E. B. White�s classic essay �Here is New York,� allows the reader to feel palpably the verve and wonder of Manhattan. It demonstrates how one might organize the chaos of city life through the power of one�s mind. It is as useful in a class for its limitations as for its extraordinary virtues; it is clearly the vision of a successful white man at a specific historical moment who has spent his time in the comfortable enclaves of Manhattan, rather than its depressed areas or outer boroughs.
 
 
 

      �Bartleby, the Scrivener,� and �The Overcoat� are both stories of loneliness, poverty, and inner walls that we construct between people, walls reinforced by the concrete spaces and the layout of the cities in which we inhabit. They are both stories of the copyist, a job that no longer exists, but one whose symbolic value continues in the corporate world of the modern city.  These two heroes respond very differently to the alienation of labor, each staging his own original protest against the cruelty of the system and those who further its power.
 
 
 

       Paule Marshall�s �From the Poets in the Kitchen� is an essay on the formation of a Bajan writer in New York City. She talks about her early training as a writer in the kitchen where she listened to the natural poetry of the Bajan English and the women who use it as their only tool with which to struggle against the triple marginalization they experience as black, foreigners, and women in an alien country. She explains how the space of the island has travelled with these women to the city, and she demonstrates the poetry, philosophy and power that their use of language contains.
 
 
 

       Amazing Grace, by Jonathan Kozol, tracks the lives of children growing up in the South Bronx, at the time of publication, one of the poorest, most crime ridden and drug infested areas of New York. Kozol demonstrates the way in which governmental bodies have forgotten or deliberately hidden away these darker secrets of the city; and yet, in spite of the city�s neglect and its impossible red tape, Kozol witnesses the remarkable resilience of these forgotten people.
 
 
 

       �Olmsted�s Trip�:  A description of Olmsted�s philosophy behind the design of Central Park � a �democratic playground� intended to counter the rigidity and divisiveness of European parks and embody the American ideal of equality � this essay helps students begin to understand that design reflects ideology.
 
 
 

       �Spring Rain�:   This compact essay explores the connection that city dwellers have to nature by describing a rain storm in midtown Manhattan.  Updike draws parallels between the natural sounds of the city (e.g., the honking of taxi cabs) and the sounds of nature.
 
 
 

       �The Judgment of Birds�:  Eisley�s narrative connects three experiences with birds in three different settings:  Manhattan, his rural home, and a desert.  Through each experience he comes to understand the connection between humans and animals and the ways in which animals belong to our living spaces as much as we do.
 
 
 

       �Eiffel Tower�:  Barthes� essay considers the symbiotic relationship between a landmark and its city, the city and its past, and the citizen and the city.  Barthes admires the tower for the fact that it is both seen and a seer; that it is both meaningless (it has no purpose) and full of significance (it represents Paris to all of the world); and that it creates a link between the old Paris and the modern city.