So, I probably could have found a picture of the actual beach at the Jersey Shore to illustrate this plug for y'all go to read my meditations over at The Atlantic on how Jersey Shore fits into the long literary and artistic tradition of the beach as a site of humiliation and bad decisions. As the piece begins:
When he gave his youngest daughter permission to go to Brighton, England, Pride and Prejudice’s Mr. Bennet declared that Lydia would never be happy "until she has exposed herself in some public place or other, and we can never expect her to do it with so little expense or inconvenience to her family as under the present circumstances." But he could have just as easily been talking about the members of Jersey Shore, the MTV reality show about a summer share house that, with its first season just ended, seems on the verge of becoming a mass cultural phenomenon.Check it out. But I (corny, I know), chose the bridge for another reason. In the next month or so, I'll be starting a column for a new section of The Atlantic's website, writing pieces much like this one. It may mean I have to cut down on the frequency with which I post here a little bit, but the blog is definitely not going away. You all are too valuable an audience for me to test my ideas on and to talk things over with for me to let y'all go. I don't say it often enough, but thank you for reading, for talking back, for emailing. You make me a better writer and thinker.