Awe on Steroids

"Manhattan is awe on steroids."
Llewellyn King, Enterprise

Plain Talk

"I'm from Brooklyn. We talk plainly."
Al Sharpton, quoted in Newsweek

Grateful Witness

"Right now, New York feels ungentrified, and everyone who left the city left it to us, for us. The city feels more alive than I have seen it in some time. I see the performances at Sheridan Square on Christopher Street, and vogueing at Chelsea Piers. It feels like the city is alive with creativity and energy. I’m grateful to witness this version of NYC in my lifetime. This has been such a difficult time for all of us, yet New Yorkers are as resilient, pragmatic, and hopeful as ever."
Prabal Gurung, Fashion Week Daily 

New York Cab Ride

"The average New York cab ride is still one of the most exciting experiences in the city. These guys take chances with your life for 5 bucks that you wouldn't take for 5 million."
Jerry Seinfeld, Is This Anything?

Fragile Quilt

"New York is unique: a fragile quilt of many cultures, religions, and peoples whose contributions enhance and enlighten us all." 

David Dinkins, A Mayor's Life

Irritation and Attraction

 

"What is this strange thing that happens to me regarding New York? I spend my life chasing the slightest opportunity to come here, I arrive, and feel instantly possessed with a terrible indignation against everything. New York is a city that irritates me, but that attracts me in an irresistible way."
Julio Camba, La ciudad automatica

Galaxy Full of Stars

"Below me, the city spread out in all directions. Sparkling lights lined up in the neat rows of Manhattan, and the bridges to Queens and Brooklyn draped like beaded necklaces across the glassy East River. Looking at New York from above at night is like looking at a galaxy full of stars."
Juliana Romano, Summer in the Invisible City

Sense of Discovery

"All of these New York moments, their sights and sounds, their emotions, provide so much optimism and continue to feed the city's cultural imagination and regeneration. I have never felt so alive with a sense of discovery as I do here, never too sure of knowing what something tastes like. This is a city that teaches me about food, about people, about myself. And I experience the city each time I return like it's the first time."
Alain Ducasse, Alain Ducasse's New York

Climactic Synthesis of America

Times Square (Pixabay)

"New York is at once the climactic synthesis of America, and yet the negation of America in that it has so many characteristics called un-American."
John Gunther, The City

New York Chaos

"I loved the chaos of New York. The city is its own third world country, with its snarling traffic, its overflowing garbage cans, its corrupt politicians, and its rats and its rats that scurry across darkened streets and subway tracks."
Isabel Vincent, Dinner with Edward

All Faiths

"New York is of all faiths -- and of none. It is a Northern city, a Western city, a Southern city, a foreign city. It is a city of the extremes of selfishness and of philanthropy."
Edgar Fawcett, Edgar Fawcett

The Best

"New York City is one of the greatest places on the planet. You have the best in food, art, theatre, and definitely people-watching."
Matt Bomer, British GQ

New York Life

"That’s what New York life is like. You find a place with lots of sunlight, with at least a 1:4 rat to roach ratio, and within walking distance to a supermarket and/or train and/or bus to get you to that train or bus or what-have-you, and you plant yourself. You sit and wait and hope you can stay afloat when the next rent swell smashes into you."
Alcy Leyva, And Then There Were Crows

Anything Might Happen

Midtown (Pixabay)

"My impression is that in New York anything might happen at any moment. In England nothing could happen, ever."
John Sparrow, The City

Background Sound

"New York has a constant background sound, like the galaxy has constant background radiation, and New Yorkers use it to situate themselves, much as astronomers use radiation to fix our place in the universe."
Kevin Baker, The Atlantic 

The Best Thing About Being in New York

"The best thing about being in L.A. is having a car. The best thing about being in New York is that my car's in L.A."
Kevin Bray, Los Angeles Magazine

Central Relationship

Love by Robert Indiana (Pixabay)

"When I moved there in the late ’90s, I instantly fell in love with New York in a way that I had never and will never fall in love again (with a piece of geography). It was basically the central relationship of my life for a long time."
Devin Friedman, Medium

Sponge

Coney Island (Pixabay)

"New York is like a sponge. It absorbs you, empties you, and then throws you out to dry."
Unnamed undocumented immigrant, quoted in La Chulla Vida

Trying to Make It in New York

"Change has always been part of New York’s history, and the protagonist of its many tales of renewal is the city itself. New York is still trying to make it in New York."
Lucy Alexander, Robb Report

Bold and Proud

 "New York is unflinching and unapologetic. New York allows herself moments of vulnerability because she knows she’s strong as lignum vitae. New York is that way because she’s made of a community of people who are themselves—bold and proud, open and resilient."
Ilfenesh Hadera, Fashion Week Daily 

Fortune Teller

"You go to New York to have your fortunes told." 
Jean Cocteau, quoted in The Cincinnati Enquirer