Of course an irreverent newsletter lives in Naarm’s Nicholas Building, a lone heritage-listed sentinel peopled by young creatives (help!). The bone-seizing cold soon thwarted Cathedral Coffee shop plans, and we took the elevator up to the editorial lair.
Substack darling of the Naarm literariti, email magazine The Paris End is a masterclass in independent cultural criticism. Devised by editors Oscar Schwartz, Sally Olds and Cameron Hurst, alongside their aesthetic leader, cartoonist Aaron Billings, The Paris End marks a return to the halcyon days of Janet Malcolm and her contemporaries, that of New Yorker articles that press the membrane between urban truth and fiction. How did The Paris End come to be? Olds enumerated the steps: “we all knew each other, we wanted a platform to publish ourselves, and starting a substack had a low barrier to entry”. The cosmic forces of flippancy and earnestness aligned, and The Paris End was born.
The tartaric troika noticed a gap in literary fictions and magazines, an absence of 1970s-style “going out” reportages. The publication’s main focuses bring this style back to the fore. Editors work on long-form pieces, uncovering Melbourne mysteries and providing non-mainstream salves, including an interview on UniMelb’s Gaza solidarity encampment organisers. Their stellar conceit is “The Stars”, a fortnightly output of cultural otherworldliness, awarding one to five stars for five du jour things. Whether it be BRAT, the heinous Archibald portrait of Jacob Elordi, or the sombre topic of media layoffs, the editors have something to say about it. It may not change your fiercely-held opinion, but it will make you laugh.
When asked how “The Stars” was dreamt up, Hurst explained that they “needed a quick review-type thing”; though it is not as highfalutin as their longform work, it’s a feature as recognisable and beloved as the black-and-white cartoon. Of course, disharmony arises — for this section, the three have navigated the challenge of using a shared voice. “The Stars’ format itself created this voice, one that was a bit mean and a bit flippant”, Schwartz theorised. Hurst added that their shared voice is one that the time-honoured Google Doc shaped: “we collaborate there and have real-time dialogue, changing each others’ first drafts”. The Google Doc journalistic experience brings a delightful but unnecessary urgency to any task — in the case of The Paris End, it renders their prose biting and vibrant. Regardless, disagreements rear their head in jocular ways, such as the re-reviewing of a book.
Each of the editors have a different relationship with writing and criticism — Schwartz has felt the constraints of working for mainstream media, Hurst has written more academic-style writing for her art history work, Olds has published a delicious essay collection. Much to our envy, no one brushed shoulders with student politicians at university, besides Hurst’s lone article published in the University of Melbourne’s student magazine Camp which “did not aid her journalistic chops.” But, in common, they are voracious readers, a trait to which they constantly point when unpacking their inspiration and origins.
Each editor fondly agreed that, when refining their voice for their The Paris End contributions, they imagine each other as their audience. Instructing others how to be true to their voice is a difficult task, but they offered helpful contributions. Olds reminded us, “The voice should be an accident you can’t escape”. Hurst provided the time-honoured, but undeniable, adage: “Reading a lot, writing a lot”.
The Paris End’s title satirises Naarm’s Paris End, the city’s corner of faux European sybaritism: “it takes itself too seriously, but it’s also such a joke, because it’s no Paris”, Schwartz explained. He later revealed himself to be a Melbourne-hater, plotting a move to Sydney. We tried to warn him! Hurst added, “it is a nod to, but also an undermining of, Australia’s peripheral position, its distance from writing and creative cultures overseas”. And of course, the “End” conjures an Anthropocenic feel.
Of course, readers are familiar with the avalanche of substacks, many of which are navel-gazing — it is easy to tire of them. What differentiates The Paris End? According to Hurst, it boils down to a newsletter’s focus: “we choose something to write within the remit of a focused publication”. Schwartz feels as if the “official” nature of writing for a publication lends “permission to write a real journalistic story”. Olds pointed to their teamwork as a regulator on any lapses into self-indulgent pontification. It is undeniable that they work in synchrony — even their interview answers harmonised in dulcet tones.
Finding tips and people to interview has also proven to be one of the team’s many congruities. Schwartz pointed out the importance of “always listening for interesting tidbits”, reminding us that a topic can only be shaped into a story when it is attached to a “tangible thing to carry the idea”. Hurst agreed, adding that part of respecting a story is “developing an intimacy” with those at its centre. Bound by a shared understanding of the fragile balance between maintaining a critical voice and surviving without legal representation, we had never been happier to hear that it does not have to come at the expense of friendship and rapport.
Our final question was highly technical and judiciously planned: why did BRAT only receive a four-star rating in the June 13 line-up? Between laughs, Hurst revealed that Schwartz had told her she would “not remember the album after two weeks” — now amended to two months. While this convincing argument may have persuaded us, the crowds at Melbourne club classic YahYah’s Thursgay set (which the team insisted we visit) certainly would not.
With the disease of flat affect ravaging our most literate, the future of culturally-fresh and unflaggingly-funny reportages may be in the hands of these plucky and talented four.
We look forward to waking up starry-eyed on Thursday mornings, to becoming confused when we receive emails from both The Paris End and The Paris Review forevermore. We’ll always have The Paris End — or, at least, until the death of cultural criticism falls upon us all.
