Part III: Yes, Deborah Needleman gets it right in the August 25th issue of T Magazine, Women's Fashions. Juxtapositions: The Writer's Room, Rooney Mara and The Value of Things.

How did we arrive here?

 There's Part I orchestrated by Kristina O'neill of WSJ. and Part II discussing the first 80 pages of T Magazine which is a segue to where we are heading.

We are discussing the form and content of T Magazine under the leadership of Deborah Needleman.  One question posed earlier is: does she get it right?

Part II ended with "Let's fast forward to page 246, the last of the featured articles."

But how did I arrive precisely at page 246?

I began trolling the FALL FASHION ISSUE section beginning on page 201(with its intriguing collage of four photographs) which pointed me to my port of call.

(Quaere: Why does this section include no ads, display an intro page with a collage of four photographs, then begin with This is Rooney Mara  and conclude with the Writer's Habitat?)

Rooney Mara

(courtesy of desktopop.com/wallpaper)

My trolling began with discovering Rooney Mara, especially enhanced by the entrancing 76 second misty and magical On Set video shot by photographer David Sims 

Rooney is iconic on many levels-- evoking strong shades of Audrey Hepburn, the deceased yet timeless, elusive, reclusive and reticent star of cinema and fashion. 

I then  landed at the seemingly familiar bookshelf images of writers Jonathan Lethem and Julian Barnes on pages 247 and 248 respectively.

Here is a section entitled --The Writer's Room-- devoted to the working habitat (surroundings of significance) of five notable writers who are about to release their next book.

With photographs by John Spinks -- minus the flair and excitement of the first 80 pages--we glimpse the minimalist working environment of these authors.

All that is needed to inspire each one- "a view from Rome, a pristine computer screen , a photograph of a Basquiat, an I.B.M. 196c typewriter, the ghost of another author"--is found "within these walls."

Author, Jhumpa Lahiri
(in the small print below authors's name : Winner of the Pulitzer Prize)

I then spotted the page featuring Jhumpa Lahiri.

Her room is bare but for a small desk once belonging to a cardiologist. Her desk faces the Alban Hills and the Apennines. Her terrace, which opens just to the right of her desk, offers magnificent views of the Forum and the Palatine of Rome.

What interested me most is a bold text inset which reads:

In "The Lowland" (Knopf), Lahiri offers a sweeping and poignant tale of two brothers separated by geography and ideology. 

I immediately placed a hold on the book at my local library which has 49 holds on 38 en route copies.

A few days ago, much to my surprise, I learned that the book had made the short list of the prestigious 2013 Man Booker prize.

After my discovery of this Writer's Room, I turned back to the editor's letter on page 82.

Ms. Needleman, who joined T as its editor just about a year ago, is 'right on' with her remarks and guiding philosophy.

Her page carries this title: THE VALUE OF THINGS

She discusses the same Writer's Room article (as I have just done); she  expends her entire column of about 400 words to expand on the idea that the items these writers cherish the most are important to them because of the symbolic meaning they possess.

Their enduring quality, in my estimation, is the result of the ideational and emotional attachment they assign to them. 

The editor expresses her desire for permanence of the physical object in this way:  "Living in an age when most things are both digital and disposable creates an even more intense longing for physical objects that speak to you and will remain in your life."

Fashion comes and goes. What is hot today is passe tomorrow.

And a lot passes for fashion.

There is plenty to chose from in this issue as there are over 150 pages of ads.

The Mona Lisa painting by Leonardo da vinci

at the Louvre Museum, Paris

Courtesy of Wikipedia

But it is the rarest of art (and artists) that is/are worthy of ascending and entering the pantheon of the greats, the truly timeless and priceless. Two such examples we can all agree on are The Mona Lisa pictured above and Venus de Milo pictured below.

Venus de Milo

Louvre Museum, Paris

Courtesy of Wikipedia 

The artist struggles with his medium to extract order, meaning, grace and beauty out of the chaos of this material world replete with "the faded bouquets of urine," and "your sororities of pain and darkened subways" as Major Jackson pens it in his poem Beach Readings.(Click here for A Picture and a Poem/ Beach Readings by Alex Katz and Major Jackson; also on page 198 of T.)

Jackson contrasts the spiritually uplifting, refreshing and seaside pleasures of vacationing on Cocoa Beach, Florida with the harsh, crude, squalid and hence depressing realities of living in New York.

Wallace Stevens, one of the great poets of the last century, depicted the aforementioned artist's struggle in his classic poem The Idea of Order at Key West:
       
         Oh blessed rage for order, pale Ramon
         The maker's rage to order words of the sea,
         Words of the fragrant portal, dimly starred
         And of ourselves and of our origins,
         In ghostlier demarcations, keener sounds.
 
Ms. Needleman has done her job well presenting us with  high quality objects,things and stuff to experience, digest and contemplate.

It is for us-- the influential reader of the Times-- to chime in.

Do you agree with my comments, observations and conclusions?

Let our voices be heard.

Let the games begin.

What is you opinion?