NY SUBLIME ARTICLE

One thing that both Cynthia Ozick and E.B White are extremely successful in doing is relating to their audience. For those who consider themselves “true” New Yorkers, when reading this piece they laugh quietly to themselves or roll their eyes or shake their heads rapidly in agreement. Whether its her mentioning of Central Park joggers, marathon runners, museum addicts, street walkers, business men, SAT students, or fashionistas she really displays the multifaceted population of NYC. In contrast to E.B White Ozick seems to emphasize some of the more negative aspects of NYC. That was one of the things that bothered me about this author, when someone criticizes something i hold dear to my heart i tend to defend it immediately. I had to keep reading to fully grasp Ozick’s meaning.

Quotes that stood out for me:

“But grandeur on this style is a neighborhood of the mind, a narrow one at that”

“What Manhattan talks about obliquely or openly-what it thinks about, whatever the season-is ambition”

“It is only the city that lives on, half-amnesiac, hardly ever glancing back…”

“”Yet there is a difference Newyork ambition has changed face”.

 

ambition”               A major point that was emphasized was an integration of the classes. NYC is one of the only places in the world where you can find the poor steps away from the rich. The unmotivated, egotistic, aimless, shameful, angels, extraordinary, the completely ordinary, all culminate in one overpopulated city, all for different reasons and yet can very well bumo into each other during rush hour.

 

 

 Without understanding the title of the essay it is easy to completely misunderstand the intent of each sentence. Many while reading might at first see a certain cynical tone in which a lot of the downfalls to NYC are brought to light, almost in a condescending tone. This introduction of lack luster qualities of NY and yet still people remain in the millions to walk these polluted streets is in itself explaining the title. Synthetic Sublime, meaning a manmade form of a natural inexplicable feeling. New York City is just that.