Those of us who patronize the corner newsmonger somewhat more often than our local greenmarket won't need to be convinced of Burchill's thesis. Not literally without a back page, that is, but a magazine where the editors have been impolite enough to push you out the back door without a final feature on the left-hand page that faces the inside rear cover. Like a book or movie, a magazine begs for a kind of closure. And it can be rewarding to pay attention to what editors are doing with this largely unzoned piece of prime real estate. In fact, in many cases a back page can be used to take tea leaf readings of what Deepak Chopra might call a magazine's Inner Self, its unvarnished soul.
Some back pages are, unfortunately, more telling than others.
Over at George, too, the inherent starfuckiness of John F. Kennedy Jr.'s after-school project reaches toxic levels at each issue's end. Ed Kosner, Esquire's embattled editor, could likely use one of Estefan's syncopated rubdowns right about now. In Baumgold's case, look before you leap. Kosner's impulse to keep his back page in the family isn't a rarity. Usually, though, it's a magazine's publisher who tries to sneak into the starting line-up.