Writing wisdom from late New Yorker editor John Bennet

John Bennet, 76, died July 9, 2022.

Even avid readers of The New Yorker might not recognize his name. He started at the magazine on the copy desk in 1975 and retired as a senior editor in 2016. He also taught a course in magazine writing at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism for many years.

“Through some rare mix of taste, judgment, candor, composure, selflessness, and insubordination, he earned that measure of trust and affection which makes it possible for editors to deliver cold, hard feedback, and for writers to be open to it, and grateful,” Staff Writer Nick Paumgarten wrote in, “John Bennet, Enemy of the Blah Blah Blah.”

A native of Athens, Texas, Bennet coined sayings about writing and editing which he often repeated. His writers and students came to call them “Bennetisms.”