Page 52 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - New York City

50  INTRODUCING NE W Y ORK CIT Y

Remarkable New Yorkers

New York has nourished some of the best creative talents
since the beginning of the 20th century. Pop Art began here,
and Manhattan is still the world center for modern art.
The alternative writers of the 1950s and 1960s – known as the
Beat Generation – took inspiration from the city’s jazz clubs.
And, as New York is the financial capital, many leading world
financiers have made it their home.

Henry Miller (1891–1980) wrote
about his experiences in the
book Tropic of Capricorn (1939), Pop artist Andy Warhol
which was banned until 1961.
Jack Kerouac (1922–69), Allen York in the 1960s with Roy
Ginsberg, and William Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol
Burroughs all went (1926–87), who made some of
to Colum bia Uni­ his cult films at 33 Union Square.
versity and Keith Haring (1958–90) was a
drank at the San very prolific graffiti artist who
Remo Café in gained fame for his Pop Art
Green wich murals and sculptures.
Village. James Robert Mapplethorpe (1946–
Baldwin (1924– 89) acquired notoriety for his
Novelist James Baldwin 87), born in Harlem, wrote homoerotic photos of men.
Another Country (1963) on his Jeff Koons (1955–) was part
Writers
return to New York from Europe. of the Neo­Pop or Post­Pop
Much great American literature Ralph Ellison (1914–94) penned Movement of the 1980s,
was created in New York. Invisible Man (1952) in Harlem, while street artist Jean­Michel
Charlotte Temple, A Tale of Truth, while Richard Wright (1908–60) Basquiat (1960–88) still retains
first published in 1791 by wrote Native Son in Fort Greene. a cult following for his Neo­
Susanna Rowson (c.1762–1824), The city’s current list of writers Expressionist works.
was a tale of seduction in the city is strong: Jonathan Franzen,
and a bestseller for 50 years. Joshua Ferris, Téa Obreht, and
American literature won Jennifer Egan, among others. Actors
international recognition with High­profile émigrés like Martin In 1849 the British actor Charles
Washington Irving’s (1783–1859) Amis and Salman Rushdie also Macready started a riot by calling
satire, A History of New York (1809). call the city home. Americans vulgar. A mob
Irving coined the names “Gotham” stormed the Astor Place Opera
for New York and “Knickerbockers” House, where Macready was
for New Yorkers. He and James Artists playing Macbeth, police opened
Fenimore Cooper (1789–1851), The New York School of Abstract fire, and 22 rioters were killed.
whose books gave birth to the Expressionists founded the In 1927 Mae West (1893–1980)
“Western” novel, formed the first influential American art spent 10 days in a workhouse
Knickerbocker group. Edgar Allan movement. It was launched by on Roosevelt Island and was
Poe (1809–49) lived in the Bronx, Hans Hofmann (1880–1966) with fined $500 for giving a lewd
while Herman Melville (1819–91), Franz Kline and Willem de perfor mance in her Broadway
author of Moby Dick (1851), was Kooning, whose first job in show Sex.
born in Lower Manhattan. Henry America was as a house­ The musical has been
James (1843–1916) became the painter. Adolph Gottlieb, Mark New York’s special
master of the psychological novel Rothko (1903–70), and contribution to the
with Washington Square (1880), Jackson Pollock theater. Florenz
and his friend Edith Wharton (1912–56) Ziegfeld’s (1869–
(1861–1937) was known for her went on to 1932) Follies
satirical novels about New York popularize ran from 1907
society, such as The Age of this style. to 1931. The
Innocence (1920). Pollock, Kline, opening of
By the end of World War I, and de Oklahoma!
Greenwich Village had become Kooning all on Broad­
New York’s Left Bank. Poet Edna had their studios way in 1943
St. Vincent Millay, playwright on the Lower began the
Eugene O’Neill, and the writer East Side. Pop age of
E. E. Cummings all lived here. Art began in New Vaudeville actress Mae West musicals by

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