the way the sun defines the silent streets

There is a scene in Sophie's Choice (the movie) that takes place on the Brooklyn Bridge. It is a scene that does not appear in the novel. The three main characters (of the book and the movie) Stingo, Nathan, and Sophie are celebrating Stingo's writing. For the moment they are each free of the troubles that strike their minds. With Champagne in hand, Nathan, from above, hanging on to one of the bridge's massive cables, toasts:

"On this bridge, on which so many great Americans writers stood and reached out for words to give America its voice. Looking toward the land that gave them Whitman and from its Eastern edge dreamt his country's future and gave it words ... On this span of which Thomas Wolfe and Hart Crane wrote ... we welcome Stingo into that pantheon of the Gods ... whose words are all we know of immortality."

Dreamt his country's future and gave it words ... whose words are all we know of immortality. Is there a lovelier way to express the joy of passion and creativity? I hope not, it would be too much. And it is my thought here that these words flow easily when one stands high on that bridge's span, with the incomparable skyline (even in its 1950s form) as muse in the background.

Thoughts on writing and books are all a jumble these days. So I've been looking a little closer to home for how it is all done. As an outer borough resident, I admit to a certain amount of defensiveness about my hometown, about the often accused (but wrong) belief that the only creative minds live in Manhattan. I'm an unapologetic Queens native, I find myself both irritated and relieved (it will keep the "pretty people" away) by the let's-acknowledge-a-good-reason-that-Queens-shouldn't-yet-be-used-as-landfill-again pat-on-the-head articles the NY Times prints every couple of months. Because, let's face it, if you live in NYC and you don't live in Manhattan you might as well live in Staten Island or, g*d forbid, Jersey. And throughout the decades of cliched hopefuls in all media coming to this city in the hopes of "making it," the one thing in common they have is their emergence from whatever burg they've come from into Manhattan. Certainly they do not arrive in Queens. Not even Brooklyn. (Though they may find their success a long time in coming and wind up in one or the other in order to afford the rent ...)

Brooklyn. If you are able to at least afford there, you may maintain some credibility. Apparently. But, I have never understood the allure of the place. Brooklyn. It simply doesn't appeal. Except in fiction. Because at least it has some real weight from its depictions in novels. And while I ruffle at the Times' condescension, even I understand that Queens is has been immortalized by Gatsby as the "valley of ashes"--which, is Fitzgerald's description of Corona and Flushing Meadows Park, the town my family and I are from. So I wanted to take a look at what else one might find as far as offerings using the backdrop and imagery of Queens (we do not have many landmarks here that serve to inspire such quotes as above). And, while what I was able to uncover was somewhat slim, it is not a completely barren landscape. Here are a few:

Paradise Travel, Jorge Franco Ramos - A tale of Colombian immigrants arriving in New York and living in Jackson Heights.

A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, Dito Montiel - A Memoir, though I include it anyway, as we should all know by now how uncertain they are ...

From Rockaway, Jill Eisenstadt - Not a favorite of mine, and I was quite hard on it in my High School paper book review of it, however, while its subject matter is rather trite (bored teenagers getting into trouble), it's backdrop is certainly unique (as is Rockaway as part of Queens).

And we even have a couple of publishing houses and our own Book Fair (and our own month for celebrating books, apparently, April. I missed it, as I imagine most of us did ...):

Q-Boro Books - Jamaica

The Spirit that Moves Us Press - Flushing, Morty Sklar, Editor (and wonderful poet)

And lest we forget, Queens gave you The Ramones and Kerouac lived here (right above what is now Kalish Drugs on Woodhaven Blvd.), too.