The image of New York in American literary non-fiction represented by Gay Talese’s A Serendipiter’s Journey

• Authors: Wasilewska-Przeszlakowska Joanna

Title variants

EN

The image of New York in American literary non-fiction represented by Gay Talese’s A Serendipiter’s Journey

• Languages of publication: PL RU EN

Abstracts

EN

The paper is devoted to the image of New York City created by a representative of American post-war literary non-fiction, Gay Talese. What is especially brought into focus in the analyzed New York – A Serendipiter’s Journey is the approach the writer employs to present his personal picture of the city. Talese’s attitude consists in combining some key techniques of traditional reporting with a more individual and imaginative treatment relying on a wanderer’s/stroller’s point of view. From the perspective of a city traveller New York is unconventionally pictured through its untypical and usually unnoticed aspects such as e.g. forgotten places and odd occupations. It is emphasized that the writer’s image of the city actually results from a number of pictures accumulated in the course of his own and many other individual journeys. Finally, the paper accentuates the effectiveness of the literary journalistic technique of merging the non-fictional with the literary in order to convey the convincing and credible vision of reality.

Keywords

EN

American literary non-fi ction; city image; New York; journey; street

• Publisher: Uniwersytet Warmińsko-Mazurski w Olsztynie
• Journal: Acta Neophilologica
• Year: 2012
• Issue: XIV/2
• Pages: 199-207

Dates

published

2012

Contributors

author

Wasilewska-Przeszlakowska Joanna

• Uniwersytet Warmińsko-Mazurski w Olsztynie

References

• Barańczak S., Biblioteka Poetów Języka Angielskiego. Emily Dickinson, 100 wierszy, Kraków, Wydawnictwo Arka 1990.
• Boynton R.S., The New New Journalism. Conversations with America’s Best Non-Fiction Writers on Their Craft, New York, Vintage Books 2005.
• Finnegan R., Tales of the City. A Study of Narrative and Urban Life, Cambridge University Press 2004.
• Fisher P., Hard Facts: Setting and Form in the American Novel, New York, Oxford University Press 1986.
• Sims N. and M. Kramer, Literary Journalism. A New Collection of the Best American Non-Fiction, New York, Ballantine Books 1995.
• Stevenson D., Cities and Urban Cultures, Buckingham, UK, and Philadelphia, Open University Press 2003.
• Swirski P., All Roads Lead to the American City, Hong Kong, Hong Kong University Press 2007.
• Talese G., Fame and Obscurity, New York, Ivy Books 1993.

Identifiers

ISSN

1509-1619