Un-American

"My one thought is to get out of New York, to experience something genuinely American."
Henry Miller, The Air-Conditioned Nightmare

Badge of Honor

West 14th

"Anyone who has spent a typical August in New York has often been confronted with the penetratingly pungent odor of roasting garbage, overripe in the ninety-plus degree noonday sun.  It's an odor you don't soon forget and a kind of badge of honor for those with enough temerity to spend time in New York during that stygian month."
Richard Goodman, A New York Memoir

Serene and Somber

"Serene was a word you could put to Brooklyn, New York, especially in the summer of 1912. Somber, as a word, was better."
Betty Smith, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

Hope and Despair

Pixabay

"In Rome I am weighed down by a lack of momentum, the inertia of a spent civilization.  In New York I feel plugged into a strong alternating current of hope and despair."
Ted Morgan, quoted in 1,911 Best Things Anybody Ever Said

So Many Ways to Die

Third Avenue

"There are so many ways to die in New York City, c'mon! Subway crashes, drive-by shootings, race riots, construction cranes collapsing on the sidewalks, manhole covers blowing up and asbestos shooting into the sky."
Denis Leary, No Cure for Cancer

Mistake

Fifth Avenue

"All New Yorkers make the mistake of thinking that New York is America, which is ironic when you consider the map."
Jonathan Tropper, Plan B

Desperate Summer

Gantry Plaza spray pad

"A New York summer is frenetic, syncopated, blistered, frayed, dusty. There is a desperation in its heat, and a sense of letdown, despite relief, in its air-conditioned indoors."
Cynthia Ozick, Quarrel & Quandary

Fascinating

"New York is the most fascinating city in the world, and the most essentially cosmopolitan."
Richard Burleigh Kimball, Virginia Randall: Or, Today in New York

Carnival or Freak Show

"To grasp her charm, her alarm, her sometimes rotten scent and rancid underbelly along with her spectacular treasures, you must walk. New York is basically a gigantic, sophisticated carnival or freak show."
Michael K. Corbin, Art for the People

High Life

Pexels.com

"New York isn't just frantic, it's the perfect place to indulge in all the heady high-end perks of the high life."
Elizabeth M. Rees, Demigods and Monsters

Summer is News

Coney Island

"In New York—fidgety, frittering, frenzied, boiling New York—summer itself is news."
Cynthia Ozick, Quarrel & Quandary

What America Stands For

Oculus

"New York is the very best of what America stands for."

Suzanne Oliver, The Faith Club

New York is Crazy

"I realized that New York is crazy. It's difficult to think straight here! There is too much of everything — too much poorness, too much richness."
Harold Carlton, Sacrifice

New York Gossip

"There is really only one forum where the unique New York confluence of power, money, celebrity and controversy is dissected on a daily basis: the city's gossip columns. That's where the agenda is set."
Frank DiGiacomo, The Kingdom of New York

Nothing Stays the Same

Williamsburg

"This is New York. Nothing stays the same for very long."
J.F. Englert, A Dog Among Diplomats

Greenwich Village

"Growing up, I only wanted New York. To be precise: I wanted Greenwich Village. I wanted the subway. I wanted struggle. I wanted culture. I wanted action."
Alyssa Shelasky, Apron Anxiety

Harsh Mistress

"New York is a harsh mistress."
Tom Maremaa, Imagined

Village Under Glass

"She still couldn't believe sometimes she actually was a resident of this city. The place was rarified, striking, closed off, and encapsulated. A village under glass."
Helen Schulman, This Beautiful Life

Torn Down

"As usual in New York, everything is torn down before you have time to care for it."
James Merrill, Essays in Criticism

Doesn't Belong to the Rest of America

New York Passport Agency

"New York City, which has a way of making you feel like you're in the Third World just seconds after you thought you'd conquered all of Western civilization, has never really belonged to the rest of the country."

Meghan Daum, My Misspent Youth