Sullivan is young (32), British and conservative at a magazine that is old (82), American and every so often liberal. Despite his brilliant writing abilities, this didn’t always make for a good fit. His efforts over the last five years to position The New Republic as more cultural and less political (extending even to Sullivan-as-celebrity, posing for a Gap ad) left many readers yearning for the yeasty days of editors Michael Kinsley and Hendrik Hertzberg. Some staffers speculate that owner Martin Peretz may have hastened Sullivan’s exit, which comes in the middle of a political year. “I wish Andrew a long and fruitful life, but he has changed the subject,” Literary Editor Leon Wieseltier told The Washington Post. “The problems around this office were not medical problems. He was responsible for an extraordinary amount of professional and personal unhappiness.” Pitilessness lives.
