Imagining New York City Imagining New York City literature, urbanism, and the visual arts, 1890–1940 Christoph Lindner 1 1 Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries. Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 © Oxford University Press 2015 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above. You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Lindner, Christoph, 1971– Imagining New York City : literature, urbanism, and the visual arts, 1890–1940 / Christoph Lindner. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-19-537514-5 (cloth)—ISBN 978-0-19-537515-2 (paper)— ISBN 978-0-19-970518-4 (ebook) 1. City and town life—New York (State)—New York—History. 2. New York (N.Y.)—Social conditions. 3. New York (N.Y.)—In motion pictures. 4. New York (N.Y.)—In literature. 5. New York (N.Y.)—In art. 6. Space (Architecture)—Social aspects—New York (State)—New York—History. 7. Public spaces—Social aspects—New York (State)—New York—History. 8. Buildings—Social aspects—New York (State)—New York—History. 9. Sidewalks—Social aspects—New York (State)—New York—History. 10. Social change—New York (State)—New York—History. I. Title. HN80.N5L49 2015 303.409747'1—dc23 2014023869 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper { contents } Acknowledgments vii List of Figures xi IntroductIon: the Mutable cIty 3 archive city 3 changing new york 4 Modern city, urban Imaginary 6 Skylines and Sidewalks 9 after city 12 Part I—SkylIneS 15 new york Vertical 17 The city from above 20 requiem for the twin towers 22 building the Skyline: a brief architectural history 25 text and the city 40 new york dreamscapes 53 Fantasy Island 58 after-Images of new york 63 revisioning the Skyscraper 75 cinema and the Vertical city 79 The city from Greenwich Village 84 Metrotopia 86 The empty city 93 new york undead 97 vi Contents Part II—SIdewalkS 107 new york horizontal 109 Sidewalks and Public Space 110 a Short history of the Grid 116 Street-walking 123 broadway Promenade 126 Manhattan Flanêuse 132 blasé Metropolitan attitude 138 city of Slums 145 Sidewalks and Fear 152 tales of the tenement 155 new york underground 162 elevated city 165 high line, lowline 171 Subway city 178 underground Fantasies 184 Slow Street 190 Afterword 195 Notes 199 Bibliography 213 Index 223 { acknowledgments } This book has been long in the making, spanning three transatlantic moves, four jobs, and two sabbaticals. It is with pleasure that I am able to acknowledge here the various forms of encouragement, support, and constructive critique that the project has received over these years. At Aberystwyth University, Peter Barry, Helena Grice, Andrew Hadfield (now at Sussex), Claire Jowitt (now at Southampton), Sarah Prescott, and Tim Woods were instrumental in helping to kick-start the book in both practical and intellectual ways. At Northern Illinois University, William Baker and Keith Gandal (now at CUNY) were key partners for talking about modernism and New York City. At the University of Amsterdam, my research group, the Cities Project, pro- vided both a context and a community within which to develop the book’s core ideas about urban modernity. Many more opportunities for intellectual exchange, which shaped, challenged, and extended my thinking, were provided by the cosmopolitan intellectual community of the Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis (ASCA). A significant portion of this book was written during a visiting professorship at New York University in 2013, and I would like to thank both the Department of Social and Cultural Analysis and the Institute for Public Knowledge at NYU for hosting my visit. Jessica Coffey, Sam Carter, Candice Golys, Caitlin Zaloom, and Erik Klinen- berg were among the many people at NYU who helped to make this time productive and stimulating. I am also grateful to the New School for Public Engagement for appointing me as a visiting scholar during the last months of my research stay in New York and for providing not only a superb work space but also access to a highly engaged faculty and student community. For other, equally important forms of hos- pitality and insider knowledge about New York, I thank Douglas and Jolie Glickman, John and Rani Londoner, Andre and Ana Appignani, Erica Rutt Gale, Tom Polley, and Theodore Ross. Final revisions to the manuscript were made during a visiting scholar appointment at the Institute for Urban and Regional Development at the University viii Acknowledgments of California, Berkeley—a uniquely inspiring place for research and writing on cities. My thinking has benefited from conversations and exchanges with many scholars in the fields of American studies, architecture, art his- tory, cultural analysis, geography, media studies, sociology, and urban studies, including, among others, Nezar AlSayyad, Gary Bridge, Peter Brooker, Hugh Campbell, Ben Campkin, Deborah Cherry, Yiu-Fai Chow, Stanley Corkin, Jeroen Dewulf, Stephanie Hemelryk Donald, Isabel Gil, Derek Gregory, Sue Harris, Joseph Heathcott, Andrew Hussey, Shirley Jordan, Jeroen de Kloet, Barabara Korte, Janet Kraynak, Bill Marshall, C.J. Lim, David Pinder, Jennifer Robinson, Eric Sandeen, David Scobey, Maren Stange, Edward Soja, Douglas Tallack, José Van Dijck, Ginette Verstraete, Sophie Watson, Richard J. Williams, and Sharon Zukin. I am also indebted to the book’s two anonymous reviewers for their detailed and insightful comments. A number of institutions and funding bodies generously provided support for this project, beginning with the British Academy, who funded the first archival visit to New York City. I am also grateful to the Graduate School at Northern Illinois University for providing a summer research grant at a crucial stage in the book’s development. For awarding a much-needed publication grant, I am grateful to the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts. Almost every image in this book was made possible by the Graham Founda- tion. The University of Amsterdam funded a crucial research leave that made it possible to work on the project in situ. For stepping in as acting directors of ASCA during my sabbatical in New York, I owe Robin Celikates and Jeroen de Kloet much more than I can repay. Pedram Dibazar and Miriam Meissner were outstanding research assistants and important intellectual collaborators. The opportunities to road-test various sections of the book in the form of invited talks and public lectures were invaluable, and I am grateful to the organizers of these events and the audiences who par- ticipated at the following institutions: Brown University, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Catholic University of Portugal, Institute for Ad- vanced Studies in the Humanities–Essen, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Radboud University of Nijmegen, The New School, New York University, Queen Mary University of London, University of California–Berkeley, University of Copenhagen, University of Green- wich, University of Edinburgh, University of Freiburg, University College London, and the University of London Institute in Paris. Acknowledgments ix Parts of this book incorporate material revised from the following journal articles, and I am grateful to the publishers involved for per- mission to draw on this work: “Willa Cather, Daniel Libeskind, and the Creative Destruction of Manhattan,” Journal of American Culture 28.1 (2005); “New York Vertical: Reflections on the Modern Skyline,” American Studies 47.1 (2006); “New York Undead: Globalization, Landscape Urbanism, and the Afterlife of the Twin Towers,” Journal of American Culture 31.3 (2008); and “After-Images of the Highrise City: Visualizing Urban Change in Modern New York,” Journal of American Culture 36.2 (2013). This book is dedicated to Becky, Joseph, and Hannah for our time together in Brooklyn. Christoph Lindner Berkeley, 2014