Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-73555-1 - The Cambridge Companion to the Literature of New York Edited by Cyrus R. K. Patell and Bryan Waterman Frontmatter More information The Cambridge Companion to the Literature of New York Walt Whitman once described New York City as “the great place of the western continent, the heart, the brain, the focus, the main spring, the pinnacle, the extremity, the no more beyond, of the New World.” From its origins as a Dutch trading post called New Amsterdam to its embodiment of modernity at the turn of the twentieth century, New York has always held a special place in America’s national mythology, a gateway to the USA and its premier cultural center. Illustrated and featuring a chronology and guide to further reading, this Companion explores a wide range of writing by and about New Yorkers, from early poetry and plays to modern punk rock. It sheds new light on the work of Whitman, Melville, Wharton, O’Neill, Ginsberg, and a host of other authors who have contributed to the city’s – and America’s – rich literary history. cyrus r. k. patell and bryan waterman are Associate Professors of English at New York University. A complete list of books in the series is at the back of this book © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-73555-1 - The Cambridge Companion to the Literature of New York Edited by Cyrus R. K. Patell and Bryan Waterman Frontmatter More information THE CAMBRIDGE COMPANION TO THE LITERATURE OF NEW YORK EDITED BY CYRUS R. K. PATELL AND BRYAN WATERMAN © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-73555-1 - The Cambridge Companion to the Literature of New York Edited by Cyrus R. K. Patell and Bryan Waterman Frontmatter More information CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo, Delhi, Dubai, Tokyo Cambridge University Press The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge cb2 8ru, uk Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521735551 © Cambridge University Press 2010 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published 2010 Printed in the United Kingdom at the University Press, Cambridge A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication data The Cambridge companion to the literature of New York / [edited by] Cyrus R. K. Patell, Bryan Waterman. p. cm. – (Cambridge companions to literature) isbn 978-0-521-51471-2 (Hardback) 1. American literature–New York (State)–New York–History and criticism. 2. Authors, American–Homes and haunts–New York (State)–New York. 3. New York (N.Y.)–In literature. 4. New York (N.Y.)–Intellectual life. 5. Literature and society. I. Patell, Cyrus R. K. II. Waterman, Bryan, 1970– III. Title. IV. Series. ps255.n5c35 2010 810.9'97471–dc22 2009052176 isbn 978-0-521-51471-2 Hardback isbn 978-0-521-73555-1 Paperback Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of urls for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-73555-1 - The Cambridge Companion to the Literature of New York Edited by Cyrus R. K. Patell and Bryan Waterman Frontmatter More information CONTENTS List of illustrations page vii Notes on contributors ix Acknowledgments xiii Chronology xiv Introduction 1 Cyrus R. K. Patell 1 From British outpost to American metropolis 10 Robert Lawson-Peebles 2 Dutch New York from Irving to Wharton 27 Elizabeth L. Bradley 3 The city on stage 42 Bryan Waterman 4 Melville, at sea in the city 58 Thomas Augst 5 Whitman’s urbanism 76 Lytle Shaw 6 The early literature of New York’s moneyed class 90 Caleb Crain 7 Writing Brooklyn 109 Martha Nadell 8 New York and the novel of manners 121 Sarah Wilson v © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-73555-1 - The Cambridge Companion to the Literature of New York Edited by Cyrus R. K. Patell and Bryan Waterman Frontmatter More information contents 9 Immigrants, politics, and the popular cultures of tolerance 134 Eric Homberger 10 Performing Greenwich Village bohemianism 146 Melissa Bradshaw 11 African American literary movements 160 Thulani Davis 12 New York’s cultures of print 176 trysh travis 13 From poetry to punk in the East Village 189 daniel kane 14 Staging lesbian and gay New York 202 robin bernstein 15 Emergent ethnic literatures 218 cyrus r. k. patell Epilogue: Nostalgia and counter-nostalgia in New York City writing Bryan Waterman 232 Further reading 241 Index 244 vi © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-73555-1 - The Cambridge Companion to the Literature of New York Edited by Cyrus R. K. Patell and Bryan Waterman Frontmatter More information ILLUSTRATIONS Figure 1 “A description of the towne of Mannados or New Amsterdam as it was in September 1661.” By permission of the British Library. 12 Figure 2 Drawing of Diedrich Knickerbocker by Felix O. C. Darley for the 1849 edition of A History of New York. By permission of the New York Public Library. 28 Figure 3 John Searle, Interior of the Park Theater, watercolor, 1822. By permission of the New-York Historical Society. 47 Figure 4 F. S. Chanfrau as Mose in A Glance at New York, 1848. Courtesy of the Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, DC. 50 Figure 5 “Bird’s-eye view of New York City with Battery Park in the Foreground,” 1851. Courtesy of the Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, DC. 59 Figure 6 Walt Whitman. Steel engraving by Samuel Hollyer from a lost daguerreotype by Gabriel Harrison. Courtesy of the Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, DC. 77 Figure 7 Allen Ginsberg, New York City, Fall 1953. © Allen Ginsberg/CORBIS. Used by permission. 80 Figure 8 Frontispiece from Charles Astor Bristed’s The Upper Ten Thousand (1852). Courtesy of The Fales Library & Special Collections, New York University. 95 Figure 9 Frontispiece from Matthew Hale Smith’s Sunshine and Shadow in New York (1868). By permission of the New York Public Library. 96 vii © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-73555-1 - The Cambridge Companion to the Literature of New York Edited by Cyrus R. K. Patell and Bryan Waterman Frontmatter More information list of illustrations Figure 10 Photograph of the Brooklyn Bridge, 1934. Courtesy of the Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, DC. 111 Figure 11 Publicity photo of Edna St. Vincent Millay, 1914. Courtesy of the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, DC. 154 Figure 12 Silent protest parade on Fifth Avenue, New York City, July 28, 1917. By permission of the New York Public Library. 164 Figure 13 Gerard Malanga and Patti Smith. Flyer for a poetry reading at St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery, New York City, 1971. By permission of Gerard Malanga Private Collection. 191 Figure 14 A scene from the Split Britches’ play, Upwardly Mobile Home, 1984. Photograph by Eva Weiss. Used by permission. 206 Figure 15 The Five Lesbian Brothers performing Brave Smiles at the WOW Café in 1992. Photograph by Dona Ann McAdams. Used by permission. 207 viii © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-73555-1 - The Cambridge Companion to the Literature of New York Edited by Cyrus R. K. Patell and Bryan Waterman Frontmatter More information CONTRIBUTORS Thomas Augst is Associate Professor of English at New York University. His scholarship explores the historical and social contexts of reading, writing, and speaking, seeking to interpret how literary institutions and practices have shaped the moral life of modern liberalism. He is the author of The Clerk’s Tale: Young Men and Moral Life in Nineteenth-Century America (2003), and the co-editor of Institutions of Reading: The Social Life of Libraries in the United States (2007). Robin Bernstein, originally from Coney Island, Brooklyn, is an interdisciplinary scholar of US theater, performance, and literature. She teaches at Harvard University, where she is an Assistant Professor with a joint appointment in the Program of Studies of Women, Gender, and Sexuality and the Program in History and Literature. The editor of Cast Out: Queer Lives in Theater (2006), she is currently complet- ing a book manuscript titled Racial Innocence: Performing Childhood and Race from “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” to the New Negro Movement. She has published articles on the playwrights Anna Deavere Smith, Lorraine Hansberry, Angelina Weld Grimké, and on the children’s author Louise Fitzhugh. Elizabeth L. Bradley is Deputy Director of the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library. She is the author of Knickerbocker: The Myth Behind New York (2009), and edited the Penguin Classics edition of A History of New York, by Washington Irving (2008). Her work on New York City history and culture has been published in Bookforum and The New-York Journal of American History, and she is a contributor to the Encyclopedia of New York City.