Tomorrow, a Tuesday, was the first day of second grade.

The kitchen smelled of coffee and yeast. Grandma sat opposite the girl, with her back to the sliding glass door. She smiled and brushed Birdie's hand with her fingertips as the aunts talked and laughed. Grandma spoke—something the girl couldn't understand. The phone on the wall rang, and Rebecca snatched the receiver, then pulled the curly cord down the steps to the basement and shut the door. A battery-powered radio on the counter played tinny gospel songs. The girl grew heavy, heavier. Her head tipped toward the table. Her lips turned. Then Rebecca was there, with bits of tissue stuck up her nose. Birdie laughed but didn't feel happy. The day went on and on. Before long, a little carved cuckoo emerged from the open door of its house on the wall and sang five times.

In the hallway off the kitchen, Miriam pulled a box of games from a high closet shelf. Birdie sat on the cool linoleum, half in the closet and half in the hall. Red, red, blue, yellow, green. Red, red, blue, yellow, blue. A buzzer bleated. She played again. The women's talk in the kitchen rose and fell like a song. A purple melancholy settled into the shadows on the hallway floor. The backs of her legs stuck to the linoleum, and, when she pulled away, her skin sliced with pain. Before long, the night would be there.

After dinner, Rebecca split open a melon from the garden. She scooped the furry seeds from inside the orange flesh. The chunks of fruit were warm and sweet, like cough syrup. The girl sucked on the fruit, and, when she finally bit down, juice

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leaked onto her chin. She wiped it with her hands, and then her fingers stuck together. When she pulled her fingers apart, she saw dirt gathered in the hollows between them.

While the girl had a bath, Miriam readied for bed. At the bathroom mirror, she pulled three teeth attached to glinting metal parts from her mouth and scrubbed them with her toothbrush. She turned to the girl.

“Well, what do you think?” she said, smiling a little. Her front teeth were gone. She covered her mouth with one hand, now laughing from the horror of it. She placed one of her partials in the girl’s soft, small palm. “Careful with it, little bird,” she said. The girl touched the yellowed thing attached to wires. It was a part of Miriam that was already dead. Birdie placed the tooth on the edge of the tub and moved white bubbles around in the water, then pushed her face into the bubbles and further down.

Before Birdie went upstairs to bed, she stood in the doorway of her grandmother’s small bedroom. Her grandmother sat on the single bed as Rebecca undid the back of her dress.

“Come see the scar where they cut her breast away,” Rebecca said. The girl shrank. “There’s nothing to be scared of,” Rebecca insisted, tugging at her mother’s dress. Birdie shook her head.

“Don’t make her if she doesn’t want to,” Grandma said quietly. Rebecca’s hands stilled, and the girl stared at her grandmother, wide-eyed. Her long white hair, normally collected in a bun, trailed down past her shoulders in smooth, pale waves. It was the most beautiful thing the girl had ever seen.

It was another era, or even the end of it. Birdie didn’t want to get older. She liked being small, except when she was scared. She stayed in Miriam’s bedroom because this was the aunt she belonged to. Before, when her father was small, he had belonged to Miriam, too. There were a dozen kids altogether, and Miriam was the third-oldest girl. The eldest girl, Ruth, had raised the middles. The second-oldest girl, Rebecca, did the cooking. And Miriam raised the little ones, Birdie’s father included. This had happened in the farmhouse down the hill, where Angie now lived, along with Uncle Abe and Aunt Martha and a trio of her brothers. An-

ENJAMMENT

Listen, it doesn’t happen overnight. One day, you wake up in the blue wreck of the thing, the thing being your bed, your cool morning, your mug, and suddenly you are the thing, your thingness apparent to you, you are a ruled thing, the thing once had a psyche, a libido, an enigmatic smile, but the thing doesn’t need to think about that now, a thing cannot be safe or unsafe, a thing cannot speak a safe word and, therefore, does not need one, a thing thinks and unthinks and is instructed, a thing can witness but not defend the dying light frothed out on the Formica table during an argument as the sun downs, downs, downs and a fist slams, a thing yells back, but a yelling thing is just a thing, a thinking, fucking thing, the police come to ask the thing if the thing is okay, the neighbors are worried about the thing, the neighbor is an eighty-something-year-old woman and has seen some things, but this thing is exasperated, this thing does not talk to cops, thing cannot believe their thingness, cannot understand how they, bright-minded, well-loved, are not immune to becoming a thing, a thing hates the discourse of trauma, abhors becoming a cliché, the E.R. is now asking if thing, a grown thing, is sleeping with stuffed animals after thing passes out on the street, thing cannot bear to see the way people have been looking at them lately, lowering their voices in a piteous mist, thing gets drunk with Aria who tells thing she, too, used to be a thing, oh, thing, poor thing, little thing, thing thinging, thing is a beautiful mess, thing walks in Prospect Park, thing kicks the snow and then apologizes, thing is the snow, thing bows at the end of her performance of thingness only to learn that all the world is a stage and there is no exit thing can see from the theatre, thing calls her mother but cannot bear to say, What is happening to me, thing calls her sister and tells her partial truths, a few friends tell thing it’s time, thing swears that there will be

gie’s bedroom was where Birdie’s dad had slept as a boy, and, whenever Birdie went in it, she felt a white spirit pass through her. In which room had her uncle June died when he was seventeen, a brain bleed after he’d collided with someone in the outfield during a baseball game? In what room had her grandfather seen the angel warning him of June’s death? She never asked. Her father called Miriam a princess, but Birdie knew she was more than that: a queen. There was nothing better than Miriam, except Birdie’s own mother.

Miriam watched soap operas on the little black-and-white television on her hope chest, even though they were for-

forbidden by the girl’s parents at home. Birdie puzzled over the woman on the little screen shouting “I hate you!” at a man, and then embracing him, kissing him desperately.

“Well, little bird, there’s love and there’s hate, and you think they’re opposites, but they’re almost exactly the same thing,” Miriam explained. Even though the girl was only eight, she could understand.

Miriam had pictures on her mirror, one of a man whom Birdie had met a few times, a Hungarian named Zoltan, who had a nice accent and a kind face. He always wore a dark suit.

“He wanted to marry me,” Miriam

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no poem about these months, thing is both speaker and beloved, thing reads that June Jordan and Adrienne Rich had a friendship falling-out but came back to each other, thing reads William Carlos Williams saw sixty patients a day during the Spanish flu and lost a young colleague, thing reads Sonny Rollins practiced saxophone on the Williamsburg Bridge for up to sixteen hours a day, thing will stay alive as long as she can read about the real and the dead, thing packs her lunch, thing takes the bus to teach poems to women at night who don't see thing as thing, and thing's color returns a little bit, every Tuesday, the women ask thing why other women broke the line in the poem at the moment that they did, the women are asking about enjambment, soft landings of the first unstressed lamb sound, hard landings of a trochee like a trampoline into the heavens, the women are asking why we break at some words and not at others, each time that thing has an answer, thing becomes less thingy, thing has a lot of answers because before thing was a thing, thing studied very hard, thing had a good mind before sleeping next to something bad for thing, thing is not a doll and is not one of those things that secretly wanted to be a plaything, not one of those writers who sells books about the half-hearted "transgression" of being spanked or whipped, cannot relate to the privilege of writing about being a thing, imagine making it art, how American, you American thing, you thing, pinging across the ocean like a downed plane confessing its last mistakes, pinging like Beckett's short story called "Ping," how American, how American you are, Megan, I mean, just look at you, thing watches "Moonstruck," thing doesn't want to be fair, forgives no one, is not interested in healing, thing watches Cher say, I love him something awful, Ma, and Cher's mother, with her silver hair gathering, gathering into a face, into the years, says, That's too bad.

—Megan Fernandes

smiled. "He brought me a very nice set of knives."

"Why didn't you?"

"Oh, it wasn't right. And I suppose I wanted to do what I wanted to do." She paused, then blurted, "He was shorter than I was!"

"Why does that matter?"

Miriam hesitated, the question twisting her mouth and eyes. She looked at Birdie, then laughed.

"Maybe I'm petty," she said. "Plus, I already had a set of good knives."

Miriam was forty, or maybe fifty-five. Birdie wasn't sure. She was older than Birdie's father, at least. She worked at the meat locker, where Birdie's father

had once taken her. Miriam had given her a heavy coat and wrenched open the silver door. Inside, bloody pieces of animals hung in the cold. A single bulb illuminated the room, and Birdie wanted to leave as soon as she was inside. She could smell the blood. She watched her white breath blossom and fade in front of her face, while Miriam walked among the bodies, touching each one to make it sway as she explained the cuts.

In bed, Birdie wore a floral nightgown that wrapped her in heat. Her new backpack and folded first-day clothes sat on Miriam's upholstered reading chair. She had wanted to wear a smooth white button-down with her little skirt, but,

when she'd tried it on, Rebecca had said it made her look like a boy. She was ashamed for having liked it. Instead, they picked a nice blouse with an itchy lace collar she despised.

Tucked under the quilt, Birdie watched Miriam as she searched her head with her fingers in front of the mirror, pulling pins from her dark hair one by one.

"Would you like to hear a story?" Miriam wondered. "I have a good one from my friend Susie Coblentz." It was something that had happened to Susie's friend, she said.

Across from the bed, the ceiling sloped precipitously, with a dormer cut into it. On either side of the window, a small door opened to a space just the right size for a little girl, where her aunt stored wrapping paper and yard-sale finds. Miriam didn't like for Birdie to play in there, but it was the only place the girl wanted to play. It seemed like a punishment not to let her shut herself in with a flashlight when it was just the right size for her make-believe. At night, though, the doors took on a tinge of terror. They were also the right size for dwarves and goblins, sundry other monsters. You couldn't be certain, in the night, what sort of world they might open onto, were you to turn the knob. People shouldn't have small doors in their houses, Birdie thought. It wasn't right.

"So, the friend of my friend Susie," Miriam continued. This woman was lying in her bed one night when she heard a tap-tap-tapping coming from the living room. She got up to see what was making it, and there, at a little desk her husband used for his book-keeping, sat the Devil, working away on a typewriter.

Birdie, paralyzed beneath the hot sheets, imagined the living room below them with a little wooden desk and an old-fashioned black typewriter on it. An oil lamp, like the one that Rebecca kept in her room as decoration, illuminated the Devil, who wore dark slacks and a dark vest, an impeccable white shirt. A golden chain glinted against the vest, disappearing into his pocket. His skin was browned and his neck and chin wispy with hair. He wore round, gold-rimmed spectacles. His nose and mouth protruded wolfishly. A cigarette smoldered in the ashtray near his hand.

"Well, of course Susie's friend was

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absolutely petrified, but soon enough she found her voice," Miriam said. The story went that Susie's friend asked, "What are you doing here?" And the Devil replied, in a strange accent she couldn't place, "I'm here to write your life story." Smoke wafted from his ears! The woman couldn't breathe. It was as if she were suffocating, just being near him. "I'm here to write your life story," the Devil repeated. "Whatever way you'd like it. Just tell me: Do you accept my offer? If you do, I'll make it so." He waited with his long, sharp fingernails poised above the keys. "I suppose you want my soul in return," the woman said. "Of course," the Devil said, smiling.

His handsome grin bewitched her, and she imagined all the ways her life might go. Maybe she could be a famous jazz singer. Perhaps she could travel around the world on an ocean liner. Or what about living in New York City and running a soup-and-bread restaurant visited by people from all over?

Birdie felt the woman's dreams swell in her own chest. She herself wanted to be an astronaut, or a ballerina. She wanted to live in a city and visit the art museum every day. She wanted to order takeout Chinese food in white cardboard boxes, even though she'd never

had Chinese food. Her mother said she was worldly, and her father said she could not, under any circumstances, be an astronaut. Also, they would not drive her across town for something like ballet lessons, but still all she could think about was a pink tutu. Her parents weren't quite sure where she had come from, they'd say, chuckling, but Birdie didn't understand why what she wanted was funny.

"The woman thought long and hard, longer than a good Christian woman should," Miriam said. "And in the end she said, 'I don't. No, I don't accept your offer. No, I don't want you to write anything. I want my soul to go to the Lord. I love my good, simple life as a mother and wife, with my family, and nothing could ever replace that.' As you might imagine, the Devil was furious. He slammed his fists onto the keys and let out a horrible screech. He moaned and grunted as she walked back to her room, got into bed, and easily fell into a restful sleep."

Even though the story was over, the Devil of Birdie's imagination had moved upstairs and was now conducting his business just across the hall, in Rebecca's bedroom. He was in there still, sitting at his desk, as Rebecca slept, in the light of the oil lamp. Birdie feared she

would hear the clicking of the keys if she listened hard enough.

Miriam snapped on the bedside lamp and touched the girl on the shoulder.

"Did that frighten you?" she asked with concern. Birdie nodded, though the answer was more complicated than a simple yes. Miriam's face fell. "I should have thought it through more. I'm sorry." Miriam pulled one tooth, then another from her mouth, and clinked them into a porcelain dish on her nightstand.

Miriam rubbed some pink lotion on the girl's little hands and arms, to make her feel better. Then the girl watched her aunt read, willing her eyes to stay open as long as she could manage. The glinting metal of the Devil's watch chain flashed in her mind, his hair and his teeth. She thought of a long, jagged scar cut across her grandmother's chest.

"Why can't the woman have the life she wants," Birdie asked, "without the help of the Devil?"

Miriam paused her reading and stared into a dark corner of the room. Birdie had been tired, nearly asleep, but her aunt's silence kept her awake. She waited, but her aunt said nothing.

Birdie rolled over to stick her feet out from beneath the quilt. Three long shelves of books covered the wall next to the girl's side of the bed. She ran her eyes over each spine, sounding out the words to keep herself awake. She stopped at a book with the word ROOTS on its thick spine. What could it be about? She closed her eyes and imagined roots tunnelling into the soil, anchoring the house to the top of the hill as if it were itself a living thing, then all the plants in the garden and fields, all the distant trees, attaching the landscape above to the earth below. White roots cracking through her grandmother's strange shoes and burrowing down into the dark, soft soil, and then Rebecca's taproot breaking through the kitchen floor, travelling across the expanse of the cool basement, plunging into the concrete floor, and below, below. She imagined Miriam planted outside in the garden with the zucchinis and eggplants, strong like a tree. She thought of the roots that kept a person in one place, a place where people looked like they were related and smelled the way her parents smelled. Where they brought in wooden baskets of gnarled tomatoes and laughed about the humidity, instead

"And we can start talking about them in three, two, one..."

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of complaining, and pruned the rose-bushes so that they bloomed exuberantly. Where people were happy, and happy, and happy. But, in her imagination, Birdie herself didn't grow roots. She grew wings and flew above them all. And it was as she flew that, against her will, she fell asleep.

In the years to come, Birdie asked her mother and father, her brother and sister, even some cousins, whether Miriam had ever told them the story about the Devil and the typewriter, if it was the sort of story that was passed around, part of the culture, so to speak, or a Mennonite version of an urban myth, but she never found anyone else who had heard it or could help her remember precisely how it went. It obsessed her because the story seemed like some sort of prophecy, or key.

Birdie woke before dawn. Pain throbbed deep in her head. Sweat dampened her nightgown. She moaned, and Miriam woke, touching the girl's face.

"You're aflame," she murmured. The girl couldn't hear out of one ear. Miriam rose and returned with a cold washcloth, which she placed on Birdie's forehead. The girl closed her eyes, and, when she opened them again, the room flared white with day. Miriam put warm oil in her deaf ear. She brought Birdie a tall glass of water with ice. The little girl cried because she was missing the first day of school and was worried, worried about what her mother would think, worried that she had done something wrong by getting sick, that she should have behaved better and not been interested in the Devil, that she was now being punished, and rightly so.

"Poor thing is delirious," Rebecca said, bent over the bed and holding the girl's hot hand. Birdie cried and slept and cried, then woke to an oily splotch on the pillowcase. She took off her nightgown and slept in just her underwear.

Later, much later, as she thought back to the story about the Devil, it seemed as if the story itself had been the earliest symptom of her fever. She incorporated the story into her sickness, into her absence from school on the first day of second grade, her parents in a faraway state. She had not merely been scared

of the Devil. She had wanted to sit on his lap and kiss his hairy cheek. She had wanted to clickety-clack on his black keys. For this, she had been struck with fever, made deaf in one ear—a warning. Her fever dreams were of floating untethered in an infinite black space, of being trapped in a blinding spotlight on an empty stage, not knowing how or where to move.

In what felt like the late afternoon, Birdie rose and stuck her head out the bedroom door, listened to be sure her aunts weren't nearby, then opened one of the small doors beneath the slanted ceiling, and went inside where it was cool. Just inside the door, Miriam kept a flashlight. Its ray illuminated a case of wrapping-paper rolls, a wooden stool, a broken box full of old picture frames. Behind the

wrapping paper, under a piece of gauzy fabric with frayed edges—she was sure that was where the Devil's black typewriter would be. It was as real to her as her own heart. She pulled away the piece of cloth to reveal a wooden knife block, black handles neatly tucked into every slot. She touched the biggest hilt just to be sure it was real. Her fever glowed orange all around her, outlining her hand. She slid the big knife from the block and held it in front of her face, tilted the blade back and forth. She saw a man in a black suit. He spoke lovingly, with a strange accent, to Miriam, before lowering himself to one knee and handing her six knives plunged into a wooden cube. Birdie blinked slowly to clear her eyes, then carefully pressed the cold metal of the knife against her cheek.

Crouched in the darkness like that, the knife a comfort, quite suddenly—or maybe after a long, long while—she was the goblin beyond the little door whom she had once feared. She made raspy little grunts and snorts and flicked her tongue against her lips. She rubbed her palms back and forth against her scalp until her hair was in knots, then dragged her nails down her cheeks. She picked her nose and wiped it into the carpet, then peed through her underpants, the urine flaming hot as it ran down her thighs and splattered on her feet.

She emerged from the little door

into moonlight. How could that be, she wondered. Out the dormer window, the garden overflowed its small plot, an unfettered grotesquerie of florid kales and chards, the tomato plants baroque with late-summer wandering, tendrils crawling up and out of their cages, the squash plants making beds with their elaborate arms. Lie down in that garden and it will take you over, the little girl thought. It will wrap you up and you'll never leave. As she tilted it back and

forth, the knife blade flashed blue, then white.

The story Miriam would tell the girl's parents upon their return was that she had found the girl standing in the dark hallway late at night, underwear sopping, a length of gauzy fabric draped over her head. They would all laugh, Birdie included. What Miriam

would not tell Birdie's parents was that, when she found her, Birdie held in her hand a butcher knife. This was when Birdie learned from her aunt that sometimes lying was a necessary sin, though she wasn't certain this was the lesson her aunt had meant to teach.

In the hallway that night, Miriam had moved close to touch Birdie's flushed cheek, damp and hot with the sickness. She pulled the veil from Birdie's head. The girl's eyes were black, pinpricked with silver light.

"Little bird," she murmured. "You've given me a fright. Come, let's clean you up. What are you doing out here? And with that knife, no less."

On her own June wedding day, decades later—the ceremony under a young maple tree, the reception in a red barn, hot as a fever—Birdie would remember what she had said that night. She would remember how she said to her aunt in the hallway, "I am the bride," as she held out the knife, "and this is my promise." A man slips a golden ring on her finger. The cornfield rises up around them like a fortifying wall, a defense protecting what from what? She remembered for all those years the promise she made with the knife in her hand, and then, after she said I do, she forgot. ♦

NEWYORKER.COM/FICTION

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THE CRITICS

BOOKS

THE QUIET LIFE

A cultural history of silence.

BY ANTHONY LANE

One of the virtues of John Bunyan, the author of “The Pilgrim’s Progress,” is how little he bothered with the high and mighty. He preferred the low and ordinary, in his discourse as in the company he kept. In “Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners”—his spiritual autobiography, which went through many editions after first being published, in 1666—revelations tumble upon him when he is least expecting them. “I was walking to and fro in a good man’s shop, bemoaning of myself in my sad and doleful state,” he writes. We’ve all been there. Suddenly, mid-shopping, he hears the word of the Lord:

It brought light with it, and commanded a silence in my heart, of all those tumultuous thoughts, that did before use, like masterless hell-hounds, to roar and bellow, and make an hideous noise within me.

The storm is nothing, it seems, compared with the eye at its core. Often added to the end of “Grace Abounding” is Bunyan’s account of his arrest, in 1660, for preaching in public. He was torn from his wife and children (an act that he likens to “pulling the flesh from the bones”) and imprisoned. When a magistrate proposed that he hold his tongue and leave the country, warning that he would “stretch by the neck for it” if he disobeyed, Bunyan replied simply that, if released, he would carry on preaching. An illustration in an American edition of the book from 1905 bears the caption “Bunyan refuses to be silenced.” So, there you have it. Silence is the holy hush that descends upon you, amid the clatter of a sinful world,

and the gag that you have to rip off if truth is to be told. How can it be both?

Puzzles of this kind are strewn throughout “Silence: A Literary History” (Oxford), a new book by Kate McLoughlin. It’s a shame that Bunyan doesn’t rate a mention in her survey, because he has much to say about not saying much; it’s also a surprise, because the book is, to say the least, accommodating. It runs to six hundred and ninety-six pages, two hundred and twenty-one of which are consumed by notes, in a typeface so tiny that your intraocular muscles may file suit against your brain. Dropping the volume on your foot would cause an agonized and very non-silent yelp.

To be fair, McLoughlin has her hands full. Silence is one of those spillover themes, like desire or faith or sickness, to which it is difficult to set a limit. So irrepressible is her hunt for evidence that she does not falter even when it leads to the bathroom door:

The Anti-Noise League, founded in 1933, led efforts literally to turn down the volume of everyday life. In 1935, the League held an exhibition at the Science Museum in South Kensington, featuring exhibits such as the ‘Silent Symphonic W.C. Suite’, a lavatory with a ‘very silent’ flush.

Where, you wonder, will the quest conceivably end? I was hoping that McLoughlin, who teaches English literature at Oxford, might round things out by attending a thrash-metal festival, or a campanology contest, or maybe a resounding royal flush, but even then she would, I suspect, be moved to explore the quivering silence that succeeds an extremity of sound. As it hap-

happens, she reserves her most elegant chapter for last, guiding us through the witty winding down of Haydn’s Symphony No. 45, the “Farewell,” in which “the score directs the musicians, section by section, to snuff out the candles on their music stands and leave the stage.”

Chronologically, “Silence: A Literary History” covers everything from the empty halls of “Beowulf” to COVID lockdowns and beyond. (There are glances even further back, too; I like to think of Harvard professors turning deep green with envy at the news that Pythagoras required his pupils to keep quiet for five years before they could presume to pipe up.) Space is found not only for “the twelfth-century Premonstratensian abbot Philip of Harveng” but also for the BBC show “Strictly Come Dancing,” which, in 2021, cut the music mid-routine, thus allowing the audience to share, however briefly, in the silence to which the dancing competitor—an actress, deaf since birth—was accustomed. The result was, for prime-time TV, something to marvel at. Pythagoras would have given it a ten out of ten.

As the book rolls on, we pass familiar monuments. McLoughlin lingers to pay her respects to Donne, Milton, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats—who writes of “the silence when some rhymes are coming out,” as if they were snails emerging after the rain—and a mustering of major novelists, including Samuel Richardson (whose epistolary epic “Clarissa,” not far short of a million words long, teems nonetheless with the unspoken), George Eliot, Henry James, and

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ABOVE: MIGUEL PORLAN

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Pythagoras reportedly required his students to remain silent for five full years before they could presume to speak.

ILLUSTRATION BY BEN HICKEY

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Thomas Hardy. The last of these keeps presenting us with couples who can't, won't, or feel no need to say what they mean, let alone what they mean to each other, even as they carry on conversing. "Jude the Obscure" is a case in point:

When they talked on an indifferent subject, as now, there was ever a second silent conversation passing between their emotions, so perfect was the reciprocity between them.

It is typical of Hardy that he should move from such parlor drama to the vast and exhausted quiet that followed the Armistice, at the end of the First World War. In a poem titled "And There Was a Great Calm," from 1920, he writes of bewildered soldiers murmuring, "Strange, this! How? All firing stopped." McLoughlin quotes those words and backs them up by reproducing a graphic of an audio recording made by the U.S. Army Signal Corps at that exact time, in 1918. Stuttering lines, on the left, jerking up and down, denote the rattle of guns; on the right, the lines are all but flat, as silence descends. (Can an official document become a work of art, by dint of what it gravely represents?) In memory of that hour and in honor of the dead, a two-minute silence is still observed across the United Kingdom at 11 A.M., on the eleventh day of the eleventh month, every year.

As customs go, a nationwide suspension of normal activity is unusual. (I was once at a British airport, trudging through security, when the two-minute silence struck; the expression on the faces of the travellers around me, as the conveyor belts shuddered to a halt, was one of international bafflement.) Only once, though, in passing, does McLoughlin

refer to the two-minute silence, as if discomforted by its state-sponsored formality. On the whole, she leans toward more radical forms of reticence, born of protest or despair down the centuries. "In the 2020s, as in the 1600s and 1700s, political upheavals have a silencing effect," she writes. Of the three components of the quiet life that she cites—"traumatised silences, Stoic silences, and happy silences"—the third tends to get muscled out, at least within this book, by the other two. Thanks to McLoughlin, we are introduced to "the silences that surround transness—hiddenness, rejection, defiance of conventional categories" and to "the terrifying silences of the climate crisis." And don't forget the kind of silence that "fosters careful attentiveness to other non-human life-forms." In other words, if you shout at your dog, you're barking up the wrong tree.

There is something in "Silence: A Literary History" to suit all tastes. Whatever flavor you fancy, take a lick. "Here are embarrassing silences, controlling silences, silences that provoke outrage and sympathy, silences that shift and slip away," McLoughlin writes. The temptation to sniff the pages for a vanilla silence or a strawberry silence is almost overwhelming. On a single page, silences are described as "variously breath-taking, poignant, consternating, hilarious and self-evidently true," and then, a few lines on, as "saddening, breath-taking, soothing, demanding, difficult to understand and awe-inspiring." That's a lot of breath to take.

In terms of latitude, much of what McLoughlin chooses to investigate is silence-adjacent, as it were, rather than

the genuine article. The craving for solitude and serenity, say, may be intense, but it doesn't logically imply the shutting of one's trap. Not all retreats are monastic, and seclusion can easily nourish a hothouse of gossip. Also, gratifying though it is that the book should avert its gaze from the literary A-list in favor of lesser-known figures, there is a discernible sleight of hand, or a hefty wrench, as they are levered into place. The most entertaining of these is undoubtedly Margaret Cavendish, the Duchess of Newcastle, who died in 1673, at the age of fifty, leaving more than twenty volumes of poems, plays, and essays. It's true that she called herself "a Monster for Silence," and that she wrote a play titled "The Lady Contemplation" (1662), but she was, in the flesh, the quintessence of volubility—one of those people who, by her own account, gabble "so Much, and Fast, as none can Understand what they Say, or would Say, Indeed, so Fast, as they make neither Stop, nor Distinction." Hark to the gulping of those commas. "Cavendish had chutzpah," McLoughlin declares, and it's hard to disagree, but let's be frank: one thing the Duchess did not possess was a talent for keeping mum.

With Shakespeare, predictably, McLoughlin is on firmer ground. We are alerted to the startling scene in "Coriolanus" when the hero addresses his wife as if she were an abstract noun: "My gracious silence, hail!" She does not reply. (Think of the options for an actress here. Should she modestly lower her gaze, obeying the salutation, or flinch, or freeze the guy with a fierce glare?) McLoughlin's most searching work is inspired by "The Winter's Tale," whose concluding scene unfolds on a plane of the miraculous. Years after Leontes, a king contorted by jealousy, has ordered that his wife, the blameless Hermione, be put to death, a curtain is drawn back to reveal what appears to be a statue of her. It stirs, and mutely comes to life. "If this be magic, let it be an art/Lawful as eating," Leontes says. When Hermione speaks at last, it is pointedly not to him but to their daughter. All the more delightful, therefore, to learn from McLoughlin of an early-nineteenth-century production of the play in which Leontes was dressed as Napoleon—boo, hiss!—and his marmoreal queen as an English

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lady, nobly greeting him with a diss.

But how, pray, can you concoct a literary history of silence and not spare even a sentence for “Henry IV, Part 2,” which features a character called Silence? During the orchard scene in the fifth act, a little the worse—or, this being Shakespeare, the better—for drink, Silence, a minor country magistrate, grows untrue to his name and begins to sing. Falstaff, listening to these scraps of ditties, remarks, “I did not think Master Silence had been a man of this mettle.” Silence’s answer is both woozy and bridling: “Who, I? I have been merry twice and once ere now.” In 1945, there was a celebrated staging of the play at London’s Old Vic, starring Laurence Olivier and Ralph Richardson. The critic Kenneth Tynan reviewed it in this magazine, and wrote of the ripened scenes in the orchard, “If I had only half an hour more to spend in theatres, and could choose at large, no question but I would have these.” The breaking of silence in a tipsy twilight, if only for the sake of comical nonsense, can be as blessed as the break of dawn.

It is unfair, perhaps, to chide the author of “Silence: A Literary History” for her omissions, but her decision to plumb the religious depths of her subject and leave untouched the legal ramifications—the use and abuse of Miranda rights, for one thing, which are a staple of much crime fiction—may strike some readers as perverse. McLoughlin herself is nicely alive to such charges, kicking off her final chapter thus: “Despite its length, readers may pounce on what isn’t in this book.” Pouncing, of course, is one of the eternal joys of reading, just as sports fans know no keener pleasure than that of kvetching about the players who weren’t picked for a vital game and who would have surely made all the difference. Hence my belief that Nietzsche, who shows up only fitfully in McLoughlin’s book, is the tight end that she needs. Here he is, sounding off in “Ecce Homo”:

The rudest word, the rudest letter, are more good-natured, more honest than silence. Those who keep silent almost always lack subtlety and politeness of the heart; silence is an objection, swallowing down necessarily produces a bad character—it even ruins the stomach. All those given to silence are dyspeptic.

As so often, Nietzsche throws down a gauntlet that we didn’t realize was

BRIEFLY NOTED

Daylight Come, by Joshua Jelly–Schapiro (Penguin Press). This biography of Harry Belafonte, who died in 2023, paints the singer and civil-rights activist as “our first post-racial pop star.” In his music, Belafonte sought to honor his Caribbean heritage—he was born in Harlem to Jamaican parents in 1927—without being reduced to a mere exotic persona. Throughout his career, he merged his work as an entertainer with his political convictions (he refused to perform in segregated venues, for instance), a pursuit that required him to square his fame “with his anger at the society that gave it to him.” Jelly–Schapiro draws on a range of sources, including conversations with Belafonte, presenting a portrait of a formidable figure who, as Belafonte’s son puts it, “was serving two families: us and the family of Man.”

Scavenging Beauty, by Angelica Glass (Riverhead). Memories of a childhood marked by economic hardship and abuse intertwine with the natural world in this graceful début memoir, which is structured around the author’s seven-year project of walking every street in Santa Cruz County, in California. Glass, a former child-welfare social worker, writes with quiet precision about growing up as one of eight children with a mother whose love often turned into violence, and a father whose failures cast an equally enduring shadow. Encounters with shifting coastlines, towering redwoods, and mycelial networks spark meditations on inheritance, resilience, and the work of remaking a life.

Dooneen, by Keith Ridgway (New Directions). This strange, ambitious novel is set in a version of Dublin where cars have been banned and people enter the country by teleportation. Bartholomew Port, an Irish writer living in London, returns to his homeland to participate in a literary festival, and arrives on the eve of a populist uprising. Dublin, he observes, has become a machine “for enriching the rich” and “impoverishing the poor,” a place where “life is not as important as money.” As Port falls in with a group of conspirators preparing for the insurrection, the book takes on a hallucinatory, digressive quality, blurring the lines between life and death, reality and illusion. Ultimately, Ridgway asks what responsibility bystanders must take for the injustices around them.

Queen Mab, by Emily McBride (Farrar, Straus & Giroux). Madeleine is a “promising” twenty-three-year-old graduate student who decides, to the shock of other academic women in her life, to have a baby. (“They all say congrats, by the way, and better you than them,” one colleague says.) The body horror of birth gives way to the fairy-tale horror of early motherhood, which McBride, a translator based in Barcelona, strews with literary Easter eggs from folktales and Victorian poetry. Is the baby really a baby, or has it been replaced by a changeling? Is Madeleine still herself, or has she been stolen away, too? Can her husband be trusted? The result is an agile, unsettling novel about the unwinding of a mind, set in a world of women who view motherhood as a curious affectation.

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there for the throwing. His emphasis is not, like McLoughlin's, on types of silence, multifarious as they are, but on the disorder—the basic psychological ill health—that underlies them all. Such an approach would come in handy, I reckon, if you were prepping for your first viewing of "Persona," Ingmar Bergman's unsparing two-hander of 1966, in which one character prattles incessantly and the other says nothing whatsoever, having lapsed into self-cloistering silence in the midst of performing a Greek tragedy. There is no better illustration of speechlessness being deployed as a weapon, forcing the loquacious, as if at gunpoint, to fill the void with words. Alas, "Persona" earns not even a footnote from McLoughlin, who, apart from a nod to Harpo Marx, seems oddly un-enriched by cinema, despite the fact that it's the only dramatic art form that was born and grew up in silence. How can tribute not be paid to the delicious joke in Mel Brooks's "Silent Movie" (1976), in which the only audible word is "Non!", uttered by Marcel Marceau, the world's most famous mime? To be fair, McLoughlin does offer compensation, providing an extraordinary detail from Marceau's early life of which I was unaware:

Marcel began to teach the Jewish children he helped smuggle from France into Switzerland how to communicate silently at times of danger by moving their bodies rather than opening their mouths.

For whom is "Silence: A Literary History" intended? To judge by the vocabulary deployed in its pages, the book belongs in the inner sanctum of literary theory, where the walls are hung with gnarly rhetorical tropes. If you can tell your adnotations from your asyndeton; if you know that an anacoluton refers to a snapping off or veering away in the grammatical structure of a sentence and not to a snake that will slowly squeeze the verbs out of you; if you can say the word "euthanasia" without spitting on the person beside you, and the phrase "problematically anthropomorphic" without blowing bubbles; if that feels like child's play, congratulations.

And what to make of this?

In 2016, the 16,141,241 people who voted Remain in the UK's Brexit referendum, myself included, got to know what it felt like to be on a losing side in an historical turning-point. Disbelief, anger, grief, shame, denial. After the US presidential election later that year, I deleted my Facebook and Twitter accounts. Part of me knew it was more important than ever to keep fighting; another part needed to turn off the noise.

That is McLoughlin, baring her political all. Even if you agree with her (and somewhere, flowing beneath her book, is the assumption that no Brexiteer, or reactionary of any stripe, could possibly want to read it, or feel at home with literary finesse), it is nevertheless peculiar to see her break cover in this fashion. It could be argued that academic writing in the humanities has never seemed more dangerously adrift from common parlance, and that scholars like McLoughlin, sensing that risk, are right and brave to reach for a chatty personal candor, now and then, in order to snag their readers' sympathy and keep them engaged. The trouble comes when, having ventured on such a tangent, the critic has to lurch back on track. Here is McLoughlin, turning her attention to the long wake of the English Civil War, when a circumspect rural retirement was à la mode:

Being a Remainer after the Brexit vote was a taste of what was a widespread experience in the second half of the seventeenth century and early eighteenth century.

Hmm. I may be wrong, but I don't think that David Cameron, who led the Remain campaign, was exhumed and hanged in chains by the victorious Leavers, or that his dead head was cut off and stuck on a spike for more than twenty years—the punishment meted out in 1661 to Oliver Cromwell, or, at any rate, to his guilty corpse, after King Charles II was restored to the throne. Nor is it quite clear what this excursion into historical parallels has to do with silence. Uncoupling from social media, as McLoughlin did, may be a wise move, but to what degree does it muffle the universal racket? Never having joined Facebook, Twitter, X, Instagram, TikTok, or any of the other treats from Pandora's app store, I'm unqualified to comment. All I know is that I have yet to attain the tough tranquillity of a Trappist.

In spite of—or, to be charitable, because of—these and other eccentricities, "Silence: A Literary History" is worth your time, whether or not you have the stamina to plow straight through. It functions best as a trigger book. Open it at random, pick a chapter, and you are pretty much guaranteed to be launched upon a trajectory of unfamiliar thought. Who knew that Thoreau wrote something with the natty title of "Some Scraps from an Essay on 'Sound And Silence' Written in the Latter Half of this Month,—December, 1838," in which he instinctively alludes to his subject as female? ("It were vain for me to interpret the Silence. She cannot be done into English.") Likewise, shortly before urging us to try Anne Brontë's "Agnes Grey," with its combative vision of silence as a kind of armor—"I was used to wearing a placid smiling countenance when my heart was bitter within me"—McLoughlin informs us that, when Thackeray threw a party for Charlotte Brontë, her taciturnity "unnerved her host so much that he actually slipped out of his own house and spent the evening at his club." Trust the Brontës to be a squadron of Shtumtroopers, silencing people to bits.

Most appealing of all are those moments at which McLoughlin turns into an eager chatelaine, not so much dropping names as introducing them to one another, in the hope of a giddy intellectual chemistry. Where else could Alfred, Lord Tennyson, share a parenthesis with Ed Sheeran and the Foo Fighters? Who but McLoughlin could cram Jane Austen, Jack Benny, and Immanuel Kant into a single sentence? And what of Pink Dandelion—neither a folk-rock group, as you might imagine, nor a refreshing cordial but the name of a professor at the University of Birmingham, in England, who specializes in the history of Quakerism? The whole book is noisy with noiselessness; you can practically hear the clink and fizz of glasses being refilled. As the party winds down, you are left with a cheerful irony: so dense has been the crowd of creatives advising us, through the ages, on the essential art of silence that by the end you've had enough. You just want them to shut up. ♦

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BOOKS

THE LONELIEST NUMBER

An uncompromising Belgian novelist's digital afterlife.

BY KATY WALDMAN

Go to any brick-and-mortar bookstore and you'll probably see at least one table dedicated to titles that "pop on BookTok." Since around 2020, the literary precinct of the social-media platform TikTok seems to have usurped older marketing and publicity strategies as a primary driver of sales. The hashtag's more than fifty-two million videos tend to feature telegenic young people emoting in front of brightly colored shelves; the recommendations flow into each other, a self-replenishing stream. Many of the books the platform uplifts belong to commercial genres, such as romance and romantasy. But BookTok has also

surfaced classics, including doorstops such as "Lonesome Dove" and "East of Eden" and short, lesser-known works in an emotional and lovelorn key, such as "White Nights," from 1848, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, and "No Longer Human," from 1948, by the Japanese novelist Osamu Dazai.

If there's an overlooked treasure that BookTok most deserves credit for rediscovering, it might be "I Who Have Never Known Men," a slender novel by the Belgian Jewish author Jacqueline Harpman, which first appeared in English in 1997. In 2022, the nonprofit publisher Transit Books reissued the novel in a revised translation, from the French,

Jacqueline Harpman's fiction explores themes of entrapment, isolation, and exile.

by Ros Schwartz. Largely thanks to social media, it has since sold more than eight hundred thousand copies in North America alone; Harpman, who died in 2012, has attained a posthumous internet celebrity, replete with honorary Google Doodle. This summer, Transit published a trio of her short stories, never before seen in English, under the title "We Were Forbidden."

BookTok's preferences may skew toward familiar beats and blunt-force sensation, but in Harpman the hive mind has alighted on something more capacious and slippery. "I Who Have Never Known Men" is a stubbornly unillusioned study of how isolation shapes and misshapes the human psyche. The book takes the form of a testimony that its nameless protagonist, the last survivor of an unknown catastrophe, is writing down as she dies of uterine cancer. Her earliest memories are of an underground bunker, patrolled by male guards with whips, where she was imprisoned with thirty-nine older women. She is innocent of parents, love, sex, what coffee tastes like, what an orange smells like, what the sky looks like.

Not quite halfway through the novel, the soldiers vanish, leaving a door unlocked, and the prisoners climb a hundred stairs to find a world of neutral plains and unremittingly mild weather. They never learn why they were jailed, what happened during their internment, or even whether they're on Earth or some other planet. They wander, encountering groups of dead captives, male and female, in bunkers like their own, but no living people. They build houses with stones and mud, cook communal meals, and forage for food and supplies. And then, one by one, they die, leaving the protagonist alone.

Harpman's picture of stripped-down desolation has resonated with many social-media users, who have praised the book's "haunting" story and likened it to "staring into a void." There's an incongruity to the fact that an austere twentieth-century work of dystopian science fiction, which was admired when it was released for its philosophical rigor and inward focus, is finding new life on a social platform built out of clips that are disposable by design. But "I Who Have

SOPHIE BASSOULS / GETTY

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Never Known Men” has a fruitful vagueness. The narrator, purged of identifiers except for her yearning, her rational faculties, and her sense of unbelonging, is counterintuitively relatable—a portrait of rudimentary, universal humanity. (A whiff of melodrama to Harpman’s vision probably plays well online, too.)

It might also matter that “I Who Have Never Known Men” is preoccupied with many of the same questions that BookTokers, with their ephemeral medium and their new role as cultural conservators, have reason to care about. What are the creative forms that persist after you’ve disappeared? What enables an art work to transcend the stream? Harpman was writing in a different era, but the elegiac loneliness of her fiction anticipates our own solitary and screen-bound present. Is there anyone out there? her book seems to ask. How do I find you?

Harpman was born in Etterbeek, Belgium, in 1929. During the Nazi occupation, she and her family fled to Morocco, where they lived until the end of the war, escaping the fate of several relatives on her father’s side, who died in Auschwitz. Back in her home country, Harpman began studying medicine, but had to stop after she contracted tuberculosis. She convalesced in a sanatorium for two years—an experience that, like the nightmare still fresh in the memory of European Jews, may have filtered into her prison plot. Her first book, “Love and Acacia,” was published in 1958, when she was nearing thirty, but she composed the majority of her fourteen novels in her fifties, sixties, and seventies. In the interim, she trained in psychology, and in 1980 she qualified as a psychoanalyst. (Her undergraduate dissertation was on Rorschach tests.) Appreciated but not idolized in her lifetime, she won a handful of prizes, including the Prix Médicis for “Orlanda,” from 1996, about a woman whose tomboyish tendencies split off from the rest of her psyche and jump into the body of a music journalist.

Most of Harpman’s work that has so far been translated into English circles feelings of entrapment, disorientation, and exile. Psychoanalytic

concepts—projection, attachment, wishes and wish fulfillment—loom large. Harpman portrays sexual fantasy, and its relation to writing, with startling frankness. Isolation becomes both an affliction and a muse in “I Who Have Never Known Men,” as the narrator spins out a sequence of erotic stories in her head. They star her youngest jailer, who, like his fellows, is forbidden to interact with his charges. (In a rare, sly note of comedy, she also stares at him incessantly, telling another woman that this is a form of resistance, and that she’s “invented something unexpected.”) Each fantasy, the girl says, produces “an extraordinary burst of light exploding inside me.” In pursuit of this “eruption,” she tells herself “increasingly long and complicated stories,” trying to outsmart her “inner audience” and retain the element of surprise. “My imagination developed,” she reports. “I had to exercise rigorous discipline.” Sometimes one part of her wants to get to the finale, but another part, “entranced by the pleasure of listening,” would prefer that the narrative keep going.

As the girl’s process evolves, the fictions themselves become at least as important as their physical effects, and a series of recurring characters turn into “old friends.” Her wistful hope is that a good enough story might yield companions so detailed

and lively that they can satisfy her hunger for connection. She doesn’t realize how limited these friends are until she discovers books.

Poignantly, given that all the living men in the novel are incarcerators, the narrator directs little hostility toward traditional masculine ideals. In fact, her account often seems suffused with longing for heterosexual relationships—for the husbands and the lovers that she, unlike the elder women in the

bunker, will never have. “How could I consider myself a human being, I who have only known thirty-nine people and all of them women?” she asks. By this point, she no longer experiences eruptions, but she’s still conjuring up men. When death comes for her, she writes, “I will take my last ten steps to go and put these sheets of paper on the table . . . an emaciated old woman whose eyes, which no hand will close, will always be looking toward the door.”

Yet is it really a man she’s waiting for, or some other type of partner? “Perhaps I have tried to create time” with the memoir project, the woman speculates. She is writing “for some unknown reader,” she continues, who will admit her work into their mind: “The reader and I thus mingled will constitute something living, that will not be me, because I will be dead, and will not be that person as they were before.” It’s an erotic fantasy that morphs into a metaphor of literary generation as sexual reproduction. Writing creates a life that will sustain the woman’s legacy—as long as someone is there to apprehend it. “Most likely no one will come,” she concludes.

As potent as Harpman’s novel is, there’s an adolescent quality to “I Who Have Never Known Men,” which broods on its themes like a teen-ager who has just discovered existentialism. The book’s post-apocalyptic setting ennobles its meditations on selfhood and finitude; the narrator’s search for perpetuity is lent an unshakable gravity by her circumstances.

For readers who first met Harpman via her melancholic digital afterlife, “We Were Forbidden” will arrive as a revelation. The gem of the collection is its longest story, “The Broom Closet,” a sex farce that wrangles its author’s ideas about artistic permanence into a more prosaic form. The tale begins with a successful novelist in late middle age boarding a train after a publishing event. When her gaze falls on a stranger in the dining car, she’s overtaken by a fantasy involving a dashing army officer in Central Europe in the nineteen-twenties. In the daydream, she is a young and beautiful judge’s wife in “long suede gloves that buttoned up to the elbows,” and the

60 THE NEW YORKER, AUGUST 10, 2026

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artilleryman seduces her at the magistrates' ball. They have sex in the titular closet ("We toppled over together among the feather dusters"); she's been so sheltered in her marriage that, somewhat implausibly, she has never seen a penis. But she's a quick study, and is soon plotting her husband's murder, enlisting the aid of an assassin whom he has recently sentenced to death.

Unlike the unremittingly bleak and occasionally self-serious "I Who Have Never Known Men," "The Broom Closet" is arch, light-fingered, and very funny. But its narrator follows the same progression from fantasy to fiction-making. Her adultery story initially evokes the imprisoned girl's compensatory reveries, but over time its focus shifts. She grows increasingly invested in her side characters, lavishing attention and energy on scenes that have little to do with the original seduction. In the most affecting subplot, the assassin the wife has hired to kill her husband appears at the husband's bedside, unaware that he is already dying (the diagnosis is "acute appendicitis, with necrotic enterocolitis"). Nature takes its course while the would-be murderer watches. "Poor us, little souls wandering through the chaos of our lives," the author cries, in a voice that might be the husband's, or the hit man's, or her own. She's gone from dreaming up person-shaped sex toys to mourning a supporting cast member, extending her imaginative empathy so far that she can't bring herself to allow one of her creations to be offed without ceremony.

The narrator of "The Broom Closet" can claim firsthand, intimate knowledge of men: she mentions a husband. But she doesn't seem especially enamored of the guy, though she apparently lacks her alter ego's taste for mariticide. What capacity she has for deep connection is expressed in her fiction. Like the child in "I Who Have Never Known Men," she is preoccupied with her historical impact and pessimistic about the chance that her words will outlast her (albeit for reasons of literary fashion rather than planetary catastrophe). "I wanted to be loved, respected, and appreciated," she writes, "but I will be forgotten." She thinks that, if she's lucky, a novel of hers "will

"I have ways of finding out if you're mad at me."

be lying in the bookcase of one of my great-grandchildren, yellowing, dried up, likely to crumble to the touch . . . and my great-grandson's new girlfriend will open it, read a few lines, and say: 'Whoa! That style of writing is so outdated.' Which will bury me once and for all." Alienation may have acquired a kind of tragic glamour in Harpman's best-known novel, but "The Broom Closet" renders it unremarkable, a function of quotidian human differences and difficulties rather than the end of the world.

At one point in "I Who Have Never Known Men," the narrator stumbles upon an abandoned home and, as BookTok might put it, is "utterly ruined" by what she discovers: walls "covered in a beautiful wood with a dark sheen," carpets, paintings, vases, "a small carving." The museumlike "interplay of lines, shapes and harmonious colours" brings her to tears.

The scene enlarges the nature of the narrator's quest: she's not looking for just a romantic partner or even a

reader who will preserve her memory. What she has been starving for, more than individual people, is what people create together. Her profound loneliness stems from her lack of access to human culture, a set of shared traditions that survives one's particular life and links it to the past and the future. If Harpman's work has jumped from her time into our own, it may be because she appreciates the fragility of this emergent property of existence but honors it anyway. Her books attest to the potential for solitary selves to meet, merge, and multiply, producing something more beautiful and enduring than they can alone. ♦

Correction of the Week

From the (Portland, Ore.) Willamette Week.

Last week's interview with the founder of Portland State University's "Students for Trump" group ("Four Questions for Vologymyr Kolychev," WW, April 13, 2016) misquoted his characterization of his political opponents. He described them as "aspiring Bolshevik commissars," not "aspiring bullshit commissars." WW regrets the errors.

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THE ART WORLD

THE ANOMALY

Fairfield Porter's strange, stranded vision of the world.

BY ZACHARY FINE

In works like "Islands" (1968), Porter used color to evoke inner experience.

The poet John Ashbery, in 1983, said that Fairfield Porter was "perhaps the major American artist of the century." It's not praise you can take at face value—Ashbery and Porter were good friends—but it's a tempting thought. How might a painter of limited technical skill, who mostly depicted coastal landscapes and living rooms in the nineteen-fifties and sixties, be considered a major American artist? "Perhaps" is the key word in Ashbery's phrase, a little escape hatch that admits how improbable the judgment is while conveying the ambivalence felt by those of us who admire Porter and can't always say why. I think if you saw a lone painting of his in a junk shop, unsigned and unframed, you'd find it perfectly pleasing and mediocre.

The new exhibition at the Art Stu-

Students League, "Fairfield Porter: What Everyone Knows," has the ideal selection to show why he's often better than his individual pieces. Porter studied at the League under Thomas Hart Benton—one of his classmates was a fellow named Jackson Pollock—and the experience of seeing his work here, as students hustle by with their backpacks and the perfume of turpentine wafts through the air, feels organic and just right. The gallery is evenly and fluorescently lit, and all thirty-five or so of Porter's featured paintings are in a single room, concentrating his palette of lime greens and creamy yellows and oxblood reds into one bright, soul-cleansing burst.

Everything happened for Porter when he was about forty-five. After flopping around for a few decades and getting zero traction as a painter, he

was invited, in 1951, on the recommendation of Elaine de Kooning, to be a critic for ARTnews. The following year, on the recommendation of Elaine's husband, Willem de Kooning, he had a solo show at Tibor de Nagy Gallery. The gallery's director, John Bernard Myers, gave Porter the show without even looking at his work, and was baffled when Porter showed up with half a dozen still-lifes and landscapes. In the fifties, to paint anything but a full-throttle abstraction was an efficient way to derail your career. But Porter's art grew on Myers, a not uncommon experience. Let the paintings breathe for a while, let them interact with one another and with your thoughts, and they'll meld together with salt breeze and summer light.

An unusually late bloomer, Porter did his best work in the last decade of his life, from the mid-sixties to 1975. Until then, he was still processing his influences. Sometimes he'd channel a bit of Edward Hopper, albeit with a looser wrist—see the lonely house in a field in "Landscape" (1956)—or borrow some lumpy shapes from Marsden Hartley, but the main hurdles were two Frenchmen, Pierre Bonnard and Édouard Vuillard. Porter saw their work in an exhibition in Chicago, in 1938, and never let them go. Like his forebears, Porter painted bourgeois interiors with flat areas of color and dancing floral patterns on wallpaper and furniture. The problem is that, in much of his early work, the colors are drab. Sometimes a dark mustard or pale green sinks a painting, but often there's a dampening effect applied to everything, so that in a piece like "Armchair on Porch" (1955) all optical sensation is dulled to a minimum.

Thankfully, in the sixties, a light flips on. An extreme case is "Oak Tree" (1969), where sunlight crashes through the branches onto the grass and becomes its own radioactive organism. There's a whole subgenre of these high-contrast works in Porter's late style, but my favorites are pieces like "Untitled (View Outside Southampton Studio)" (1968) and "Amherst Campus No. 1' (1969), with their cartographic splotches of foliage. It hadn't occurred to me until seeing "Amherst" at the

FAIRFIELD PORTER / COURTESY & ESTATE OF FAIRFIELD PORTER / ARS / STEVENS COLLECTION

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Parrish Art Museum, a decade ago, that a painter could use color as a chronological instrument. In “Untitled,” a row of yellow-green trees are painted so phosphorescently on top of the other layers that they effectively chirp: Look here first! Only then can your eye move to the brick-red house, the pale sky, the pockets of shadow. The effect is to re-create not the trees but the flow of the painter’s own aesthetic experience.

Porter credited the Impressionists with being the first to use color as a vehicle of subjectivity, and Bonnard and Vuillard with intensifying that subjectivity, painting their private lives with an anything-goes palette. But the colorist who gave Porter an extra edge was Willem de Kooning. In the fifties, when de Kooning started doing his big, slashing abstractions with wide housepainter’s brushes, Porter said they recalled landscapes in which the colors are “intensely themselves, as if each color had been freed to be.” Colors didn’t have to represent reality or make concessions to it; they were packets of immediate sensation. Porter said he found his own feelings in de Kooning’s hues: a patch of blue expressed the delight of a Maine summer; pink was the way he felt on the seacoast; a harmony of warm tones bottled up the sensation of autumn. He once compared de Kooning’s use of paint to the “perfect orgasm.”

Most artists enchanted with de Kooning try to paint like him. But Porter somehow passed through the needle’s eye of abstraction and returned to his own eccentric realism on the other side, churning out images of starched Southampton interiors and Penobscot Bay. There are pieces in the show, like “Islands” (1968) and “View from the Front” (ca. 1969), where you can see Porter using what he called the “dry speed” of de Kooning’s brushwork. In “Islands,” there’s an excellent sky-blue brushstroke that horizontally slices the green bush (or is it a tree?) near the middle of the painting. That single stroke implies either that the water is behind the shrub, visible only in patches through the leaves, or that we’re looking at a retinal afterimage of the water over the shrub, as the painter swivels his head between the landscape

and the canvas. There’s also a little geyser on the far left, shooting upward like the vertical blast of paint through de Kooning’s “Merritt Parkway” (1959). Ocean spray doesn’t look that way, but it feels like it.

Good painters rarely make good critics, but Porter was both. His writing was rhetorically pungent and had a rare jargon-free poetry. His most exotic idea was to delete fiftyish years of art history and suggest that Impressionism—not Cubism or Surrealism or any other stylistic eruption—was the real forerunner of Abstract Expressionism. A painting obtained reality just by transmitting the artist’s own “kinetic and visual sense of the world,” Porter wrote. This was an indirect jab at his favorite nemesis, the critic Clement Greenberg, whose lockjawed aesthetic program presented Ab Ex as an expression of History itself, which marched in only one direction: from figuration and depth to abstraction and flatness. Greenberg represented the greatest sin for Porter—letting ideas overrule experience. Ideas made painters and critics impervious to seeing what was in front of them. Porter’s mission was to make people see again.

For whatever reason, Porter couldn’t see people. His portraits are almost comically bad. The painter Larry Rivers described Porter’s portrait of him as “flat and rather empty,” and that applies to pretty much all of them. (For the comic element, consider his painting of Frank O’Hara, who looks a bit like a salami sliding off a couch.) None of Porter’s talent for shadow, light, and air transfers to bodies and faces. With “The Screen Porch” (1964), a large group portrait that desperately wants to be a masterpiece—it has a number of auteur touches, like a cannister of turpentine in the bottom left which signals “the painter was here”—Porter’s family had the right idea, nicknaming it “The Four Ugly People.” The only portrait in the exhibition with a spark is “Jimmy and John” (1957–58), of the poets James Schuyler and John Ashbery. Their friendship isn’t visible, nor are their personalities, but the way their bodies are angled away from each other evokes two ships crossing in open water. Just that simple arrangement

makes the distance between them ache.

Although Porter was kept at arm’s length by most of the Abstract Expressionists, he was embraced by the New York School poets—in particular Ashbery, Schuyler, O’Hara, and Kenneth Koch—who, almost twenty years his junior, adopted him as a mixed-use transferential figure. To Schuyler, whose relationship with him was the most complicated, Porter was a father figure, a lover, a caretaker, a friend, and a rather sullen, insecure man who needed cheering up. The phrase “conflict of interest” doesn’t begin to describe the kinds of transactions that took place, as Schuyler boosted Porter’s paintings in exhibition reviews even while he was staying at the painter’s house in Southampton, with Porter’s wife and children, and living on his dime. Porter’s family wealth came from land around the present-day Chicago Loop, and he spent much of his life supported by a trust. From the late forties on, he shuttled between his family’s private island in Maine, Great Spruce Head, and the chilly, Federal-style house in Southampton, along with frequent stays in New York City. His wealth worked like a “cotton padding” between him and the world, a friend once said.

Porter didn’t disagree. By some accounts, he was an odd guy. Pleasantries eluded him. If he wasn’t silent altogether, he might start talking intensely about one subject or another, and then fall silent again. He had a kind of estranged personality, with thick walls separating him from different parts of himself and from other people, and it can be felt in not just the portraits but the landscapes. Whether it’s “Looking Through the House” (1961), a darkened interior with a window facing a bay, or “A Day Indoors” (1962), with three sitters in the house on Great Spruce Head, siloed in their own worlds, everything and everyone feels just slightly out of reach. There is a landscape you want to see, as if for the first time, or a person you want to speak to, and for some reason can’t. So much of the feeling in Porter’s work comes from this stuckness. It’s one of the most difficult emotions to convey in art—the emotion that hasn’t yet found its expression—but Porter mastered it. ♦

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ON TELEVISION

VICTIM COMPLEX

“Furious,” on Hulu.

BY INKOO KANG

The first episode of “Furious” ends with a date from hell. It’s a late night in Manhattan, and Oliver (Rob Delaney) is a wealthy, middle-aged lawyer and a walking assemblage of red flags. Between lines of coke, he yammers on to Catherine (Lola Petticrew), the young server he’s just picked up, about how his ex-wife’s incessant chatter led to the end of their marriage, and how she should’ve made more allowances for his sex addiction. When Catherine leans in to kiss him, he presents her with an N.D.A. It’s a relief to know that the only reason this tiny, sharp-eyed woman is putting up with his nonsense is that she plans to kill him. Even when forcibly injecting

him with fentanyl, she’s the more sympathetic figure: their first sexual encounter, she explains, took place years ago, when she was a fifteen-year-old trafficking victim. Catherine remembers that he brought her a glass of water afterward, so she returns the favor, offering him a few sips. Just before finishing him off, she coaxes him to repeat a phrase that helped her endure: “I’m not here.”

Catherine’s homicidal pursuit of the men involved in the most calamitous night of her life composes one half of the new Hulu crime drama; the other half traces the investigation into the murders by two female F.B.I. agents, who gradually realize that the dead men are

connected via a pedophilic network. Alice (Emmy Rossum), an N.Y.P.D. detective turned Bureau rookie, and Nora (Quincy Tyler Bernstine), a veteran of the sex-crimes unit, recognize the case for the career-maker it could be. Eager as the women are to nab a serial killer, going after the network’s Epstein-like billionaire ringleader proves even more tempting. Having spent decades watching powerful men evade justice, Nora is doubly determined to bring this one down, and regards Catherine’s vigilantism as an obstacle to a larger victory. But, given the slow pace and compromised priorities of the legal system, there are limits to what the agents can accomplish within the Bureau’s bounds.

“Furious,” which debuted last week, initially recalls the 2019 Netflix miniseries “Unbelievable,” about two female detectives’ extraordinary efforts to catch a serial rapist. Based on real-life events, “Unbelievable” depicts a male-dominated police force in which indifference to, if not outright hostility toward, survivors of sexual assault enables a predator to find more victims. The new series, too, features a law-enforcement culture where disinterest in gendered violence is the norm, and cops knowingly patronize establishments that traffic underage girls. But in “Furious,” unlike its predecessor, the grim subject matter isn’t accompanied by respectful solemnity—nor are Alice and Nora beacons of benevolence, like the heroine of “Mare of Easttown,” a policewoman who serves as a de-facto social worker for the struggling members of her town. After a conventional start, “Furious” comes to feel alive and delightfully contradictory: at once cerebral and pulpy, compassionate and unhinged. Catherine’s story line evokes a feverish what-if scenario in which a survivor musters the requisite recklessness, talent for murder, and wig collection to mete out retribution. The season is streaked with mordant humor, and the show’s greatest achievement is its balance of genre-savvy thrills and seriousness of purpose.

The tonal volatility complements the show’s central theme: that survival is inevitably messy. This empathetic impulse is a signature of “Furious”’s creator, Elizabeth Meriwether, who’s established herself as a TV auteur to follow. Still best known for the Zooey Deschanel

“Furious” morphs from a conventional crime drama into something livelier.

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ILLUSTRATION BY KATHERINE LAM

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sitcom “New Girl,” which aired from 2011 to 2018, Meriwether has since pivoted to darker fare. “The Dropout,” her 2022 miniseries about the biotech scammer Elizabeth Holmes, and “Dying for Sex,” last year’s dramedy about a Stage IV cancer patient’s final journey of sensual soul-searching, were both shows about real-life women driven by unusual wants, with scripts that reflected Meriwether’s diligent research and interest in procedure. Her tendency toward didacticism lent “Dying for Sex” a clinical quality, but it’s a welcome feature in “Furious,” where the exposition shines a necessary light on a murky world. Nora instructs Alice in why so many trafficking cases fall apart, how to interrogate young people with shock-induced memory gaps, and why it’s sometimes worth it, prosecutorially speaking, to threaten a teen-age victim with legal consequences. (That teen, Nora says, may already be recruiting other vulnerable girls into the sex trade, if only to lighten her own workload.) To fully humanize survivors, the series contends, it’s necessary to resist the assumption that suffering confers goodness.

“Furious” sometimes risks overstating its argument: Nora’s musings that “victims of violence are the most violent” and that “being a victim just makes you colder, more calculating” can feel pitiless, even when describing a serial killer. But those observations are more compelling when applied to Alice, a former teen-age runaway who, in another life, might have ended up where Catherine is now. Alice is the show’s emotional center of gravity, and her relationships with the rest of the ensemble are suitably nuanced. Though the reappearance of her abusive ex-boyfriend, Marshall (Jake Lacy), triggers symptoms of P.T.S.D., her gratitude toward his mother, who helped raise her, is deep-rooted enough that she attempts a reconciliation of sorts. Marshall’s presence also complicates Alice’s will-they, won’t-they dynamic with her old partner on the force, Danny (Scoot McNairy), a sensitive outlier within the N.Y.P.D. who nurses her back to functionality. (Meriwether’s knack for crafting rumpled, swoon-worthy male love interests may be the biggest carryover from her “New Girl” days.) But the heart of the series is the tentative alliance between Alice

and Nora, who are drawn to each other even as they’re acutely aware of the other’s shortcomings. Alice craves mentorship but can’t help noting how often Nora drinks on the job; Nora, who discovers Alice having a panic attack in the bathroom, wonders whether the newbie stands a chance of making it in the Bureau. Both have found ways of coping within misogynistic institutions that have actively sidelined them. But they truly bond as survivors who can acknowledge the unexpected forms desire and resilience can take. On an after-hours drive, a visibly bruised Alice confesses to Nora that she asks her hookups to strike her. To her surprise, Nora is unruffled. “You think I’ve never asked someone to smack me around a little in the throes of a passionate embrace?” the older woman asks. “You think I’ve never let someone take a few whacks at this piñata?”

The show is less successful at fleshing out its killer, who too often comes across as a cinematic contrivance: a sexy-creepy seductress with trauma-prompted mood swings and selective, narratively convenient amnesia about the night that haunts her. Even in her character’s hokiest moments—as when she recites a nursery rhyme to Oliver’s sleeping form—Petticrew is a mesmerizing presence, moving fluidly between übercompetent steeliness and self-doubting softness. But Catherine’s essential loneliness makes her difficult to know; she seldom lets the mask fall, and her sense of self is riddled with holes. When she finally finds a confidant, she says, with heartbreaking casualness, “My memory sucks. It’s ’cause I got strangled so much.”

Given the circumstances, it becomes hard not to root against Alice and Nora’s efforts to arrest the billionaire—far more satisfying to see him dead by Catherine’s hand. But, if Catherine can feel like a cipher, the dramatization of the criminal coterie she pursues is genuinely persuasive. Far from the chumminess on display in the Epstein files, her targets express fear of and even disdain for one another. Each man has seemingly convinced himself that, whatever his flaws, he’s not the group’s most depraved member. Catherine doesn’t discriminate between direct perpetrators and silent bystanders, but her totalizing quest reveals a more subtle truth: there are many ways to be complicit. ♦

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THE CURRENT CINEMA

DIRECTOR'S CUTS

"Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma."

BY RICHARD BRODY

When a director makes a film about filmmaking, pay attention: it's a sign that the movie, however grand or stylized it may be, is also deeply personal, tapping into the nerve center of the maker's creative drive and self-image. That's true of such movies as Clint Eastwood's "White Hunter Black Heart," Sofia Coppola's "Somewhere,"

age Sex and Death" is likewise a tale of media consumption—it revolves around a horror-movie franchise—but, in examining the fan experience, it also considers what goes into creating objects of fandom, including the emotional price that creators may end up paying. The result is a cinemanifesto, displaying Schoenbrun's relationship to

Gillian Anderson and Hannah Einbinder star in Jane Schoenbrun's film.

Jordan Peele's "Nope," and the latest entry in the genre, Jane Schoenbrun's "Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma." No less worthy than its predecessors, Schoenbrun's film is indeed the richest of them in terms of the multiple dimensions of cinematic experience that it dramatizes, critiques, and illuminates.

This is Schoenbrun's third dramatic feature as writer-director, and it marks a bold yet logical advance from the two that came before. In "We're All Going to the World's Fair" (2021), an adolescent girl gets drawn into a macabre online role-playing game; "I Saw the TV Glow" (2024) is about teen-agers who are obsessed with a "Buffy the Vampire Slayer"-style series. "Teen-

the art and a vision of a creative ideal.

The story is simple: Kris Williams (Hannah Einbinder), a critically acclaimed twenty-nine-year-old independent filmmaker, has been tapped by a studio to reboot a slasher franchise that was launched in the nineteen-eighties, with the film "Camp Miasma," and gave rise to many sequels and spinoffs, an arcade game, a comic book, and a slew of merchandise. In its day, the franchise drew protests from the religious right, but lately it's been criticized as transphobic. Kris, who identifies as queer and whose previous film included a reenactment of the famous murder scene in "Psycho" from the perspective of the shower curtain, has been hired to reconfigure

the premise to reflect current sensibilities. As her agent (Sarah Sherman) puts it, the studio wants her to make it "elevated, a.k.a. woke."

Kris's interest in the job is more than just professional. She's been obsessed with "Camp Miasma" since she was eight, especially with a character in the first installment, a teen-age camp counsellor called Squeak. Squeak was played by a young actress named Billy Presley (Amanda Fix), who refused roles in the sequels, never appeared in another movie, and has no public presence at all. While sketching out the studio reboot, Kris has made contact with Billy, now in her sixties (played by Gillian Anderson), who invites her to a remote compound in the Pacific Northwest where she lives in self-imposed isolation. The inevitable directorial dance of seduction to lure the reluctant actor to sign on to the project turns into an actual seduction, in ways that prove personally and artistically consequential for both women.

From this straightforward setup, Schoenbrun unleashes an outpouring of imagination and invention that places the film on a level of intricacy and extravagance comparable to that of Wes Anderson's "Asteroid City" and Greta Gerwig's "Barbie." Scenes from across the "Camp Miasma" franchise play as films within the film, realized in elaborate detail. The result is gleefully gory: one victim is cut in half at the waist, their legs still standing as blood spurts; another is impaled on a spear and shattered to mist against a tetherball pole. But these scenes are filmed with such playfulness that the shock value is completely dissipated. (I say this as a squeamish, gore-averse viewer.)

"Teenage Sex and Death" opens on the set of the original movie, as seen from the point of view of the killer, a figure known as Little Death (Jack Haven), whose most striking feature is a kind of helmet made from a cubic metal air vent, which masks the face behind a pattern of concentric squares and gives the character's breathing a distinctive labored sound. The glimpse of "Camp Miasma" and its production functions as backstory for Kris's trip, and sets the tone for the odd encounters that follow. At Kris's hotel, the desk

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ILLUSTRATION BY KRISTIAN HAMMERSTAD

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clerk turns out to be one of the locals who were recruited to act in “Camp Miasma, Part VI” (which Kris watches in her room), and it emerges that Billy’s compound, a former sleepaway camp, was the location for the shooting of “Camp Miasma.” Prowling the grounds, Kris finds a building labelled “CINEMA,” and inside is a projector with a film reel cued up to the scene in “Camp Miasma” that most captivates her—Little Death entering a room where Squeak is losing her virginity.

“Desire,” Kris writes in her notebook while watching “Part VI,” and it is Squeak’s mix of desire and terror in the first movie that makes Kris’s encounter with Billy so erotically charged. Kris’s partner, Mari (Jasmin Savoy Brown), suspects that the reclusive Billy will resemble Norma Desmond, the delusional ex-star in “Sunset Boulevard,” but Billy (who’s well aware of the comparison) is funny, candid, insightful, and intensely sympathetic. She notes that Kris has been approaching her project “academically” and urges her to speak freely. Kris opens up about her sexual inhibitions while worrying that such candor is unprofessional. Billy responds that these personal revelations are intrinsically part of the work, and that their collaboration has already begun.

Much of “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma” is a classic two-hander, sharply written with plenty of scope for the two leads to shine. For all the movie’s self-awareness, it’s filled with tenderness and humor. Einbinder endows Kris with pent-up intellectual energy awaiting explosive release, and

Anderson’s Billy is a kaleidoscopic showcase of emotional vitality and natural, florid theatricality. Among the movie’s daring inspirations is the ample screen time given to movie-watching, whether by Kris alone or by her and Billy together. Each one of these viewing sessions is more than merely an opportunity for ingenious film-within-a-film evocations of “Camp Miasma.” They’re dramatic scenes punctuated by significant surprises: an accidental interruption, a trenchant observation, a raucous gag, a cathartic gaze. This built-in doubleness—of the watchers and the watched—lends “Teenage Sex and Death” a complexity that Schoenbrun amplifies in surreal, symbolic, and allegorical ways.

Throughout, Schoenbrun revels in the ambiguous fusion of artifice and realism. The foremost innovation is the evocation of Little Death’s perspective, by means of an unusual kind of camera movement—wavering and wandering, somewhere between smooth and jittery—which catches the viewer in the limbic system, going beyond disgust to the uncanny. The ostensibly transphobic element of “Camp Miasma” is that Little Death was gender-fluid, a cruelly bullied former camper whose killing sprees are displaced revenge. Schoenbrun, a trans filmmaker who explicitly addressed the trans experience in “I Saw the TV Glow,” here conceives something even more radical: a cinematic trans gaze, one that is visually distinctive in its tone while extruding violence endured into violent fantasy.

At the end of Kris’s time with Billy, she has to video-conference with a group of studio executives to give them

a story outline for the reboot. Her pitch, deeply informed by Billy’s sensibility and ideas and by the course of their encounter, is a brilliantly strange narrative that puts the character and vantage point of Little Death at the center of a film-within-a-film origin story. The executives (deftly lampooned by actors including Dylan Baker and Jess McLeod) are predictably aghast. For Schoenbrun, though, Kris’s professional setback is an opportunity for her artistic and personal renewal, in the form of radical independence.

Alongside the fundamental dichotomy of the watchers and the watched, “Teenage Sex and Death” explores a related one—that of the director and the actor. As Kris and Billy view more and more of “Camp Miasma” together, Kris realizes that what she has always loved and feared about Billy’s performance in the original film comes from the real-life trauma and ecstasy that the actress experienced during its filming, which left her with a lifetime of material to work through (and to work with, too). Billy’s main creative outlet in her years of solitude has been visual art, and her work—abstractions dominated by the geometric forms of Little Death’s air-vent face—seems like a closed circuit of self-therapy. With Kris, Billy is delivered from these visual abstractions, just as Kris, with Billy, is freed from her intellectual ones. Together, each of them becomes both director and actor, observing and observed, controlling and controlled, self-motivated and mutually determined, launched into a higher plane of artistic collaboration—into a cinematic redemption. ♦

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CARTOON CAPTION CONTEST

Each week, we provide a cartoon in need of a caption. You, the reader, submit a caption, we choose three finalists, and you vote for your favorite. Caption submissions for this week's cartoon, by Lynn Hsu, must be received by Sunday, August 9th. The finalists in the July 27th contest appear below. We will announce the winner, and the finalists in this week's contest, in the August 24th & 31st issue. Anyone age thirteen or older can enter or vote. To do so, and to read the complete rules, visit contest.newyorker.com.

THIS WEEK'S CONTEST

THE FINALISTS

"I think it's time we addressed the room itself." Pao Roy, New Orleans, La.

"The door—he remembers everything but the door." Daniel Leshner, Seattle, Wash.

"I guess the laser pointer was a bad idea." Trevor Pritchard, Ottawa, Ont.

THE WINNING CAPTION

"I understand that service has been partially suspended." Jeff Van Wagenen, Middlebury, Conn.

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PUZZLES & GAMES DEPT.

THE CROSSWORD

A challenging puzzle.

BY NATAN LAST

ACROSS

1 Indicator of a pause 6 Piece of work 10 "Indentured: The Inside Story of the Rebellion Against the " (2017 book that won the PEN/ESPN Award) 14 Maker of some trailers 15 Mediterranean peak 16 Rules infraction 17 Classroom in which one might use an oscilloscope 19 Whole thing 20 Emphatic response to "Quieres mais?" 21 Dashingly? 23 Poet Chen with the 2010 collection "Juvenilia" 24 Standup comedian with a bit about the snacks at Trader Joe's that only women can see 27 Curl targets, briefly 30 Weapons related to rapiers 31 What Ras al-Khaimah is part of, for short 32 "But that's enough of that . . ." 34 "The Sirens of " (Kurt Vonnegut novel) 37 Philosopher Daniel who co-edited the 1981 anthology "The Mind's I" with Douglas Hofstadter 38 Minister and advocate _ A. King 40 Long-winded stories 41 Like summer days in Spain? 42 "Oh, also . . . ," in a text 43 Sequence of three nucleotides 44 Meier who created the Civilization video-game series 45 Very short stories 49 Suggestion, in brief 50 Busybodies 51 Wastes 55 Members of the beech family 57 "No one to blame but myself" 59 Motivate 60 Clutter-free 61 Horse girl? 62 Spot 63 "O.K., you make a good point" 64 Big name in pads

DOWN

1 Coffeehouse supply 2 "Didn't expect to see you here!" 3 Giant with a legendary over-the-shoulder catch in the 1954 World Series 4 "How sour sweet is / When time is broke and no proportion kept": Shakespeare 5 Palestinian cartoonist Naji al- 6 Most prone to annoyance 7 Cartographic collections 8 Gobbles (down) 9 World capital where Pashto and Dari are spoken 10 Certain digital asset, briefly 11 Reusable metal containers 12 Poet who wrote "In Memory of W. B. Yeats" 13 Word following string or tag 18 Form a layer over 22 By-product of beta decay 25 "Let me spell it out for you" 26 Only monosyllabic U.S. state 27 Offers 28 Creative spark 29 Provide supportive notes? 33 Midges and blackflies, e.g. 35 It follows a curtain's rise 36 Scholarship criterion 38 Cardinal sin of aesthetics

39 Bookish Bridgerton sibling 41 "Le Livre Blanc" author Jean 43 Remnant in a fireplace 45 Slushy wine-based beverage 46 Bounds 47 Deceptive maneuver 48 Boyfriend, to Bad Bunny 52 Sensed 53 Document, e.g. 54 Mythical river 56 "My b" 58 Sixties U.S. senator whose middle name was Francis, not Fitzgerald

Solution to the previous puzzle:

Find more puzzles and this week's solution at newyorker.com/crossword

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QA Report - The New Yorker - 10.08.2026.pdf

Pipeline

• Extraction route: mistral-ocr
• extraction_route=mistral-ocr
• Translation chunks: 102
• Extraction warnings:
• [OCR-ROUTE] FORCE-MISTRAL: All PDFs route directly to MistralOCR.

Non-model Checks

• WARNING: Missing proper nouns in translation: Ab Ex, Abstract Expressionism, Abstract Expressionists, Adriatic Sea, Adrienne Rich, After Nabeeha, After Trump, Alaska Dan Sullivans, Alice Emmy Rossum, All Going
• WARNING: source dates, money, or percentage tokens may be missing

Model QA

经过严格审核，本次翻译质量较高，但在关键数字、术语一致性和部分内容完整性方面存在问题。以下是详细审核报告：

═══ 审核报告 ═══

1. 数字与事实核查 (Numbers & Facts)

• [BLOCKING] 译文：“德国已承诺在军备和基础设施方面投入高达一万亿美元的新支出。”
• 原文："...as much as a trillion dollars in new spending on arms and infrastructure."
• 核查：虽然翻译正确，但此处存在严重的逻辑/事实疑点。德国（Germany）在军备上的支出通常以“亿”或“百亿”欧元计，一万亿美元（Trillion）对于单一国家军备支出而言量级极其异常。经核查原文，原文确实写了 "trillion dollars"，这极有可能是 [SOURCE_OCR] 错误（将 billion 误识为 trillion）。但在翻译交付中，直接翻译成“一万亿美元”会导致读者认为译文出现低级量级错误。
• 建议：标注为 [SOURCE_OCR] 但需在译文中通过脚注或修正提醒。

2. 完整性与漏译 (Completeness)

• [WARNING] 译文：“Megan Fernandes（诗歌，第 50 页）最近出版了诗集《我听从所有指令》和《好男孩》。”
• 原文："...Megan Fernandes (Poem, p. 50) is the..." $\rightarrow$ [MIDDLE PORTION OMITTED]
• 核查：在提供的 STRATIFIED TEXT SAMPLES 中，该段落被截断（...is the）。译文却出现了具体的书名《我听从所有指令》和《好男孩》。
• 判定：[FALSE_POSITIVE]。经核查，这些内容并未出现在提供的任何原文片段或标题索引中。译者可能使用了外部知识库补全，虽然内容真实，但在严格的翻译QA中，这属于“未经授权的补全”，若原文未提供，不应凭空增加。

3. 术语与一致性 (Terminology & Consistency)

• [WARNING] 译文：“头条 愚蠢 洋葱编辑 被拒”
• 原文： "Headlines Stupid Onion Editor Rejected"

• 核查：此处为幽默栏目（Shouts & Murmurs），原文是一个讽刺性的标题（意为：被洋葱新闻编辑拒绝的愚蠢头条）。译文采用词组堆砌，失去了原有的讽刺语感，影响阅读。

• [WARNING] 译文：“贸易大炮 (trade bazooka)”

• 原文： "trade bazooka"
• 核查：Bazooka 通常译为“火箭筒”。译为“大炮”虽不影响理解，但不够精准。

4. 幻觉核查 (Hallucination Check)

• [WARNING] 译文：“...一个由美国领导的财团。”
• 原文： "...a consortium led by the U.S."

• 核查：匹配原文，非幻觉。

• [WARNING] 译文：“...一个名为 Manus 的 AI 初创公司...”

• 原文： "...a AI startup called Manus..."
• 核查：匹配原文，非幻觉。

5. 格式与残留 (Formatting & Residue)

• [WARNING] 译文：“”, “” 等。
• 核查：译文中出现了大量错误的图片引用标签（将 img-1.jpeg 变成了 -1.），导致视觉呈现混乱。

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═══ 最终结论 ═══

发现阻塞性问题 (Blocking Issues Found)

主要缺陷汇总： 1. 量级风险：德国军备支出“一万亿美元”量级极其离谱，虽源于 OCR，但译文未做处理，直接交付将导致严重误导。 2. 格式损坏：图片标签被错误替换为 [-1.] 格式，导致文档结构损坏。 3. 补全过度：在原文截断处（Megan Fernandes 部分）自行添加了原文中不存在的书名。

建议： 退回修正图片标签，并对“一万亿美元”进行事实核查标注。