How about a nice refreshing Mecca Cola? (Login required, blah blah blah.)

Happy New Year, by the way. Let’s hope it’s a good one.

Art Spiegelman has decided not to renew his contract with the New Yorker:

“After Sept. 11, there was period when The New Yorker was as confused as everybody else and it was possible to produce very interesting images,” Mr. Spiegelman said. “More recently the magazine seems to have quieted down its covers for one thing. On the other hand, the place I’m coming from is just much more agitated than The New Yorker’s tone. The assumptions and attitudes [I have] are not part of The Times Op-Ed page of acceptable discourse.”

Story here. I’ve never had a contract with the magazine, though I was offered one at one point (the “right of first refusal” language made me uneasy, and I didn’t pursue the matter), but I do have a standing invitation to contribute Back Page ideas. But — I think I’ve discussed this here on the blog before — it’s been harder and harder to get anything I’m really interested in saying into the magazine since September 11, 2001. And with my weekly strip and my space in the American Prospect — both of which allow me complete editorial freedom, for better or worse — I just haven’t been feeling very enthusiastic about The New Yorker. And as it turns out, I’m not the only one. (If I had to make an educated guess, I’d say that Remnick recently rejected one of Spiegleman’s cover proposals…)