New Magazine Aims for 'Readable' Style

With help from faculty advisor Martin H. Peretz, the editor-in-chief of The New Republic, two juniors recently co-founded The Harvard Current, a political magazine aimed at bringing national and international issues of student interest to the campus.

Dan M. Loss '00 and Bom S. Kim '00, co-editors-in-chief as well as co-founders, presided over the magazine's first full staff meeting last Wednesday night, at which article topics for the inaugural issue, slated to print before winter break, were discussed.

The new magazine's executive board also includes Senior Editors Daniel J. Cappello '99, Manisha S. Shetty '99, Associate Editor Raj Chetty '01, Business Director Stephen R. Jemison '00 and Design Editor Kris K. Manjapra '00.

Executive board members said they are enthusiastic about working on The Current due to both the journalistic expertise of Peretz, who is also a lecturer on social studies, and the enthusiasm of the co-editors-in-chief.

"It's really exciting. We have a really great group of people putting it together," Shetty said.

Staff members said Peretz has been in touch with the senior executive board, providing feedback on topics and giving suggestions for articles.

Chetty said Peretz will also give the staff some guidance on how to run the fledgling magazine.

"He's not a distant advisor, so that's neat," Shetty said.

Loss, Kim and several other students have been planning to start up a new political publication on campus since last spring.

Staffers of The Current said they aim to expand the definition of politics as currently reported by Harvard students and fill what many said they believe is a void in the campus's journalism.

"There's a lack of really readable journals on campus. Many publications are so focused, and they're wonderful...but they tend to read like term papers... Ours will be much closer to The Crimson," Shetty said.

According to Shetty, the staff has three main goals: "One, make it readable; two, link things that are happening on the national and international scene to Harvard; and three, we're going to call up people involved and follow links to other paths, and only use other articles as background," she said.

Cappello added that the staff wants to keep the contents fresh, as the magazine's name suggests.

"We want it to be something lively that you can follow. Other publications about politics on campus are well-researched and very good, but I was sort of looking for something to come out that students would pick up," he said.

Chetty, who also writes for the Harvard Political Review (HPR), emphasized that the newer political magazine will have a unique focus.

"It's not meant to be directly competitive with HPR, it's just filling in a slightly different area of publications on campus," he said.

HPR Editor emeritus Robert J. Teply '99 said he believes it is difficult to found and maintain a new magazine in an academic environment rife with publications as diverse as The Lampoon and HPR.

"The campus publication scene is really vibrant here... I do recognize that people are starting up new publications, so there must be people who are interested in different outlets. HPR has been around for quite a while, and I think the continuity that we can bring is a real strength," he said.

"Our focus is more national and international, and that's the kind of reporting that we like to do," he added.

But staffers of The Current said that is exactly the journalistic trend they are trying to buck. Instead, Loss said, they hope to engage the student community by relating social and political events and issues to Harvard life.

"We want to interest the campus readership. Some articles will be explicitly just campus issues; others will be more international issues that try to take a campus slant," he said.

Although The Current is still technically an unofficial organization, approval by Dean of Students Archie C. Epps III is pending, and the staff is working on the first issue.

The magazine is currently funded by advertisements, but Loss said he will be applying for grants from the Undergraduate Council in the future.

The magazine is scheduled to appear bimonthly in the near future but the staff expects to begin publishing monthly at some point down the line as funds per-