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Descriptive writing of new york city
Descriptive writing of new york city
Descriptive writing of new york city
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Both “Goodbye to All That” by Joan Didion and American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis portray New York as a city where it is horrible to live, filled with homeless men, filth, crime, and complete displeasure, but for some reason, nobody leaves. The perception of New York City given by these two passages is a contradictory one. In both passages the narrators describe the city with great disappointment and Didion also adds a tone of annoyance to her passage, annoyed that even though she hates pretty much everything about New York she doesn’t leave, and instead of staying for the 6 months as she originally planned, getting anxious to finally be free from the horrible city, she stays for 8 years. For Timothy in American Psycho, despite the many bad things he has to say about the city, he doesn’t leave, and mentions that leaving is not an option. Ellis adds to the negative perception by making Timothy seem numb to all the crime and violence. Both show the idea that even though the people that come to New York have many bad things to say, and complain about pretty much everything, they cannot leave. Both Didion and Ellis make it clear that New York is a trap that invites you in with idealistic views written into songs and movies but once you’re in it shows its true colors and doesn’t let you leave. Although these texts were written a while ago, American Psycho written in 1991 and “Goodbye To All That” written in 1968, the idea that New York is a trap that will lure people in with false promises of an easy life, and once their here, miserable or not, they won’t leave, seems to still be consistent today. Joan Didion presents, in a passage from her essay “Goodbye To All That”, the idea of a young girl “programmed by all the... ... middle of paper ... ...e division between the upper-middle class, and the middle and lower class. The most expensive zip code in the country is a few train stops away from Low Income Housing Projects. Despite the fact that they have enough money to live in gated communities, they stay and complain. In conclusion, it seems to be that one of the most populated cities in America is the most hated by the people who inhabit it. One would imagine that in a place where the way of life is clearly horrible, there wouldn’t be 8 million people living there. People come with high expectations of city that is featured to be perfect in movies and songs, so people come for a better more ideal life, but they have no idea why they stay. New York is a city where no matter how much money you have, there’s so much to complain about, but nobody leaves or even try to fix what’s wrong about the city.
In September 1954, he moved out of Northwood in Long Island onto the Northern State Parkway to see his new house in the countryside. He specifically said that Long Island had been one of the most beautiful places in the United States, and his house was one small reason it would not remain that way much longer. His new house lacked in exterior grandeur, but it made up for comfort inside and costs in all together $25,000. Kunstler got his first glimpse of what real American towns were like when he was sent away to a boys’ camp in Lebanon, New Hampshire. He visited his hometown Northwood when he became a teenager and saw how it has entered into a coma with so little for one to do there. Northwood had no public gathering places, so teens were stuck in their little holes who smoked pot and imitated rock and roll. For the teenagers there, the waiting transforming moment was when one became a licensed driver, as I can say the same about my town. Kunstler went to a state college in a small town, Brockport in western New York State. The college was the only thing that kept the town alive with healthy conditions where it was scaled to people, not cars. He ends the chapter by pointing out that this book is an attempt to discover how and why landscape of scary places, the geography of nowhere, has simply ceased to be a credible human habitat happened and what we might do about
of the city as we read, but Whitehead’s ultimate goal is to depict the effect that a
The United States of America is known as the land of opportunity and dreams. People dream of migrating to this nation for a chance of a better a life. This belief has been around for many years, ever since the birth of the United States; therefore it’s a factor in which motivate many people migrate to the United States. Upton Sinclair, author of the Jungle, narrates the life of a Lithuanian family and there struggles with work, crime, family loss, and survival in the city of Packingtown. Sinclair expresses her disgust as well as the unbelievable truth of life in the United States involving politics, corruption, and daily struggle that many suffered through in the 19th and 20th century.
...ew York City in the 19th century. The reader will realize not every immigrant coming to America for a better life will live out their dream. However, I would not recommend How the Other Half Lives to those uninterested in the origins of New York City, the 19th century, and optimists wanting to avoid negative ideas. The entire novel revolves around the crowded tenements and unfavorable conditions of the New York City slums in the mid to late 19th century, where the crowded populations caused mass sanitation problems and disease. Although charities and the hard-working aura of the citizens were mentioned, Riis focused mostly on the struggles of the time period. Despite this, I would highly recommend How the Other Half Lives to anyone looking for a fantastic read; Riis’ use of “muckraking” will show you an entirely different viewpoint from traditional nonfiction novels.
In conclusion, from my perspective, the movie is presented in the middle 70’s, showing a portrayal of a City of New York overcrowded. The violence presented is the primary ingredient, drugs, betrayals and murderers are also included in this film that shows the city from a perspective of the streets and the world of the mafia, probably something that happened in those days and remains part of an unseen
He refers to all the immigration groups in a judgmental way. He complains about the intelligence levels of the Italians, how dirty and deceitful the Jews are, and even the immaculate cleanliness of the Chinamen. Although he does possess quite a bit of bigotry that boarders on the line of prejudice when it comes to African Americans he recognizes that they are suffering from racism and he sympathizes with th...
Although a fiction film, New Jack City details a chapter of New York’s development in which the city struggled to regain control over its dwindling economy and increase in extreme poverty and criminal behavior brought on by crack-cocaine. The poor economy encouraged a desperate scramble for money, and the rush for money, by any means, became the channel through which individuals sought to achieve the American Dream. Further, they planned to realize that dream in any way possible even if it meant making a profit from the very thing [Crack] that brought on their demise in the first
Colson Whitehead explores this grand and complex city in his collection of essays The Colossus of New York. Whitehead writes about essential elements to New York life. His essays depict the city limits and everyday moments such as the morning and the subway, where “it is hard to escape the suspicion that your train just left... and if you had acted differently everything would be better” (“Subway” 49). Other essays are about more once in a while moments such as going to Central Park or the Port Authority. These divisions are subjective to each person. Some people come to New York and “after the long ride and the tiny brutalities... they enter the Port Authority,” but for others the Port Authority is a stop in their daily commute (“The Port Authority” 22).Nonetheless, each moment is a part of everyone’s life at some point. Many people live these moments together, experiencing similar situations. We have all been in the middle of that “where ...
The tenement was the biggest hindrance to achieving the American myth of rags to riches. It becomes impossible for one to rise up in the social structure when it can be considered a miracle to live passed the age of five. Children under the age of five living in tenements had a death rate of 139.83 compared to the city’s overall death rate of 26.67. Even if one did live past the age of five it was highly probable he’d become a criminal, since virtually all of them originate from the tenements. They are forced to steal and murder, they’ll do anything to survive, Riis appropriately calls it the “survival of the unfittest”. (Pg.
While the novel consists of graphic and even disturbing description to set the scene, this is one of the most powerful statements in the novel. It shows the horrid conditions that the economically unfortunate are forced to endure in the city of Harlem. The last sentence, “That is Harlem” almost conveys a sense of normalcy. As if the reader feels anything, the last emotion the reader should experience is a feeling of surprise. If anything, the reader may be getting a creeping feeling in their gut that these people are essentially doomed. All hope has been lost. The individuals across the Hudson are no longer living, but merely trying to
New York City has always been a turning point for many, may it be a native-American wishing to make a fortune or an arriving immigrant looking for better life conditions than the ones from his home country; it was particularly true for the many Irish immigrants fleeing Ireland. However, their growing numbers and willingness to accept any kind of work presented to them, attracted hostility from the rest of the New Yorkers leading them to be depicted mostly as troublemakers and a threat to the city. The fact that they resided mostly in Five Points, the most infamous slum of the time, did not help their case either. Still, their reputation was grossly exaggerated and merits to be set right. The Irish population in New York had survived through
Dumenil, Lynn, ed. "New York City." The Oxford Encyclopedia of American Social History. N.p.: Oxford UP, 2012. Oxford Reference. Web. 8 Apr. 2013.
Picture Manhattan in 1860, a time before the city had been dolled up and gotten ready for the silver screen, before the glamour and allure took over. Amsterdam Vallan (DiCaprio) is a young Irish man that migrates to the USA at a young age. Amsterdam’s story takes place in Five Points District of New York, a filthy and dangerous part of the city before it was deleted form history. As a young boy Vallan witnessed his father’s murder at the hand of William Cutting or Bill the Butcher (Day-Lewis) during one of their many gang wars. As Amsterdam’s story progresses along side The Butcher they become inseparable, but Amsterdam had ulterior motive. Ultimately, Amsterdam attempts to betray his new found ally in order to avenge his father’s death. Historical accounts of events are almost always synthesized by the storyteller; in the case Gangs of New York Martin Scorsese tells of Five Points, The Dead Rabbits Riots, and The Draft Riots, but is his fictional story accurate through history?
... who settled on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, where we could see packs of books telling the stories and experiences of past immigrants. I felt the rush and the excitement that characterize the city, but I also couldn’t get enough of the multiple cultures in New York. One would spend days and weeks in the “City that Never Sleeps” but still, it would take many more to truly experience every aspect of it or understand how the diverse ethnicities were able to survive and succeed there.
New York, constituent state of the United States of America, is one of the 13 original colonies and states. New York is bounded to the west and north by Lake Erie, the Canadian province of Ontario, Lake Ontario, and the Canadian province of Quebec; to the east by the New England states of Vermont, Massachusetts, and Connecticut; to the southeast by the Atlantic Ocean and New Jersey; and to the south by Pennsylvania. The capital is Albany. Until the 1960s, New York was the country’s leading state in nearly all population, cultural, and economic indexes. Its displacement by California beginning in the middle of that decade was caused by the enormous growth rate that has persisted on the West Coast rather than by a large decline in