The World in a City: Traveling the Globe Through the Neighborhoods of the New New York
Page 32
There were many experts who illuminated the book's larger thoughts, and they include Joseph Salvo, William Helmreich, Jerome Krase, Jon Rieder, John Mollenkopf, Barry Lewis, Mitchell Moss, Gay Talese, Madhulika Khandelwal, Jenna Weissman Joselit, Sam Heilman, Yaakov Korn-reich, Philip Kasinitz, Sharon Zukin, Richard Alba, Neal Gabler, Cynthia Lee, Maxine Margolis, Fred Siegel, Felix Matos Rodriguez, Pyong Gap Min, Harry Daskalothanassis, Lloyd Ultan, Phaedra Thomas, Judith Owens-Manley, and Jack Ukeles. Still, the lion's share of gratitude must go to the dozens of neighborhood personalities who were willing to open their hearts and intimate stories to me—including Claudio Caponigro, Zhong Wen Jiang, Manizha Naderi, Masuda Sultan, Intesar Museitef, George Alexiou, Mavis Theodore, Hynda Schneiweiss, Kwasi Amoafo, Nicholasa Mohr, Mario Romero, Aurora Flores, Maggie Leung, Bernard Haber, Anatoly Alter, Jay Graber, Raphael Wallerstein, Shlomo Nisanov, Lana Levitin, Jesus Peña, Latchman Budhai, Shariar Uddin, Robert Gangi, Lorraine DeVoy, George Broadhead, Linda Cunningham, Bud Konheim, Charles Howard, and Brenda and Amy Zimmer. Without them, the book would have been undoable.
Without my editor, Nancy Miller, there also would not have been a book. Reading The Times pieces, she thought there was a larger work to be hatched, and she guided me in shaping it into a thematically consistent and engaging whole. With help from Lea Beresford, she shepherded me through the hundreds of painstaking steps that lead to an actual book, all with grace, ardor, and intelligence. My agent, Jane Dystel, once again saw to it that the book was handled respectfully, and her enthusiasm and attention to detail pushed me onward.
My parents—my late father, Marcus Berger, and my mother, Rachel Berger—as well as my siblings, Josh and Evelyn, bred in my bones an immigrant perspective that surely enriched the book—as did their love. Friends Alon Gratch, Michele Sacks, Jerry and Eva Posman, Jack Schwartz, Gina Schwarz, David Aftergood, Victor and Lois Neufeld, Phyllis and Elliott Rosen, Andrea Gabor, Nancy Rabinowitz, Jack Kadden, Clyde Haberman, Joyce Purnick, Connie Rosenblum, Jacques Steinberg, Jules Bemporad and Nancy Albertson, Steve Greenhouse, Miriam Reinharth, Carolyn Hessel at the Jewish Book Council, and others space won't allow me to mention were bountiful in their exuberance, and that nourished me. Most of all my wife, Brenda, and daughter, Annie, were there mornings and evenings to share my pleasures, tolerate my worries, and step in with always-brilliant suggestions. Their love made the work of the past five years a high point in my life.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Joseph Berger is a reporter and columnist for The New York Times, where he writes about education, religion, and the New York region. During his thirty-five-year career in journalism, he has covered the 1973 Mideast war, the Watergate scandal, and Pope John Paul II's trip to the United States, among many other events. Berger is a recipient of the Education Writers Association Award and a three-time winner of the Supple Award, the highest honor given by the Religion Newswriters Association. He is the author of The Young Scientists: America's Future and the Winning of the Westinghouse and Displaced Persons: Growing Up American After the Holocaust, which was named a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. He lives with his wife, Brenda, a psychoanalyst, and his daughter, Annie, in Westchester County.
ABOUT THE TYPE
This book was set in Caslon, a typeface first designed in 1722 by William Caslon. Its widespread use by most English printers in the early eighteenth century soon supplanted the Dutch typefaces that had formerly prevailed. The roman is considered a “workhorse” typeface due to its pleasant, open appearance, while the italic is exceedingly decorative.
Copyright © 2007 by Joe Berger
All rights reserved.
BALLANTINE and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Berger, Joseph.
The world in a city : traveling the globe through the neighborhoods of the new New York / Joseph Berger. p. cm.
eISBN-13: 978-0-307-49341-5
1. New York (N.Y.)—Description and travel. 2. Ethnic neighborhoods—New York (State)—New York. 3. Immigrants—New York (State)—New York—Social life and customs. 4. Berger, Joseph—Travel—New York (State)—New York. 5. New York (N.Y.)—Social life and customs. 6. City and town life—New York (State)— New York. 7. Pluralism (Social sciences)—New York (State)—New York. 8. Cosmopolitanism—New York (State)—New York. 9. New York (N.Y.)—Ethnic relations. I. Title.
F128.55.B46 2007
917.47'10444089—dc22
2007017314
www.ballantinebooks.com
246897531
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