Galaxy of Adventure

Barbara Walters at Madame Tussauds

"New York is a galaxy of adventure at once elegant, exciting and bizarre. It's a city that moves so fast, it takes energy just to stand still."
Barbara Walters, quoted in The Great New York City Trivia & Fact Book

Lonely and Sad

Elizabeth Street

"Everyone in New York is lonely and sad and needs to speak to someone."
Alix Strauss, The Joy of Funerals

Fling

"New York is always a bit of a fling for me. And yet I keep going back for more..."
Christiana Spens, The Wrecking Ball

How to Make Friends

Central Perk

"The best way to make friends in New York is to at least indirectly compliment what people do for a living."
Deborah Schoeneman, 4% Famous

Sneaking in a Nap

Grace Building

"At night, New York is well lit and unreal, filled with a blue-black glow. This may be the city that never sleeps, but if my street was any indication, it could sneak in a serious nap."
Harlan Coben, Gone for Good

New York Water

A water tower in Midtown

"My hair is always at its best in New York. I don't know what's in the water. It could be mousse."
Ellen DeGeneres, TV Guide

For the Rich

Downtown Manhattan Heliport

"New York is a city for the rich by the rich."

Choire Sicha, New York Stories

Manhattan Snob

Brooklyn Heights

"She is aware that there are people who adore Brooklyn, who embrace it wholeheartedly as a vital, vibrant part of New York City. She knows these people are many, that their legions are myriad and vast. She's just not one of them."
Alison Pace, Through Thick and Thin

Underworld

"New York City, in the summer, cannot be so different from hell. The smell of sweat mixed with the brine from the pickle barrels of vendors, the tight press of a hundred people who look right through you, the newsboys selling tragedy for a nickel, the fumes of the taxis rising like wraiths—this is an underworld, and anyone in it can point you toward an escape hatch."
Jodi Picoult, Second Glance

Bacchanal

"New York was a bacchanal of the rich and obnoxious, a Falstaffian brew of hedonism and material excess: no boundaries, no breaks--just high octane, high speed, all the time."
Jill Kargman, The Ex-Mrs. Hedgefund

Cats and Dogs

Fifth Avenue

"My family hates New York. I do not mean that they are charmingly adrift in this unfamiliar urban world, the innocents abroad. I mean they despise it, the way cats despise dogs, the way the Goldman family despises OJ, the way vampires despise sunlight."
Will Leitch, Life As a Loser

Ruined by Money

The James Hotel

"She looked out the window at all the rich Euros and trust fund kinds who had taken over SoHo and the Lower East Side, and she didn't feel as furious as she usually did about how money had ruined the city. She felt romantic. New York was big enough for all of them. The skyline would survive."
Amy Sohn, Prospect Park West

Multicultural

McSorley's Old Ale House

"The U.S. is ahead of the curve in terms of dealing with multi-cultural issues and New York is at the front of the United States' curve... New York is where you have the Irish bar with the Indian guy tending bar."
Edward Norton, in Univercity Magazine

Throb of Potential

Waterfall with glass tunnel by McGraw-Hill

"New York, its consistent throb of potential, can be a dangerous place for the overly imaginative; everyone you see is a possible route toward a different future."
Julie Buxbaum, The Opposite of Love

Well-Dressed but Unshaven

Hon. Thomas Tan Way

"Occasionally I idle time away by wondering what cities would be like, were they people. Manhattan is, in my head, fast-talking, untrusting, well-dressed but unshaven."
Neil Gaiman, SIMCITY

Restless Beast

Mulberry St.

"I don't love New York, but I respect it, restless beast that it is."
Carolyn Parkhurst, The Nobodies Album

Social Experiment

The High Line

"New York is a social experiment -- the results aren’t in yet, it may not have worked, they took way too many people with a large disparity of wealth, stacked them on top of each other, and sprinkled bagels over the whole thing."
Conan O'Brien, New York Magazine

About New York

Jersey Street

"Sometimes people don't get New York. The place is dirty and dangerous and crowded and costly, and every other place is even worse."
Kyle Smith, Love Monkey

A Walk to the Deli

West 72nd

"That's the great thing about New York. You walk down the street and you encounter like a thousand potential sexual partners every day. A walk to the deli can be very erotic."
Edward Burns, Sidewalks of New York

Subway Lessons

14st Street Subway Station

"I've been on the New York City subway enough times to know that respectful speech, polite manners, and proper etiquette aren't the requirement everywhere!"
Jordan Christy, How to Be a Hepburn in a Hilton World

Art

Art by Diana Al-Hadid on Madison Square Park

"New York City is the place where all art comes home to roost."
Adriana Trigiani, Rococo

Lawless Wilderness

Midtown

"New Yorkers, I discovered, pride themselves on their city's image as a lawless wilderness and like nothing more than reading about naive greenhorns being relieved of all their possessions within fifteen minutes of arriving."
Toby Young, How to Lose Friends and Alienate People

The Center of the World

Globe at Trump International Hotel and Tower

"I believed, perhaps to an irrational degree, that Manhattan was always going to be the best place to live — the center of the world."
Donald Trump, Trump: The Art of the Deal

No Need to Leave the House

Ninth Avenue

"Here's one of the many great things about New York City. If you don't want to leave the house, you don't have to. You can pay someone to walk your dog. You can pay to have hot meals and your newspaper delivered right to your door. You can also pay people to shop for your shampoo, pick up your dry cleaning, and run other errands. Hell you don't have to get out of bed."
Louise Shaffer, Looking for a Love Story

The Only Love

NY skyline seen from Newark

"I miss New York like I'd miss a lover. It knows I was there last month; it was smiling smugly at me, knowing I would come back under false pretenses ('I had to work and see my friends'); it knew I was there because at one time, it was the only love in my life."
Christine Cantera, Miss Expatria

City of Possibilities

West Chelsea

"New York -- the messy, pulsing, glorious city of possibilities."
Sarah Pekkanen, The Opposite of Me

Guest

Plaza Hotel

"To those who had something wonderful to give it, New York could be the kindest place in the world. But one did not want to show up there empty-handed. Regardless of residential status, one was always a guest there and one's standing always dependent upon the multitude and worth of one's offerings."
Hyatt Bass, The Embers

Alone on a Holiday

Flowers in a Midtown deli

"New York City is a hospitable place if you're alone on a holiday. Everything is open -- food stores, flower shops, the newspaper stand."
Delia Ephron, Hanging Up

Cool Experience

Fifth Avenue

"New York can be a cool experience, because everyone seems to be into themselves, rushing to their next appointment and projecting autonomy in their universe, as if to protect themselves from the knowledge of their own vulnerability."
Shirley MacLaine, Out on a Leash

Live, Leave

Williamsburg Bridge and Manhattan skyline

"Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard."
Mary Schmich, Wear Sunscreen

Reward and Punishment

Riverside Park South

"This city is reward for all it will enable you to achieve and punishment for all the crimes it will force you to commit."
Colson Whitehead, The Colossus of New York