If your source for the Wieseltier comment is the NYT reference, I suspect a tonal misread. Certainly he cannot be happy at the loss of Lizza and Wood. But I hear a charming if wounded defense of his mag, not bitchiness at either The NYer or his purloined and/or deserting staff.
But your judgment may depend on personal info. (That is, you may know he is a catty guy in general. In which case, disregard.)
No, I don't have any special insider knowledge about LW. Maybe you're right. I heard it as an instance of the kind of frustration that people at other magazines sometimes feel w/r/t the New Yorker -- in this case something like "We find these talented people from the massive pool of applicants, and we bring them to the point where they're the most respected in the field, and then the NYer with its bigger budget and reputation plucks them away and gets the credit." But you're right, it's a position that could accommodate any of various levels of bitchiness.
I don't know that much about Leon Wieseltier. He wrote an essay I liked a lot, called "Hitler Is Dead," and then he was a big backer for a war that I didn't like much at all, called the Iraq War. None of this is particularly relevant, though.
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