Farouq’s face
In an excellent example of the flexibility of the manner in which the author engages imagery, at one point the face of an acquaintance takes on the familiar qualities of an actor playing a role. The imagery becomes a through-line connecting the acquaintance to the actor to the role to a surprising metaphor at the end:
“Farouq’s face—all of a sudden, it seemed, but I must have been subconsciously working on the problem—resolved itself, and I saw a startling resemblance: he was the very image of Robert De Niro, specifically in De Niro’s role as the young Vito Corleone in The Godfather II…the smile that seemed a mask for skepticism or shyness… I had read his face as that of the young De Niro, as a charming psychopath, for this most trivial of reasons. And it was this face, not as inscrutable as I had once feared, that spoke now: For us, America is a version of Al-Qaeda.”
Not Exactly True
New York City packs a massive number of people into the very finite confines of its island geography. Looking at the city from above, it is almost beyond all reason to think that at one time it was occupied by how many thousands or hundreds—or was it merely dozens—of Native Americans. An interesting idea for imagery that haunts in its implications is, alas, not exactly true. As of 2012, the estimated Native American population of the five boroughs was more than 225,000. That might actually be more than ever lived there before the Dutch came ashore and is more than the entire population of Akron, Ohio at the time.
“There are almost no Native Americans in New York City, and very few in all of the Northeast. It isn’t right that people are not terrified by this because this is a terrifying thing that happened to a vast population.”
The is the City
The book is primarily composed of the protagonist narrating his way around New York City. With no plot to speak of, everything is episodic and disconnected. Or, that is, everything is connected by the one singular bit of connective tissue that is setting. The narrative trek makes its way through the Bronx, Queens, Staten Island and a visit to Harlem after dark which is summed up in one potent bit of imagery:
“In the Harlem night, there were no whites."
Allusion as Imagery
Of course, there is one other thing that connects all the narrative together: the narrator. Julius haunts the city in doing so he meets Kenneth, a museum who takes an unrequited sexual interest in him. Kenneth is a talker—a monologist in the face of a man who simply wants to be left alone—and in his one-sided conversation he reveals the ability to make connections that are not really connections, but merely coincidence that becomes the imagery of a certain paranoia really just starting to develop in America around this time:
“I used to live in Littleton, but I was at university in Denver, studying for my associate’s degree, he said. You know Littleton, right? The massacre happened just after I arrived there. Terrible thing. Same thing happened with New York, I got here in July 2001. Crazy, right? Completely crazy, so I don’t know whether to warn the next city I move to!”
The allusions are to the Columbine massacre and the attacks on September 11, 2001.
