After Summer of Turmoil, Oxford American Appoints Roger Hodge Editor

September 10, 2012, The New York Times

By JULIE BOSMAN

J. Henry FairRoger D. Hodge

After enduring weeks of unflattering attention over the firing of its editor, The Oxford American has hired a successor: Roger D. Hodge, a Texas-born editor and veteran of New York media.
Mr. Hodge, who was the editor of Harper’s magazine from 2006 to 2010, will become the second editor in the 20-year history of The Oxford American, a feisty southern journal of arts and culture. Warwick Sabin, the publisher, announced Mr. Hodge’s appointment in a statement Monday, saying it will begin “an exciting new era.”
The move offers the magazine a chance for reinvention after the unsavory events of the summer.
The Oxford American’s founding editor, Marc Smirnoff, was fired July 15 after an investigation by the magazine’s board into accusations by young employees of sexual harassment and improper conduct. Mr. Smirnoff has strongly denied any wrongdoing and has started a Web site, editorsinlove.com, defending himself from allegations of sexual harassment and what he has called unfair press reports about his dismissal.
The offer to edit the magazine was unexpected, Mr. Hodge said in an interview, adding that he has deliberately stayed uninformed of the circumstances surrounding Mr. Smirnoff’s departure.
“It’s an awful thing for the individuals concerned and for the institution and I just want to move on from it,” he said. “I just want to make a good magazine.”
Though Mr. Hodge, 45, lives in Brooklyn, he has ties to the South. He grew up in Texas, studied comparative literature at Sewanee in Tennessee, and began his career as a freelance writer in North Carolina. While Mr. Hodge has not been a subscriber recently, he said he has been an admirer of The Oxford American since the mid-1990’s.
While the writing in The Oxford American is “consistently good,” Mr. Hodge said, “the thing that I felt was missing was journalism.”
“That’s the thing that I love doing,” he said. “What I can bring to this magazine is experience with long-form pieces, literary journalism that is vital and important to readers.”
In mid-August, before accepting the job, Mr. Hodge flew to Little Rock to meet with the staff and members of the board.
“He brings impeccable literary credentials as well as a rigorous experience editing Harper’s Magazine,” Mr. Sabin said. “Roger is a son of the South, having been born in Texas and educated at Sewanee. Roger has an intuitive understanding of the unique spirit and character of The Oxford American, and he is the perfect person to shepherd it in a rapidly evolving publishing landscape.”
Mr. Hodge is the author of “The Mendacity of Hope,” a critique of President Obama published by HarperCollins in 2010, and is currently working on another book focusing on life in the borderlands of West Texas.
He will inherit a magazine with close to 20,000 subscribers that sells about 15,000 copies on the newsstands and operates out of the University of Central Arkansas in Conway, Ark., with a staff of about 10 editorial employees. Mr. Hodge said he planned to “commute” to Arkansas for the foreseeable future rather than uproot his wife and two sons from their home in New York.
Mr. Hodge, who has never met Mr. Smirnoff, said has “nothing but respect for what Marc accomplished at the magazine.” Mr. Smirnoff founded The Oxford American in 1992.