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The Best of The Baffler in 2014

Well well well, 2014 was a big year for The Baffler, yessir. This summer, we launched our new website and complete online archives. This fall, we organized a conference on feminism in the workplace with keynote speaker Susan Faludi (here are the illustrations and videos), and hosted a debate on the #future between David Graeber and Peter Thiel (video here).

Oh! And we went on a national book tour for our third anthology, No Future For You, and went fully independent to boot.

Above all, we’re most proud of the excellent work that we had the honor of publishing, from all of our irrepressible, irascible, witty and weird contributors. Below are some of our favorite salvos, art, stories, poems, blog posts, and miscellany from the past year.

SALVOS:

• “Hoard d’Oeuvres: Art of the 1 percent” by Rhonda Lieberman (no. 24)

• “The People’s Republic of Zuckerstan” by John Summers (no. 24)

• “What’s the Point if We Can’t Have Fun?” by David Graeber (no. 24)

• “The Vertically Integrated Rape Joke: The triumph of Vice” by Anne Elizabeth Moore (no. 24)

• “Feminism for Them?” by Susan Faludi (no. 24)

• “Slumming It: The gospel of wealth comes for Dharavi” by Daniel Brook (no. 25)

• “Brothers from Another Planet” by Chris Lehmann (no. 25)

• “The Dads of Tech” by Astra Taylor and Joanne McNeil (no. 26)

• “The Crowdsourcing Scam: Why do you deceive yourself?” by Jacob Silverman (no. 26)

• “America’s Long Holiday: When narcissism attacks” by Suzy Hansen (no. 26)

ART:

• Henrik Drescher’s illustration for David Graeber’s essay in no. 24

• Melinda Beck’s illustration for Anne Elizabeth Moore’s salvo in no. 24

• C.K. Wilde’s collages for Piketty and Graeber’s conversation in no. 25

• Randall Enos’s woodcuts for Chris Lehmann’s essay in no. 26

• Brad Holland’s illustrations for George Scialabba’s piece from no. 26

STORIES:

• “Bcc: Dridge” by Paul Maliszewski and J. Wagner (no. 24)

• “Among Friends” by Ludmilla Petrushevskaya (no. 25)

• “Solitude” by Melina Kameric (no. 25)

• “Story of an Illness” by Mikhail Zoschenko (no. 26)

• “For Yama Is the Lord of Death” by Paul Maliszewski and J. Wagner (no. 26)

POEMS:

• “Learned” by Fanny Howe (no. 24)

• “Chemical Life” by Timothy Donnelly (no. 24)

• “To Be Rid of a Rival” by Melissa Monroe (no. 25)

• “The Invisible Man’s Electric Bill” by Afaa Michael Weaver (no. 26)

• “American Mammal” by Debora Kuan (no. 26)

ODDS & ENDS, DISCUSSIONS, & MISCELLANY:

• “Nerds on the Knife Edge” by Jaron Lanier (no. 24)

• “Soak the Rich: An exchange on capital, debt, and the future” with David Graeber and Thomas Piketty (no. 25)

• “Seen Dave?: David McLimans, in memoriam” by Patrick JB Flynn (no. 25)

• “The Endlessly Examined Life: A most chronic depression” by George Scialabba (no. 26)

• “9-Eleven Memorial Museum Store” by Mark Dancey (no. 26)

BLOG POSTS:

• “What Piketty’s Conservative Critics Get Wrong” & “What Piketty’s Neoliberal Critics Get Wrong” by Kathleen Geier (April 28 and May 15, 2014)

• “Glassholes at Work” by Ned Resnikoff (May 14, 2014)

• “Friends Without Benefits” by Noah McCormack (May 30, 2014)

• “Eminent Bromain: Bud Light Invades the Rockies” by Corey Pein (September 11, 2014)

• “U2, Apple, and the Strip-Mining of Punk Rebellion” by Jeff Sparrow (September 18, 2014)