The pieces that E.B White wrote for The New Yorker gives insight into the nuances of the city. Each piece gives a different perspective into the people, places, things, and even animals that coexist in this one microcosm. His love for the city is also very apparent in many of the pieces, but especially in the last one that is entitled “New York” where in the last line he says “Yet we somehow tasted New York on our tongue in a great, overpowering draught, and felt that to sail away from so intoxicating a place would be unbearable, even for a brief spell.” (White).

His prose is filled with observations about New York that are both humorous and truthful at the same time. For example, in “The Lure of New York” when a Daily News photographer asked people why they loved New York, he got typical answers from some of the people that he asked. However, the most humorous answer came from a Greek man who said “In New York you can buy things so late at night.” This is still true today, with 24 hour Duane Reades and McDonald’s drive-throughs. However, this has become true for people in other parts of the country and worldwide with the introduction of the internet and websites like Amazon where a wide array of things can be bought at any hour of the day or night.

Conversely, some of the observations that White makes are more serious in tone. In “New York’s Cocktail” he comments on the smog problem that New York is experiencing due to the combination of fog and smoke from exhaust and various other forms of pollution. He calls this combination “the city’s cocktail” with one ‘ingredient’ (fog) coming from nature, while the other, the smoke, is a man made phenomenon. White’s observation and analysis of the smog is very ahead of its time because people were not yet aware of the dangers of pollution. Later in the essay White goes on to say “Certainly no other animal fouls its nest so cheerfully and persistently as Man, or acts so surprised or sore about it afterwards” about the self imposed consequences of the pollution. White would probably be pleased to see all the environmental activism and preservation that is happening in the present day.