Date: Fri, 4 Nov 1994 14:32:32 -0600
From: debaron[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]UIUC.EDU
Subject: Re: new york city and upstate
I'm from New York City. Queens, to be exact. And when we went to
Manhattan in the 1950s we said we were going "to the City." But if someone
asked if I was from the City I would say yes, since Queens is part of the
city. We were well aware of the ambiguity, and often had to explain which
"the City" we meant on that particular occasion. Everything else was
upstate or on the island (Long Island). Or, of course, Jersey. Brooklyn
was somewhat vague. Though it was attached to Queens, it remained a
strange place we went to only to visit those relatives who were too old to
leave. One always feared attacks by overzealous Dodgers fans. Even though
Queens was on the island, we didn't claim it as being "on the island," a
phrase that usu. referred to Nassau and Suffolk counties, which were
outside the city, in all senses.
The people from upstate referred to NYC as the city, so far as I can
recall, though of course being from the city, I spoke to very few people
who were really from upstate. One of my teachers in college grew up
upstate. He remembered being told "the City" was as closed to Hell as one
could get on this earth, and his first visit to the City, when he saw steam
rising from the manhole covers, confirmed the worst he had been told.
Our local subway stop, a 20-minute walk from my house in Forest Hills, was
in the part of our neighborhood we called The Village. You had to go to the
Village to get the subway to go to the city. Once in the city we usually
went to the Village, meaning Greenwich Village, quite a different place
from our own "the Village" in every sense, including the steam coming up
from the manholes.
Those were the days.
Now that I've been in the Midwest for over 25 years, I know that what
Mephistopheles replied when Faustus asked him where hell was (in Marlowe's
play) is true.
Dennis
--
Dennis Baron debaron[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]uiuc.edu
Department of English 217-333-2392
University of Illinois fax: 217-333-4321
608 South Wright Street
Urbana, Illinois 61801