Here is New York [Hardcover]

E.B. White (Author), Roger Angell (Introduction)

Book Description

Release date: January 1, 2000

Perceptive, funny, and nostalgic, E.B. White's stroll around Manhattan remains the quintessential love letter to the city, written by one of America's foremost literary figures. The New York Times has named Here is New York one of the ten best books ever written about the metropolis, and The New Yorker calls it "the wittiest essay, and one of the most perceptive, ever done on the city.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"On any person who desires such queer prizes, New York will bestow the gift of loneliness and the gift of privacy." So begins E.B. White's classic meditation on that noisiest, most public of American cities. Written during the summer of 1948, well after the author and editor had taken up permanent residence in Maine, Here Is New York is a fond glance back at the city of his youth, when White was one of the "young worshipful beginners" who give New York its passionate character. It's also a tribute to the sheer implausibility of the place--the tangled infrastructure, the teeming humanity, the dearth of air and light. Much has changed since White wrote this essay, yet in a city "both changeless and changing" there are things here that will doubtless ring equally true 100 years from now. To wit, "New Yorkers temperamentally do not crave comfort and convenience--if they did they would live elsewhere."

Anyone who's ever cherished his essays--or even Charlotte's Web--knows that White is the most elegant of all possible stylists. There's not a sentence here that does not make itself felt right down to the reader's very bones. What would the author make of Giuliani's New York? Or of Times Square, Disney-style? It's hard to say for sure. But not even Planet Hollywood could ruin White's abiding sense of wonder: "The city is like poetry: it compresses all life ... into a small island and adds music and the accompaniment of internal engines." This lovely new edition marks the 100th anniversary of E.B. White's birth--cause for celebration indeed. --Mary Park

Review

"Just to dip into this miraculous essay—to experience the wonderful lightness and momentum of its prose, its supremely casual air and surprisingly tight knit—is to find oneself going ahead and rereading it all.White’s homage feels as fresh as fifty years ago." —John Updike

“New York was the most exciting, most civilized, most congenial city in the world when this book was written. It’s the finest portrait ever painted of the city at the height of its glory.”—Russell Baker

“The wittiest essay, and one of the most perceptive, ever done on the city.”—The New Yorker

 “Part reverie, part lament and part exultation, the essay has long been recommended by Manhattanophiles as the best sketch ever drawn of the place. But since September 11, 2002, several sentences near the end—sentences 55 years old—resound with a prescience so eerie they bear repeating. 'The city, for the first time in its long history, is destructible,' White writes. 'A single flight of planes no bigger than a wedge of geese can quickly end this island fantasy, burn the towers, crumble the bridges, turn the underground passages into lethal chambers, cremate the millions. The intimation of mortality is part of New York now: in the sound of jets overhead, in the black headlines of the latest edition.'”—The Los Angeles Times

“… a masterpiece of travel writing. This edition contains an introduction by White's stepson, Roger Angell, himself a longtime New Yorker writer and the author of a number of best-selling books about baseball. After Sept. 11, readers will find this book touching, and prescient, in striking ways. Consider this paragraph: 'All dwellers in cities must live with the stubborn fact of annihilation; in New York the fact is somewhat more concentrated because of the concentration of the city itself, and because, of all targets, New York has a certain clear priority. In the mind of whatever perverted dreamer might loose the lightning, New York must hold a steady, irresistible charm.' The charm isn't just the city. It is also the utterly perfect prose of E.B. White.”—Lousiville Courier-Journal

“White epitomized the lucid and penetrating essayistic voice so treasured at the New Yorker, an impeccable style employed to powerful effect in this exquisitely precise contemplation of the New York City of his youth, and, by extrapolation, of humankind at large. Written in 1948, this witty and perceptive praise song to New York is a classic.”
—Booklist, February 1, 2004

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 58 pages
• Publisher: Little Bookroom; First Edition Thus edition (January 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1892145022
• ISBN-13: 978-1892145024
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.4 x 7.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (37 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #11,409 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #6 in Books > Travel > United States > New York > General
  • #8 in Books > Travel > United States > Northeast > Mid Atlantic
  • #11 in Books > Education & Reference > Writing, Research & Publishing Guides > Writing > Travel

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 26 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A gem November 10, 2003

By Daniel C. Wilcock

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

Like the Elements of Style, the timeless writing manifesto that White revised and rewrote for generation after generation of scribes, Here is New York has lasting appeal.

White captures a very large city in a very small book. Yet the end this slender volume is as satisfying as a weighty tome because White seems to get the philosophy of New York right.

And I must agree, the final pages seem to eerily fortell September 11, 2001.

If you already love New York, or if you want to know why so many do, pick this baby up and guarantee yourself a good night's reading.

32 of 35 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A timeless description of an undescribable city. May 2, 1997

By A Customer

Format:Paperback

This book, written almost fifty years ago, captures the qualities that make New York the greatest city in the world. It is a brief character sketch of the whole city. The fact that almost every word is still applicable today illustrates the eternal uniqueness and unchangability of the Big Apple. This book should be read by anyone who lives in, commutes to, or plans to visit New York

35 of 39 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars I Love New York -- Great Gift for New Yorkers Over 70! October 15, 2000

By Donald Mitchell HALL OF FAMETOP 100 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

No one could say, "I Love New York," better than E.B. White did in this slim volume of stylish, moving caresses for her lovely, loving face. To each of us, though, New York shows a different face. E.B. White has captured the universal elements of that face in his perceptive observations about what you have noticed and felt about New York, but never shared with anyone.

I have many relatives and friends in New York City who are over 70 and have told me many wonderful stories about the late 40s there. Imagine my delight when I discovered that E.B. White had written this magnificent 7,500 word essay about his experiences in the city during the summer of 1948! I have the perfect gift now to help these warm-hearted people happily relive their more youthful days. And those who love New York, regardless of their age, will love this book, as well. So I will need to buy and give many copies of this book.

The book begins with a new introduction by Roger Angell, who is E.B. White's stepson. Mr. Angell was an editor at Holiday who helped arrange for this assignment for Mr. White. Mr. White had gone to live permanently in Maine by this time, so coming to New York was a travel assignment. You may recall that Mr. White had done a stint at The New Yorker during World War II that had brought him to Manhattan, so it was also a homecoming. Mr. Angell points out that many of the scenes described in the essay are now gone, something that Mr. White also pointed out in his introduction to the essay in 1949. In addition, many of Mr. White's complaints would be even more vociferous if uttered today. But one aspect of the work is unchanging, "Like most of us, he wanted it [New York City of an earlier time] back again, back the way it was." So this essay is very much about time-specific memory, and how that evokes moods and thoughts we value most. Change that dilutes those values is to be resisted. As Mr. White said, "New York has changed in tempo and temper during the years I have known it. There is greater tension, increased irritability."

The essay teems with stylish, dynamic prose that reminded me of the vibrancy of the exploding krill population during the summer months in whale feeding grounds. New York was experiencing a heat wave, and there was no air conditioning. Perhaps that's what accounts for the often heavy mood of pessimism, relieved by only a little peek at optimism here and there.

"It is a miracle that New York works at all. The whole thing is implausible."

"Mass hysteria is a terrible force, yet New Yorkers seem always to escape it by some tiny margin . . . ."

"But the city makes up for its hazards and deficiencies by supplying its citizens with massive doses of a supplementary vitamin -- the sense of belonging to something unique, cosmopolitan, mighty and unparalleled."

The great strength of the essay is in its many wonderful, astute observations about New York. First, Mr. White points out that there are three types of New Yorkers: Those who actually were born and live there, those who commute daily, and those who come to realize some ambition. Each adds something important to the pot.

"The city is literally a composite of tens of thousands of tiny neighborhood units." "Each neighborhood is virtually self-sufficient." So in many ways, New York is also about small-town America at this time.

While the city pulses with incredible energy and activity, the New Yorker or visitor has "the gift of privacy, the jewel of loneliness." Small town America never had these qualities. In other words, you can be disconnected from the great events in the city (except for the St. Patrick's Day parade, which is ubiquitous in its noise, as Mr. White points out) if you want to be, and you can retreat from human connection into solitude amongst the masses.

He describes the ethnic groups of the city, from Jews (the largest group) to blacks (a rapidly growing one in Harlem), and comments on the diverse rituals of very different lives. The section on the Bowery and the New Yorker's reactions to the people there was particularly powerful.

He is pessimistic about the new weapons of mass destruction (the atomic bomb at this time), but cheered by the building of the United Nations. "But it [New York] is by way of becoming capital of the world" despite being capital of nothing.

The end of the essay is a meditation on an old willow tree that has been nurtured in a courtyard, a humanizing reminder of nature and of caring . . . and the past. "This must be saved, this particular thing, this very tree." "If it were to go, all would go -- this city, this mischevious and marvelous monument which not to look upon would be like death."

After you have finished meditating on this paean to humanity's strivings, consider your own home town. What does it tell you that is equally uplifting? Write down those thoughts, and share them with your family. You will have made an irresistible connection into the future through the present and the past.