Author Archives: Hayley Bifulco
Protected: Neighborhood pitch: West Hempstead
E.B. White: The New York Garbageman
The New York Garbageman, by E.B. White, sounds satirical.
White’s exaggerated diction and similes suggest that the New York garbageman annoys the community.
“There is no one in all New York we envy more than the garbageman.” This first sentence puts the garbageman on a pedestal of mockery as ALL of New York feel a type of way about them. White uses “envy” to describe the feelings toward the men who pick up garbage for a living. To say that New Yorkers envy garbagemen must mean that their feeling to be like them is very strong.
“Not even a fireman gets so much fun out of life.” This following sentence compares garbagemen to someone respected and considered a hero. Not to undermine the service garbagemen provide today, but White, in 1930, draws a contrast between the two.
White describes how the garbageman performs the job. The garbageman “goes banging down the street without a thought for anyone. He clatters his cans…he scatters ashes…is shrewd in measuring his pace.” White’s diction portrays the garbageman as careless and reckless.
When White talks about the garbageman scattering the ashes, he refers back to the time when that was a resolved controversy and one-horse dump carts were covered. Perhaps others had a problem with scattering ashes in the wind, but White chooses to compare the garbageman to that particular circumstance.
The garbageman drives how he pleases through “red lights and green, and backs his truck over the crossing with more privilege than a baby carriage on Fifth Avenue.” Babies are innocent and vulnerable creatures that the garbageman has no regard for, as suggested in the text.
Pirates have a reputation of being sneaky, greedy, and loud. White compares the garbageman to a pirate.
The last line says, “[The garbagemen] have the town by the tail and they know it.” This plays along with the idea that garbagemen think they have power in the city and act as if they do.
Response to E.B. White’s Here Is New York
E.B White, in Here Is New York, recognized Manhattan’s mortality. White rooted his theory of the city’s vulnerability with the hope that the life of New York, “this very tree,” the people, would stand firm and “hold a steady, irresistible charm” if the city crumbled.
White’s hypothetical in 1948 turned into a reality in 2001.
The mortality of the city’s surface is evident through the change of scenery in White’s essay to present day. Big businesses have taken over the small ones and advancement in technology replaced some manual labor and need for certain resources. Not only did the amount of people coming in and out of the city increase, but also the types of people and cultures settling in the city have changed. White noted the vast amount of Irish people in the city, especially during St. Patrick’s Day, and the amount of illegal Chinese immigrants settling in. The city has become more diverse and welcoming since then.
“No one should come to New York to live unless he is willing to be lucky,” White wrote. New York today, just as White said it did in 1948, thrives on the gamble people take by living in the city with its “gift of loneliness” and “gift of privacy.”
The lifetime resident, the commuter, and the new neighbor (from somewhere that’s not New York), in 1948 silently feared communism, as White alluded to in the theoretical plane crashes. In the midst of their fear, they all chose to not fold their cards in the city’s game and keep their loneliness and privacy. These three types of New Yorkers remain the same today holding the same hand of cards as the players did years ago.
A fear of being attacked that was once a silent thought became a spoken trauma on September 11, 2001.
When the World Trade Center was under attack, the city’s surface overwhelmed with destruction just as White described it would be in his essay.
Everyone’s loneliness and privacy had been interrupted.
White explained that the gift of privacy can isolate a person from events taking place just around the corner, unless that person chooses to participate. Except the tragedy of 9/11 forced every New Yorker to participate.
White said the city is destructible, but he couldn’t foresee that the city is also rebuildable. This is a way in which the essay is dated. He knew the people were a key component to the city’s existence, but not its most valuable resource.
New Yorkers are just like the lone tree in White’s last paragraph. They are Manhattan.