Customer Reviews

New York

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This collection of 42 feature articles about New Yorkers reflects the journalistic years, 1913-1919, of Djuna Barnes (1892-1982). Her flair for writing is well demonstrated; admittedly she eventually sometimes spins off into such impressionism that it gives the reader pause. Her drawing, in 33 illustrations, can be loose, or Beardsley-like in its orientalism.

Among my favorite pieces: (1) Greenwich Village when it was really a big warren for struggling artists, and darkened rooms for smouldering denizens. (2) Coney Island for rambunctious families and for well-behaved dancers. (3) Opening day at school. (4) Veterans "in harness," old guys who stay on the job with dedication. (5) Decayed Chinatown. (6) Hippodrome circus. (7) Superstitions of some important New Yorkers. (8) Italian vaudeville house. (9) The many teashops off Fifth Avenue. (10) Djuna permits herself to be bound and force-fed through a tube in her nostril, like hunger-striking English suffragettes. (11) Djuna takes the boat trip around Manhattan, and the bus tour visiting Grant's Tomb. (12) Finally, WWI in progress, New York's War Camp Community Service takes care of our boys in uniform.

[In 1921, Djuna joined the American writers flocking to Paris, and turned to lesbian themes in her novel Nightwood (1936). Back in NY in 1940, her years of drinking and reclusiveness began.]