Season of Mixed Seasons

Once a week, our editorial board reviews the grids for the upcoming three magazines. We share updates — this writer needs more time, the photos still didn’t come in for this piece — and make adjustments for balance, page counts, and breaking news.

During one of those sessions two weeks ago, we considered the question of overall tone. Should the upcoming magazine feel like a summer offering, or should it broadcast the gravity and purposefulness of Elul?

This year’s calendar had Elul arriving while many of our writers and readers were still deep in summer mode. Part of our job is to reflect the reality of our readers, to pick up the conversation topics and atmosphere and energy of the market and transfer them to our pages.

But we know that a magazine also possesses a certain ability to set a tone, inspire thought, spark debate. Should we prep the stage for the season of teshuvah, or keep putting out light, relaxing material?