New York Review of Books: no other personal ads compare

Reason number one to subscribe to the New York Review of Books: the personals, which hide out on the last two pages but deserve to be read first.

Examples, all taken from a single recent issue:

Pleasure loving writer and intellectual; dark hair, nice slender shape. Academic with no time for the academic hooey; immoderately literary, unexpectedly sexy. Ardent, if unsophisticated, observer of rivers, trees, and tides.

As a friend pointed out when we were reading these, there are more semicolons in the New York Review of Books personals than balls in a gay bar.

Then there's this stunner:

UNUSUAL EUROPEAN

Scholar-adventurer, 60, former revolutionary, published author, fit, polyglot, lives half in Africa, half in Europe, married, seeks long term mistress or full second wife in complete agreement with first (an African academic). Requirements: 30-45, independent, adventurous, witty. Strong preference for dark lady (BLACK/ARAB/LATINA).

I'm speechless. After this personals ad, writing poetry is barbaric.

Finally, just after "SMART AND BEAUTIFUL. Yet unequivocally cute.", there is:

BRIGHT, BEAUTIFUL. Passionate, intellectual. Slender, adventurous, fun--full of happy surprises and delightful unexpected contrasts. Quietly confident with upbeat spirit and true heart. People person par excellence, anthropologist at heart. Cultured, sophisticated, yet down to earth--humanitarian, international change agent.

As my wife Kate points out, who doesn't want an international change agent full of happy surprises? Who is, I add, an anthropologist at heart, unlike all you superficial anthropologists.

She's not done, either:

...drawn to Positano, Lake Sevan, Kyoto, MoMA, Bilbao, Guggenheim. Loves film, theater, NGOs, papadums, fresh lichees....

More from Kate: "This woman sounds like she was born from that stuff white people love website." After all, that website is basically just a list of topics in The NYRB and The New Yorker.

My favorite run of adverb-adjective pairings, however, is the following:

sexually active, psychologically stable, politically informed, not religious or "spiritual."

Amen.

But the gem among gems is this one. Which word is not like the others?

soft-spoken, widow, spontaneous, and easy-going.

I hope she finds someone looking for an easy-going widow. Smart, easy-going widows everywhere truly deserve love, and for all my laughing I'm glad there's an cloyingly intellectual classifieds page where they can announce themselves.