Beyond the Green Light

Over the years I've blogged about my love for F. Scott's Fitzgerald's novel 1925 The Great Gatsby.

Yes, it's the Great American Novel, one of best in all of American and world literature.

Yes, it's a beautifully written snapshot of life in Roaring Twenties NYC -- the parties, the bootleggers, the indulgent affluence leading to the Great Depression and the Second World War.

Yes, almost everyone reads it in school and either loves it or hates it (or, more accurately, either "gets it" or doesn't).

Yes, it's been made into movies, including the 1974 version with Robert Redford and the 2013 with Leonardo Di Caprio, two of the biggest stars ever.

Yes, it's the final word on the promise and tragedy of the American dream.

And that's where the novel's "greatness" lies. It shows that the American dream lies betwix and between tragedy and promise, between hope and loss, that both are true at the same time. After all, we're the same nation that declare freedom and human happiness the keys to human dignity in our nation's founding documents -- yet affirmed slavery at the same time.

Jay Gatsby, poor boy from North Dakota, reinvents himself as a Long Island millionaire (thanks to bootlegging) in order to win the heart of his lost love Daisy. But it all goes horribly wrong and he dies. He hope, as Fitzgerald writes, to recreate the past and, even though he fails, the hope endures. It is symbolized by the green light at the end of Daisy's dock that Gatsby stares at, night after night, his hope of winning her love back never dying. Love endures, hope endures, even when tragedy is everywhere.

Another thing that attests to the greatest of Gatsby is that you don't have to be an American to appreciate or be moved by it. Australian Baz Luhrman, who directed the 2013 Great Gatsby, writes movingly here about his love for the novel. Best of all, he reminds us that, as free people, as hopeful people, we should all "live for the green light."

F. Scott Fitzgerald couldn't have said it better. And these days, like the novel itself, it's more relevant than ever. 

Whaddya' Know About Da' Restaurant Business?

Like Paulie Cicero, the mob boss, asked in Goodfellas, "You know anything about this fucking restaurant business?"

Me neither.

Want to open a restaurant in NYC?

This is an eye-opening expose of what it takes.

U2 @ the Highline

Woody Allen at the Oscars 2002

Today is Woody Allen's 82nd birthday. The legendary filmmaker has been nominated for and won numerous Oscars but has made it a habit never to present or accept Oscars or any awards. He has said he doesn't believe that awards should be given to art because quality is all basically subjective. 

However, in the months after 9/11, Woody made his one and only Oscars appearance where he encouraged filmmakers to keep working in NYC. He also presented a tribute film. As usual, Woody was brilliantly funny and one only wonders how much better Oscar shows would have been had he gone to them more often. 

Who Will be City Council Speaker?

Now that the municipal elections are over, it's time for the newly elected and re-elected members of the City Council to choose their leader, the Speaker. 

There are currently eight people vying for the job and, for whatever reason, they're all men. After the mayor, this is the most powerful job in city government, since the Speaker decides which legislation gets voted on in the Council. 

Like a Papal Conclave in the College of Cardinals, the Speaker's election falls into the hands of a small elite club where they choose, mostly behind closed doors, which one of them gets the top gig. Let's hope they choose wisely -- our city's future depends on it. 

Consolidation & Andrew Haswell Green

If you want more info about how NYC consolidated in 1898, go the Bowery Boys website and download their great podcast episode about how it happened.

In essence, it comes down to one man: the father of consolidation, the one who got the ball rolling, is someone who most New Yorkers probably have never heard of: Andrew Haswell Green. And yet, if we seek his monument, look around us.

A 19th century lawyer, Green became parks commissioner and, like Robert Moses a century later,  was also a city-planning Svengali: he created the Museum of the Metropolitan Art, designed Columbus Circle, financed the creation of the New York Public Library, and facilitated the creation of Central, Riverside, Morningside, and Fort Washington Parks. Eventually he was appointed by the New York State Legislature to design a plan for consolidation and, although he didn't over "the final product", Green's efforts created the template.

His vision for the political, physical, recreational, and cultural life of NYC is the city we live in today. 

Greater Gotham: A Discussion

Interesting discussion with author Mike Wallace on his nearly twenty-years in the making sequel to his 1998 book Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898 (winner of the 1999 Pulitzer Prize). 

His new book, Greater Gotham: A History of New York City from 1898 to 1919, covers the first two decades after NYC consolidated into the five boroughs, struggling to find its identity as a massive, sprawling city. In this period, NYC transformed into a financial capital, survived the First World War, and saw the rise of Prohibition. 

Fascinating tidbit: why did NYC become the big, sometimes illogically-constructed city of five disparate counties? 

The reason: the harbor. In the late 19th century, NYC and the City of Brooklyn were competing over control of the harbor and this was diminishing the economic clout of the region and assisting the rise of that Midwestern city called Chicago. So as not to be overtaken as the nation's premier city, as well as its financial center, NYC and Brooklyn decided to put aside their differences and get together -- bringing Staten Island and Queens along for the ride (the Bronx was already part of NYC) which also had claims to the harbor. 

The result is the city we live in today. But, as this new book and discussion show, there were birthing pains and it took decades for NYC to realize itself as a functioning five-borough empire.

In many ways NYC is still an empire, a collection of different towns and villages and whole cities that make it like nowhere else in the world. That's what has and will forever make NYC fascinating. 

WE WANT WEED!!!

Recreational marijuana is now legal in eight states. Most are out west (like Colorado, California, and Nevada) and the closest state with legal weed to NYC is Massachusetts.

But that's set to change: the newly-elected Democratic governor of New Jersey has said that he will sign a legal weed bill if the legislature passes one -- and the legislature seems poised to do it. So we may very well have legal weed right across the Hudson River within the year. 

The reasons for legal weed are clear: it's safer and less addictive than legal tobacco and alcohol, it will generate massive amounts of tax revenue which will fund the government without raising other taxes, it will vastly reduce the number of arrests that will decrease the cost and increase the efficiency of our criminal justice system, it will give jobs to weed farmers, it will put dispensaries in business, and young people and minorities will no longer have their lives ruined just because they want to toke and got busted.

Only someone with a dishonest, mean-spirited agenda could oppose legal weed. Besides, how do you outlaw a plant?

Hopefully, if and when it happens in New Jersey, the usually New York State legislature will get its act together and legalize recreational pot ASAP. I can't imagine that New York City and State politicians will want to see all that business and revenue go to New Jersey and not here. A two-thirds majority of New Yorkers want  their weed legal -- so let's go ahead and do it! 

"The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel"

Looking forward to seeing this: it's a new Amazon show about a female stand up comic in 1950s NYC. This is the era that produced Joan Rivers who the titular character is apparently based on. I've seen posters for it in the subway so it's sparked my curiosity. Hope it's good!

Making NYC Radio Great Again

92.3 FM, the old K-Rock, which years ago abandoned rock music to become a pop station, is now a rock station once again. 

Sadly it won't be a resurrected K-Rock, instead calling itself Alt 92.3 and playing "alternative" rock. Back in the day, it used to be classic rock (until 1996), then became "modern" rock and then, after Howard Stern left, it became a short-lived "hot talk" station before becoming a modern rock station once more and then, finally, a pop station. It changed its call letters to WAMP and completely abandoned it's rock'n'roll identity -- until now. 

I guess K-Rock is gone for good but at least a great frequency is rightfully returned to its place in the NYC cultural firmament. 

*In 1996, when K-Rock flipped from classic to modern rock, Howard Stern was the first DJ: