Living in Brooklyn is something utterly different from
living in New Jersey or the Bronx. New Jersey and the Bronx are so
entirely out of the ordinary that they call for no explanation. Living
there has at least the merit of originality. A great poet might choose
to live in the Bronx. Minor poets have been known to commute across the
Hudson. But Brooklyn cannot be dismissed so easily. She is too big, too
close, and, for all her timidity, too contented. Her people come under
the head of those who ought to know better and do not try. Thus, while
living in New Jersey is a matter of taste, and living in the Bronx is a
matter of necessity, living in Brooklyn is a matter of habit.
And a fine, rich, ripe old habit it is, and a precious thing in a
modern, shouting world that has no habits but only impulses and vices.
Let me confess: I like Brooklyn, and I like to dream of going to live
there some day. And possibly I would go if it were not for the desire of
keeping the project before me as one of the few ideals I have retained
in life. I like Brooklyn's shapeless rotundity as contrasted with our
abominable rectangular distances in Manhattan.
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