Harriet the Spy peeks at the Paris Review

Lorin Stein, the new editor of the Paris Review, had promised "secret guest contributors" would read at his first issue launch this Saturday. Harriet the Spy could not wait to discover the identity of these mystery guests—would they be federales, desperados, orrejectorinos? Well, she packed her fingerprinting dust and set off for the Lower East Side bar where the event took place to find out.

Since Harriet is eleven years old (or is it 150?) she had to sneak in through the back.

The contributors read from a balcony in the bar while listeners stood below. (The set-up recalled Juliet addressing Romeo, or perhaps Hitler sharing ideas with followers.) Any mystery as to their identities was quickly dispelled. Poet Dorothea Lasky read first, and her work included the words, "It's me, Dorothea. Dorothea Lasky." Fiction writer Sam Lipsyte read in a way that, Harriet was told, only he could ever read. Having recently learned to read herself, she enjoyed the show very much.

The rest of the evening went down in a haze of highballs.