With his guest, David Griffin, Jeff Goodman will close his show with one last episode of Rediscovering New York, where he and Griffin will talk about some of the amazing NY history they have experienced, how it’s changed over the years, and some monumental places that you—the listener, might want to check out!
Tune in for this fascinating conversation at TalkRadio.nyc or watch the Facebook Livestream by Clicking Here.
00:02:52.590 --> 00:02:53.460 Jeff Goodman: Hello everyone.
00:02:54.540 --> 00:03:01.410 Jeff Goodman: Welcome to our listeners in the big apple from across the rest of around the world i'm Jeff Goodman and you've tuned into rediscovering New York.
00:03:02.190 --> 00:03:08.310 Jeff Goodman: professionally i'm a real estate broker with brown Harris Stevens, but our show is not a show about real estate.
00:03:08.970 --> 00:03:16.680 Jeff Goodman: rediscovering New York as a weekly program celebrating New York, its history texture its vibe sometimes its culture and its uniqueness.
00:03:17.400 --> 00:03:26.430 Jeff Goodman: And we do it through interviews with historians local business owners nonprofit organizations preservationists local musicians and artists and the occasional elected official.
00:03:27.630 --> 00:03:36.090 Jeff Goodman: On some shows we bring an individual New York neighborhood to life for you, we explore its history and its current energy what makes that particular New York neighborhood special.
00:03:37.170 --> 00:03:44.190 Jeff Goodman: On some shows like tonight's we showcase an interesting and vital color the city and its history that's not focused on one particular neighborhood.
00:03:45.060 --> 00:03:54.120 Jeff Goodman: Prior episodes you've heard us covered topics as diverse and eliminating as American presidents who came from lived in or had some interesting history here in the city.
00:03:54.660 --> 00:04:06.300 Jeff Goodman: we've looked at the history of women activists and the women's suffrage movement, the history of different immigration communities, including sorry immigrant communities, including people who were brought here enslaved.
00:04:06.780 --> 00:04:14.610 Jeff Goodman: we've looked at the history of the city's LGBT community, the gay rights movement we've looked at bicycles and cycling they've been here for 200 years.
00:04:15.060 --> 00:04:20.370 Jeff Goodman: we've looked at the history of punk an opera they haven't been here for 200 years but they have been a part of our fabric nevertheless.
00:04:20.820 --> 00:04:31.080 Jeff Goodman: i'll put a public library systems subway public art our greatest train stations and even some of our bridges to name a few yes New York has great bridges and many of the things.
00:04:31.740 --> 00:04:41.130 Jeff Goodman: After the broadcast each show is available on podcast you can hear us on apple spotify Amazon podcasts stitcher Google podcasts and other services.
00:04:41.730 --> 00:04:53.310 Jeff Goodman: tonight is sort of an extension of a show that my guests, and I did about a month ago we called it hardcover New York and New York between hardcovers how.
00:04:54.150 --> 00:05:03.300 Jeff Goodman: Authors depicted New York and fiction on the last show we're going to talk about a whole bunch of authors, we talked about F Scott Fitzgerald and EB white.
00:05:04.140 --> 00:05:14.010 Jeff Goodman: And also Joseph Mitchell and we didn't have time for another shade of New York between hardcovers which was actually how children are depicted in fiction in New York.
00:05:14.670 --> 00:05:22.200 Jeff Goodman: And I am pleased to welcome my solo guest tonight and the show special consultant David Griffin of landmark branding.
00:05:23.070 --> 00:05:28.860 Jeff Goodman: David is a lifelong architectural enthusiastic providing creative sales enhancing services for the national real estate community.
00:05:29.610 --> 00:05:37.170 Jeff Goodman: he's the founder and CEO of landmark branding and his clients include architects and design firms in addition to developers brokers and marketing companies.
00:05:37.710 --> 00:05:46.650 Jeff Goodman: His room at the top serious co hosted with Jennifer wallace of nascent art New York is the only ongoing networking series and real estate to future tours of manhattan's greatest buildings.
00:05:47.460 --> 00:05:56.010 Jeff Goodman: David has many, many published works and his latest blog is called every building on fifth, as you can tell by the title the documents every single building on fifth avenue.
00:05:56.520 --> 00:06:05.460 Jeff Goodman: from Washington square right up to where fifth avenue ends at the Harlem river in Harlem and right at that juncture, you can see the Harlem armory, which is an amazing art DECO.
00:06:06.210 --> 00:06:18.210 Jeff Goodman: Construction david's writing has also appeared in real estate weekly metropolis dwell and the national trust preservation magazine David Griffin a hearty welcome back to rediscovering New York.
00:06:18.450 --> 00:06:20.190 David V. Griffin: hey Jeff it's good to be here.
00:06:21.330 --> 00:06:21.870 Jeff Goodman: Virtual.
00:06:22.740 --> 00:06:31.110 Jeff Goodman: Yes, virtually well hopefully we'll get to do it face to face again sometime we still have that dinner engaged and told me that we've been talking about doing for months and months now, and.
00:06:31.410 --> 00:06:32.670 Jeff Goodman: They reopened in the springtime.
00:06:32.820 --> 00:06:41.460 Jeff Goodman: Who, by the way, were guests on our show about downtown brooklyn and you were one of the guests on that show as well, I forgot the number of it, but it was actually March of last year.
00:06:42.780 --> 00:07:01.350 Jeff Goodman: David i'd like to ask all my guests, how they got into what they do and, specifically, how you got into your business of showcasing New York showcasing its architecture and using very wonderful things about the city in your in your business and in your in your professional work.
00:07:02.130 --> 00:07:10.230 David V. Griffin: Well, I am a mother, who was very interested in the arts, I still have her she's still very interested in arts.
00:07:10.830 --> 00:07:19.530 David V. Griffin: And whenever we would do a family trip should create a diagram of the city or the place we're going to go so as kids I feel we were taught to learn to look at things.
00:07:20.460 --> 00:07:28.200 David V. Griffin: And observed them for what they were, and as we grew older my siblings and I became the first sort of child interpreters.
00:07:28.620 --> 00:07:37.020 David V. Griffin: For a New York state historic site old bethpage village restoration, which is quite remarkable site out in Nassau county.
00:07:37.680 --> 00:07:47.190 David V. Griffin: And what we would do is, we would dress up in costumes from the 1850s and we would participate in this historic village have been recreated and.
00:07:47.670 --> 00:07:58.140 David V. Griffin: Just sort of demonstrate the toys in the past times that era and we had a chance, sometimes actually stay over in some of the houses that were preserved there.
00:07:58.740 --> 00:08:05.760 David V. Griffin: And I think I became very interested in the idea of the historic fabric of New York in general New York state America, if you will.
00:08:06.270 --> 00:08:14.370 David V. Griffin: And how those pieces were sort of like puzzle pieces to put together to fill out the story of the history of the people out there.
00:08:14.850 --> 00:08:25.350 David V. Griffin: So, as I grew older I you know became interested in architecture as an art form and I began to you know, think of ways that I could provide services.
00:08:25.740 --> 00:08:34.140 David V. Griffin: whereby writing about the histories of buildings would help bring them alive, for you know both their owners for realtors for tenants.
00:08:34.860 --> 00:08:41.400 David V. Griffin: require them and make people understand that you know real estate is not just something on a blueprint.
00:08:41.970 --> 00:08:54.660 David V. Griffin: it's an actual environment, and you know people live and work there, and some of them did some rather incredible things so that's sort of the chain of response and activity, if you will.
00:08:55.620 --> 00:09:03.000 Jeff Goodman: You studied our history, Ambassador and also studied some architectural history, but you also have something very special in your background, which.
00:09:04.170 --> 00:09:09.390 Jeff Goodman: sort of brings us to the topic at hand tonight, which is that you also studied English and you studied fiction.
00:09:09.840 --> 00:09:19.770 Jeff Goodman: Yes, and you put together this great program for us, did you actually study any of the authors we're going to talk about tonight when when you read vassar our Alma mater.
00:09:20.580 --> 00:09:27.480 David V. Griffin: Know actually K Thompson or someone that I was introduced to by my mother, who was familiar with the books.
00:09:28.140 --> 00:09:36.810 David V. Griffin: And the thing that really drew me to those books was less perhaps K thompson's contribution, although it's remarkable books.
00:09:37.800 --> 00:09:50.910 David V. Griffin: But Hillary nights illustration, I think every night is one of those sort of unknown figures in America darkies mostly illustration and set design as opposed to painting per se.
00:09:51.540 --> 00:10:04.920 David V. Griffin: And I think that the people who know those worlds know his work and they really, really admire it but it's surprising to me how many people, you know sort of know what he's done without necessarily knowing who he is.
00:10:05.640 --> 00:10:12.300 David V. Griffin: And Harry night was interesting to me because I when I was a kid I was given a subscription to the magazine called cricket the magazine for children.
00:10:12.900 --> 00:10:19.590 David V. Griffin: And I loved it I I I still think that that is just an invaluable kind of reading and learning tool for children that particular magazine.
00:10:20.250 --> 00:10:26.100 David V. Griffin: And Hillary night did a great many of the covers on that magazine, when I was a kid and I always look forward.
00:10:26.430 --> 00:10:33.780 David V. Griffin: To seeing those parts I didn't know when they were coming, so it was always a surprise, but I was like Oh, this is that wonderful artists that does these things.
00:10:34.230 --> 00:10:41.910 David V. Griffin: And you know there were definitely other artists and cricket stable, who were you know just as marvelous magical but Hillary and I just sort of had this.
00:10:42.540 --> 00:10:46.260 David V. Griffin: kind of amazingly expressionistic quality to what he did.
00:10:47.220 --> 00:11:03.210 David V. Griffin: That really I think you know his pictures, have a lot of snaps that they're they're sort of ambulance they bounce about a bit on the paper, and I think it's it's along with K thompson's words Hillary knights images really drive the magic of eloise and tell her.
00:11:04.440 --> 00:11:16.230 Jeff Goodman: Well, we we mentioned the first time, the first book which depicts a child in New York that we're going to talk about K Thompson is the author and Hillary night is the is the illustrator let's talk about the author first, who was K Thompson.
00:11:17.100 --> 00:11:18.930 David V. Griffin: um well K Thompson.
00:11:19.410 --> 00:11:19.830 Jeff Goodman: eloise.
00:11:19.980 --> 00:11:32.040 Jeff Goodman: For those of you here, Louise Louise is a quintessential New York book taking place at a quintessential New York institution, called the Plaza which we'll talk about in a minute, but David, who was K Thompson.
00:11:32.700 --> 00:11:39.000 David V. Griffin: Okay Thompson was a very interesting person she had a very multifaceted career, she was something that was socialite.
00:11:40.080 --> 00:11:50.370 David V. Griffin: She had a long career in music before she wrote the elements books and she was was perhaps best known to people sort of viewing her as a.
00:11:51.000 --> 00:11:57.180 David V. Griffin: role that she had in a film called funny face, which I believe was 1957 Fred Astaire and audrey hepburn.
00:11:57.570 --> 00:12:12.120 David V. Griffin: And that's a very charming me and she plays it and extremely eccentric fashion magazine editor and sort of sings the song called think pink which is sort of a pan to kind of feminine influencing fashion.
00:12:13.320 --> 00:12:21.030 David V. Griffin: And MGM studios in the 1940s, she was a vocal coach for stars like Frank Sinatra and boring so she worked with some major talent.
00:12:21.810 --> 00:12:27.480 David V. Griffin: And she also had a hit cabaret act with her musical musical siblings the Williams brothers.
00:12:28.470 --> 00:12:42.420 David V. Griffin: She was just one of these very dynamic people in a way which was also very sugary very self possessed and very I think private innocence so she had this kind of interesting balance of being very.
00:12:43.470 --> 00:12:44.700 David V. Griffin: You know very sort of.
00:12:45.810 --> 00:13:01.800 David V. Griffin: The basis but also you know really kind of being herself, there was a secret part of her, and I think that's some of the provider, with a lot of frequency make people interested in her um so yeah that's that's a Thompson nutshell version.
00:13:02.520 --> 00:13:12.480 Jeff Goodman: Well, for those of our listeners who don't know a lot about Louise let's talk about eloise who was eloise What did she do what how was she depicted what's her what's her life, like.
00:13:12.810 --> 00:13:21.570 David V. Griffin: Well, oh is is of course the six year old girl at the hotel the Plaza hotel with her nanny or dog me yeah her turtle stupid he.
00:13:22.320 --> 00:13:32.580 David V. Griffin: So she is a sort of a satirical figure, much more so than I think people assume she speaks in a very kind of effective way, like.
00:13:33.180 --> 00:13:39.630 David V. Griffin: Roll the Nice to take a bowl so she has this transatlantic Accenture Those sort of diving about it.
00:13:40.290 --> 00:13:47.910 David V. Griffin: And you know she she sort of a she's an amp without meaning to be and what she actually is something that I think is a little bit Poignant.
00:13:48.420 --> 00:13:54.450 David V. Griffin: And something that you know K Thompson good purpose put into the story that was surprised that so many people sort of misread it.
00:13:54.900 --> 00:14:04.680 David V. Griffin: Is that it's only she's she's smiling neglected child you never really see parents, now the nanny is always you know six steps behind her she's always off doing some other thing.
00:14:05.190 --> 00:14:13.740 David V. Griffin: And she's trying to you know, create a world for herself in a world which has already been created the Plaza hotel is pretty creative.
00:14:15.060 --> 00:14:25.050 David V. Griffin: A lot of breakable things let's just put it that way, so hey Thompson sort of sets this little whirlwind demon in the midst of all this, you know, expensive and fashionable BRIC a brac.
00:14:25.470 --> 00:14:36.390 David V. Griffin: And you know what occurs, is what you probably think we're occurred, but you know it it's something that I think it reads as if you think it's a children's book and when you really look at it, you realize that.
00:14:37.080 --> 00:14:48.330 David V. Griffin: You know K Thompson had a very long the childhood, she was very hurt by that and I think she is trying to show a little bit of what that was like for her definitely.
00:14:48.390 --> 00:15:01.980 Jeff Goodman: Not a children's book either you raised that point David it's not a children's book, when I was young, and my mother bought me a copy of eloise you know I thought it was like a children's book, but you know, like eloise, I suppose, is a children's book like.
00:15:03.060 --> 00:15:07.170 Jeff Goodman: The TV series Batman was a children's you know.
00:15:07.500 --> 00:15:10.320 Jeff Goodman: It was it was it was a parody was a spoof.
00:15:10.620 --> 00:15:11.580 Jeff Goodman: With a lot of adult.
00:15:12.870 --> 00:15:13.230 David V. Griffin: drama.
00:15:13.590 --> 00:15:24.750 David V. Griffin: comedy of manners and you know that the thing that was interesting for me my meeting about this was that eloise herself was a kind of a fictive component of K Thompson.
00:15:25.260 --> 00:15:36.870 David V. Griffin: There was a moment where take Thompson was coming in, for rehearsals with the Williams brothers for the cabaret act that she did, and they were so angry with her, because she came in so late one time.
00:15:37.890 --> 00:15:45.900 David V. Griffin: As they were like kind of you know screaming their heads off at her you know all of a sudden said this cookie little child's voice hi I am six.
00:15:47.730 --> 00:15:57.660 David V. Griffin: And they both stopped at a kind of diffuse the situation and she evidently had been performing eloise sort of for her friends is like this little imaginary creature.
00:15:58.230 --> 00:16:08.160 David V. Griffin: And may actually have been based on an imaginary friend or sister or companion that she had kind of come up with myself, while she was always say.
00:16:09.900 --> 00:16:22.860 David V. Griffin: So and that's one reason why she was very adamant that our we use would always be six years old, but always lit up applause you'd never see the parents and so you realize in some way she she is imaginary she's not supposed to.
00:16:24.300 --> 00:16:35.220 Jeff Goodman: And maybe also that you know we talked about children depicted in fiction, maybe there was something also to a lot of people about New York that's imaginary that's not real.
00:16:35.550 --> 00:16:41.700 Jeff Goodman: yeah so we use is kind of the quintessential kid who fits into you know, an imaginary child at the.
00:16:41.730 --> 00:16:43.290 Jeff Goodman: grandest of hotels well.
00:16:43.920 --> 00:16:54.300 Jeff Goodman: If you if you're if you're a waldorf and it's not the grandest but the grandest hotel living in this imaginary world in a city that to so many people who would have picked up that book.
00:16:54.570 --> 00:16:55.830 Jeff Goodman: Is an imaginary city.
00:16:56.310 --> 00:16:57.240 David V. Griffin: Right exactly.
00:16:58.260 --> 00:17:11.280 Jeff Goodman: All right, we're gonna take a short break and when we come back we're going to continue our conversation with David Griffin this episode is called New York between hardcovers specifically children have children are depicted in fiction in New York City we'll be back in a moment.
00:19:23.460 --> 00:19:34.680 Jeff Goodman: we're back and you're back to rediscovering New York I forgot what episode, this is, I think this 128 or 29 something like that and it's entitled New York between hardcovers specifically have children are depicted in New York City.
00:19:35.250 --> 00:19:47.100 Jeff Goodman: fiction or fiction about New York my guest tonight is David Griffin David is the founder and CEO of land more branding and he also is a special consultant for the show, from the time we started way back when.
00:19:48.540 --> 00:20:04.830 Jeff Goodman: David um what were some things that may have happened in K thompson's life that might have helped her shape eloise and that might have impacted the her vision for the book and and how the character showed up in everyday life.
00:20:05.790 --> 00:20:13.530 David V. Griffin: Well, I already sort of mentioned, I think the way that she kind of brought ellie's out of herself as a way to defuse situations.
00:20:14.040 --> 00:20:21.630 David V. Griffin: And again, I do think that always was very much a component of her own recollections of being around a lonely child.
00:20:22.590 --> 00:20:29.700 David V. Griffin: You know the sort of idea to always self is imaginary is, I think, part of the seat of the book.
00:20:30.420 --> 00:20:44.640 David V. Griffin: You know there isn't really a little name down always running around the Plaza dumping water down the mail shoots drinking champagne at the age of six exception self worth and there's one rather marvelous book emily's takes a boss.
00:20:46.200 --> 00:21:02.760 David V. Griffin: that's one of four sequels eloise's eloise and always Paris, I always a Christmas time I always in Moscow and always takes the ball, so that was the last one of the bunch and in it eloise actually floods, the entire Plaza hotel during the grand ball.
00:21:03.840 --> 00:21:12.720 David V. Griffin: And I think it's sort of K thompson's way of kind of setting eloise free a little bit perhaps and being sort of like all right.
00:21:13.200 --> 00:21:22.860 David V. Griffin: We it's almost like a kind of a cartoon apocalypse actually it's a sort of thing that you think Dr seuss done with you know something called lover lover or something rather.
00:21:23.340 --> 00:21:38.220 David V. Griffin: Is the best ones out all over the entire hotels leaks spraying everywhere, everyone gets kind of rained on and the Venetian ball is flooded and everybody loves it because hey it's a big thing, so you know, at the end of it.
00:21:40.080 --> 00:21:44.190 David V. Griffin: Danny writes a check or she always does, and that's the end of the story, because.
00:21:45.240 --> 00:21:56.160 David V. Griffin: In a way, it's a it's something that I feel hey Tom to the parents signature to it and saying you know this is ellie's that's that's that's as far as it goes so.
00:21:57.030 --> 00:22:01.380 Jeff Goodman: Did Hillary night do the illustrations for all the other ways books.
00:22:01.980 --> 00:22:09.270 David V. Griffin: Yes, he did, and he started mentioned in a documentary about him.
00:22:11.040 --> 00:22:22.530 David V. Griffin: that's me Hillary the man who drew eloise Lena dunham was the director of that so and I mentioned that, because the book was marketed as a children's book The New York Times didn't review it.
00:22:23.760 --> 00:22:35.370 David V. Griffin: Because I didn't know what to do with it well, it was marketed as an adult book it look like a children's book, ultimately, though it was a complete success life magazine actually said of eloise the first book.
00:22:35.370 --> 00:22:35.700 David V. Griffin: quote.
00:22:36.060 --> 00:22:45.030 David V. Griffin: The most controversial literary heroine of the year, she charms and terrifies like a snake, which gives you some idea of I think the kind of undercurrent.
00:22:45.480 --> 00:22:56.460 David V. Griffin: of you know, the way that K Thompson pictured this person and night said, you know K told him according tonight, this is not a children's book.
00:22:56.880 --> 00:23:06.780 David V. Griffin: It evolved I don't know how it evolved to be the way it is, but it looks like a child's book so children think that's what it is, and so they sort of made it into one.
00:23:07.950 --> 00:23:15.450 David V. Griffin: But yeah as as as we noted before it's it's very much kind of a black comedy in a sense, it's a spoof of our children's books are.
00:23:17.100 --> 00:23:25.920 Jeff Goodman: and actually interestingly, the New York Times didn't review it right away when it came out because they didn't know where to put it What was it was.
00:23:26.040 --> 00:23:26.880 David V. Griffin: A work of fiction right.
00:23:27.000 --> 00:23:35.610 Jeff Goodman: Was it a children's book, how do we, you know what box do we put it in I suppose the editors of literary sections of the times were different back in the 50s than they are now.
00:23:35.880 --> 00:23:38.940 Jeff Goodman: Today, none of my none taken so long to review.
00:23:38.940 --> 00:23:49.050 David V. Griffin: And I often wonder, I mean, I do wonder, since rounding the conversation how eloise will be marketing today, I mean would it be seen as an adult book where have you seen as a children's book.
00:23:49.410 --> 00:23:58.080 David V. Griffin: Nowadays, things like Harry Potter being so successful and are there such titles for jumping from children into adult interest.
00:23:58.620 --> 00:24:07.500 David V. Griffin: I think adults are more willing to kind of share material with children, so i've maybe there's a little bit more kind of.
00:24:08.010 --> 00:24:13.290 David V. Griffin: Across the board marketing these days i'm not quite sure, but I mean, I do think that there has been a trend where.
00:24:13.620 --> 00:24:23.580 David V. Griffin: Adults are like oh i'm going to go see a superhero film, you know and that's not like what what are you 12 years old, you know, no, no, no it's you know something adults do, and there are adult themes their adult emotions.
00:24:24.060 --> 00:24:32.850 David V. Griffin: There are some adult scenes you know, maybe they keep out a lot of the adult language, but you know you go and see a marvel universal hit you know marvel picture.
00:24:33.300 --> 00:24:46.110 David V. Griffin: The marvel universe you're not necessarily looking at something that's made for just children are just adults it's a very broad range, so I think eloise might fall within that purview these days.
00:24:48.360 --> 00:25:00.960 David V. Griffin: I wanted to talk a little bit about nights illustrations and night had created a famous portrait of eloise that actually hung in the Plaza for many, many years and oil painting.
00:25:01.260 --> 00:25:02.850 Jeff Goodman: Oh, that was nice I remember that.
00:25:02.910 --> 00:25:03.840 Jeff Goodman: So well you know.
00:25:04.710 --> 00:25:07.200 Jeff Goodman: I think it was on the right side near the near the front desk.
00:25:07.590 --> 00:25:19.740 David V. Griffin: Yes, and someone's made off with it about I think about 15 years ago they have someone stole it and then it was missing for many years, and someone found it in a trash can.
00:25:20.760 --> 00:25:36.900 David V. Griffin: Actually, whoever whoever had stolen it just started and they took it back tonight, and he restored the painting, but he decided, he was going to I think he kept that one for himself you painted a copy, and that is the one that is now hanging in the Plaza hotel.
00:25:37.920 --> 00:25:40.440 David V. Griffin: Leave you mean there's no way anyone is going up that.
00:25:42.720 --> 00:25:53.910 David V. Griffin: Out there being a legitimate reasons so but yes, Hillary and I did paint the current pan painting but that's not the original version it's a slightly more.
00:25:56.970 --> 00:25:59.790 David V. Griffin: animated film style version.
00:26:01.800 --> 00:26:07.350 Jeff Goodman: I have an interesting recollection of eloise when I was young, I don't remember how old I was my mother.
00:26:08.100 --> 00:26:10.950 Jeff Goodman: I was born in 1960 and one of the fun memories, I have.
00:26:11.670 --> 00:26:17.730 Jeff Goodman: Was New York in the 60s, when I was a boy my mother took me around she's to dress me up and knickers and take people around.
00:26:17.940 --> 00:26:29.940 Jeff Goodman: You know motown and you know New York in the 60s with all these new this new gleaming architecture, you know, and we would go to the browser and for a while, I thought that it was it was a historic event that they really had been.
00:26:31.140 --> 00:26:37.920 Jeff Goodman: eloise yeah yeah like back at the time that it was built, you know right before the First World War, just had that feeling to hearing about your we get better.
00:26:38.340 --> 00:26:39.750 David V. Griffin: I mean it's interesting that.
00:26:39.810 --> 00:26:52.410 David V. Griffin: What the first one of these that we talked about my sort of the Jane you know the great gatsby in the first half of segments rather have this program on literature New York, and of course in in the great gatsby.
00:26:53.040 --> 00:27:01.800 David V. Griffin: And they go to the Plaza because that's what people did you know you went to the Plaza and even if you lived in New York, you went to the closet because the Plaza was the place where you did all the list of things you.
00:27:02.250 --> 00:27:11.550 David V. Griffin: want to do at home, because the neighbors and find out so ellie is is sort of I think also indicative of that strain of things in some ways.
00:27:11.910 --> 00:27:23.070 David V. Griffin: she's not of that generation necessarily but you could see her almost being related to those people somehow that maybe she is daisy buchanan's granddaughter.
00:27:24.060 --> 00:27:32.880 David V. Griffin: And you know you don't see the parents, because whenever daisy Buchanan would have had his daughter would have been just a superficial if she was and so she dumps the kid with the nanny and as off, you know living.
00:27:33.420 --> 00:27:45.450 David V. Griffin: Life or something, but I think there's a continuance there, the idea of the Plaza as being a place that is you know where the elite meats, and you don't you know.
00:27:46.530 --> 00:27:54.030 David V. Griffin: And I think you know going there as a child, myself and seeing the Plaza and you know, having the famous T at the Plaza at separate self with.
00:27:54.600 --> 00:28:00.390 David V. Griffin: them it's sort of interesting how they are rooms around rooms around rooms in that hotel and.
00:28:01.200 --> 00:28:08.700 David V. Griffin: There are still secret places, you know even the great public places lead on the places that we know that we don't see because we're not necessarily the guests.
00:28:09.330 --> 00:28:13.500 David V. Griffin: And then, if you are a guest you're only seeing your own room and you're not seeing the other guests rooms so.
00:28:13.920 --> 00:28:28.740 David V. Griffin: I think K Thompson really kind of plays with the idea that there could be an eloise because there is a sort of our multiple haunted House about the closet that there could be a presiding spirit in some way, I think that's what she's what she's after with this.
00:28:29.610 --> 00:28:33.090 Jeff Goodman: will hopefully not the spirit of a past manager and owner, but we won't go there.
00:28:36.780 --> 00:28:51.750 Jeff Goodman: I wonder if there was in any way a I don't mean to throw you a trick question but I don't know how it is an answer to this, but you know, being a kid growing up in New York, I wonder if there and it's not a children's book but children, you know it was.
00:28:51.930 --> 00:29:00.390 Jeff Goodman: A children they read you know and by parents, they read it, I wonder if there was a different perception or a different opinion about eloise.
00:29:01.320 --> 00:29:15.150 Jeff Goodman: For kids who grew up and lived in New York, as opposed to children who were from more far If not you know the suburbs, but you know more far flung parts of the United States for maybe the Midwest from the South, if somehow.
00:29:16.050 --> 00:29:27.870 Jeff Goodman: They held this this little girl character in New York in a different way than what I did and amongst you know in people that although I never talked to any other kids about eloise you know.
00:29:28.620 --> 00:29:35.670 Jeff Goodman: Other other books that that I read it was exposed to where you talked about things and talking about characters I wonder if there was a difference between.
00:29:36.060 --> 00:29:42.420 Jeff Goodman: between an impression, or better response you know from from people living outside New York and people living in New York, read the.
00:29:42.420 --> 00:29:50.910 David V. Griffin: boy I mean I think if you're if you're living outside of New York, by which I mean you know as you do, to outside of its suburbs and its own have to be influenced the idea.
00:29:51.480 --> 00:30:01.110 David V. Griffin: Try that and see it whenever if you are really living and and again we're also talking about a different era when there wasn't the Internet when there wasn't you know 60,000 movies.
00:30:02.580 --> 00:30:09.960 David V. Griffin: When you know New York itself was not necessarily accessible, if you lived in omaha you can see, New York because.
00:30:10.530 --> 00:30:22.290 David V. Griffin: You know, maybe saw it on TV or the backdrop of a film, but you weren't going to you know go on to the Internet and just push it on New York and to Google images get 10,000 images of exactly what the face look like, so I think.
00:30:23.070 --> 00:30:31.500 David V. Griffin: eloise is a fantasy of New York outside of New York and in New York fell she has more problematic because she is also a.
00:30:32.550 --> 00:30:43.860 David V. Griffin: Very much I think something to do with the idea of class and that's you know the invisible bubble that protects eloise is the thing that also isolates her and that's the fact that her family is.
00:30:44.340 --> 00:30:58.170 David V. Griffin: supernaturally wealthy they these people have money after she's flooded out the Venetian ball and practically destroyed the entire hotel and he is able to write the check for the full amount of the damage is done and that's the end of it man, you know.
00:30:59.970 --> 00:31:01.800 David V. Griffin: where's my rubber duck you know so.
00:31:01.920 --> 00:31:03.840 Jeff Goodman: And he goes on living at the hotel they go and look at it.
00:31:05.580 --> 00:31:10.560 David V. Griffin: As opposed to being like all right, you know pack your rubber ducky believe we were done with you, oh.
00:31:11.130 --> 00:31:16.110 David V. Griffin: crap we can't be putting up with this nonsense forever we're trying to run a business here nursery school.
00:31:16.650 --> 00:31:25.860 David V. Griffin: So you, you can probably answer that question, better than than I, because I think I wasn't as aware of I wasn't aware of, so I came delouis later on.
00:31:26.730 --> 00:31:31.590 David V. Griffin: Because I was interested in things like Hillary night, what does it for like Oh, this is really interesting but most Patricia.
00:31:31.920 --> 00:31:46.350 David V. Griffin: And, in some ways it's kind of odd to experience it'd be like this is an adult book, this is my kids stuff sort of written like it's nothing but I didn't have an idea of ellie's as a kid I remember my mother mentioned now always applause and i'm like okay always applause or.
00:31:47.520 --> 00:31:57.990 David V. Griffin: Whatever I I was sort of you know, doing I read, I read a lot, when I was a kid but I never did get to Le even though you know, as I said, Hillary was one of my favorite illustrations.
00:31:59.040 --> 00:32:05.550 David V. Griffin: And so what were your thoughts I mean did you think Oh, you know here's this little princess skipping along how annoying.
00:32:08.250 --> 00:32:08.550 David V. Griffin: But.
00:32:09.360 --> 00:32:15.750 Jeff Goodman: I suppose, even for a new yorker who grew up kind of upper middle class ish.
00:32:17.190 --> 00:32:22.650 Jeff Goodman: There was something was fascinating you know I have this vague memory, you know.
00:32:23.940 --> 00:32:27.780 Jeff Goodman: That there was the picture on the wall and my mother would have said something like oh that's eloise.
00:32:28.200 --> 00:32:35.370 Jeff Goodman: And my memory bank say I may have even asked, we went up to you know someone working there said oh he's always around.
00:32:36.180 --> 00:32:41.820 Jeff Goodman: Right, so you know it was something that I don't say I aspire to, but it was almost like magic it was almost like.
00:32:42.480 --> 00:32:51.690 Jeff Goodman: A fairy tale, you know he has this girl this this young girl living amidst all this opulence and right, it was like oh wow is and especially as you're.
00:32:51.930 --> 00:33:01.440 Jeff Goodman: walking around it and seeing it and you know, then the plush carpets and the smell and just the the grander in the end the end the luxury of the place that's how you know.
00:33:02.100 --> 00:33:05.370 Jeff Goodman: That probably says more about my personality is a boy.
00:33:06.570 --> 00:33:16.770 David V. Griffin: Is it could go either way, I mean you know it's very cool I love the Plaza, I suppose, if I really sat down and thought about it as a kid would be passing think there was somebody like them there.
00:33:17.130 --> 00:33:21.750 David V. Griffin: Because you know you hear a Plaza hotel you think all people come in, they stay for a while and then they go.
00:33:22.200 --> 00:33:29.250 David V. Griffin: And you don't realize that there are people for whom it is convenient to live better hotel because they don't want the kitchen I don't want.
00:33:29.730 --> 00:33:37.650 David V. Griffin: You know, to pay taxes on whatever it is it's actually cheaper for them to just get a nice sweet someplace send up for room service and everything taken care of.
00:33:38.610 --> 00:33:40.500 Jeff Goodman: Like frank Lloyd Wright did who lived at the Plaza.
00:33:41.880 --> 00:33:51.000 Jeff Goodman: we're going to take a break we're actually in the second half of the show we're going to move to a girl have a little bit different socio economic.
00:33:51.600 --> 00:34:01.470 Jeff Goodman: background than eloise was but not that far away, we didn't live that far away we'll be back in a moment you're listening to rediscovering New York, we will see you soon actually in a minute.
00:36:38.250 --> 00:36:47.880 Jeff Goodman: we're back in your back to rediscovering New York and our episode New York between hardcovers specifically how some authors depict children in the city.
00:36:48.300 --> 00:36:56.700 Jeff Goodman: My solo guest for this episode is David Griffin David is the founder and CEO of landmark branding and he's also the special consultant for the entire Program.
00:36:57.210 --> 00:37:03.270 Jeff Goodman: 120 something episodes of it i'm going to look that number up before the end of the show and sit and let people know what episode number, this is David.
00:37:03.960 --> 00:37:21.390 Jeff Goodman: um let's talk about your business for a second um what is it that inspires you to do what you do and to really depict wonderful things about buildings for for people who are selling or renting out office space.
00:37:23.520 --> 00:37:24.330 Jeff Goodman: you're muted.
00:37:27.480 --> 00:37:28.080 David V. Griffin: sorry about that.
00:37:30.690 --> 00:37:40.200 David V. Griffin: Basically i'm you know i'm a huge fan of architecture i'm fascinated by how buildings Look how things work and how they're sort of look and work at the same time.
00:37:40.770 --> 00:37:52.560 David V. Griffin: And you know Lewis Sullivan, called the skyscraper the machine that makes the land, pay and that's what these are these are you know buildings that are directed, for you know for commercial purposes.
00:37:53.280 --> 00:38:03.570 David V. Griffin: record for people to work in to live in whatever and the way that they aren't designed, you know sort of influences the response and the continued need for that sense.
00:38:04.140 --> 00:38:05.790 David V. Griffin: And I just find that fascinating.
00:38:05.790 --> 00:38:18.390 David V. Griffin: So, to me, you know vendor once said, God is in the details and to me it's always a great pleasure to take a walk around almost any New York City block almost any any work.
00:38:18.870 --> 00:38:25.920 David V. Griffin: And just look for that detail because it's waiting there you know, is it a little gargoyle is that you have some little bit of stonework.
00:38:26.340 --> 00:38:32.970 David V. Griffin: Maybe it's just the way that you know certain corners of buildings operate, or you know blinds are raised or not raised.
00:38:33.720 --> 00:38:40.170 David V. Griffin: All this it's just this kind of multiplicity of detail and it's woven very seamlessly into the fabric of the city.
00:38:40.710 --> 00:38:46.890 David V. Griffin: And I think more so, perhaps in other cities elsewhere around the world, I think that the new our grid.
00:38:47.370 --> 00:38:55.320 David V. Griffin: really has created a kind of a dynamic ascetic that is unique, so I extrapolate from this and you know, create.
00:38:55.830 --> 00:39:06.030 David V. Griffin: Things like listings and websites and brochure copy and selling software for realtors were owners for developers architects or design studios.
00:39:06.450 --> 00:39:12.360 David V. Griffin: I do a lot of VIP events work or you know get prepared yeah make still do a lot of online things.
00:39:12.840 --> 00:39:23.700 David V. Griffin: i've created a series of architectural extras for the New York adventure clubs very happy we work with them they're a wonderful wonderful organization, they do a lot of marvelous online content, as well as actual tours.
00:39:25.410 --> 00:39:32.760 David V. Griffin: And I have been the proud co host for many years, with Jennifer wallace of nascent our New York.
00:39:33.720 --> 00:39:46.620 David V. Griffin: To create the room at the top series where we actually would go in and tour the lobbies and then the highest possible you know available levels of skyscrapers and have receptions afterwards.
00:39:47.040 --> 00:40:00.090 David V. Griffin: And just kind of admire you know the city skyline from a point in skyline so yeah Jennifer was her husband James wallace are the Co founders and owners and they start North i'm going to shout out.
00:40:01.620 --> 00:40:03.810 Jeff Goodman: yeah so they've been guests on the show before we talked about.
00:40:03.810 --> 00:40:04.830 Jeff Goodman: Public art and they were.
00:40:05.520 --> 00:40:17.130 David V. Griffin: Exactly exactly so which we could we could do again actually i'm sure there's more that we could kind of go over but um yeah so that's sort of the story of how I kind of.
00:40:18.270 --> 00:40:21.990 David V. Griffin: began the business and why I did it and the types of things that I do.
00:40:23.100 --> 00:40:25.620 Jeff Goodman: And you're updating your blog every building on fifth.
00:40:26.340 --> 00:40:44.400 David V. Griffin: I I haven't done so recently, because the pandemic I think has kind of created a you know there's obviously sort of a speed bump there but i'm still being very cautious, for you know various personal reasons, and I just i'm not sort of like willing to go into the city and i'm.
00:40:44.790 --> 00:40:51.930 Jeff Goodman: Okay i'm sorry I thought you I thought my my bad I thought you had you know made additions to it, not too long ago.
00:40:52.200 --> 00:40:57.570 David V. Griffin: Oh no I were just yeah without getting into details it's.
00:40:58.650 --> 00:41:06.240 David V. Griffin: Just not something i'm really willing to do right at the moment but yeah so i'm hoping to do that, though, and I do have.
00:41:06.690 --> 00:41:12.360 David V. Griffin: Is a lot has changed over downtown and you and I want to be able to go back and revisit building see which ones are supposed.
00:41:12.780 --> 00:41:22.170 David V. Griffin: To replace, which was renovated, which was stored which ones, have the landmark fifth avenue is an ever changing campus and I don't think we'd want it any other way.
00:41:23.280 --> 00:41:30.450 David V. Griffin: So yeah i'm eager to get back to it, but I haven't begun those petitions, yet I do remember saying that I was going to.
00:41:32.280 --> 00:41:33.150 Jeff Goodman: Well, not and.
00:41:33.270 --> 00:41:37.770 Jeff Goodman: Another thing my mother always told me, she said New York, will be a beautiful city if they ever finished building it.
00:41:38.340 --> 00:41:57.630 Jeff Goodman: Right, you know it goes on forever anyway let's move across town, a little bit from the Plaza over to the east side and up a little bit for dairy very different kind of young girl who was depicted in fiction, who was the author Louise fits here, who is she What did she What did she do.
00:41:58.080 --> 00:42:07.170 David V. Griffin: Well, she was a very remarkable woman and she was a primarily and earlier in her career and illustrate came first, I think the public attention.
00:42:07.620 --> 00:42:15.060 David V. Griffin: As you know, straighter of a children's book in 1961 culture has been, which was a parody of emily's.
00:42:15.900 --> 00:42:28.980 David V. Griffin: emily's lives up at the Plaza but Suzuki pain was the daughter of beatnik parents so she slept on a mattress on the floor of of Lucas speak pad and Greenwich village, and you know nowadays you like call a bleecker speaking proud and Greenwich village.
00:42:30.180 --> 00:42:30.930 David V. Griffin: spirits.
00:42:30.990 --> 00:42:43.170 David V. Griffin: that's not like that's the way it works in 1961 so I can see here very closely with the author, whose name is Sandra scapa Tony I, which I think is a marvelous.
00:42:44.250 --> 00:42:57.990 David V. Griffin: Wonderful to produce the zucchini which incorporated a typewriter fox one of the first children's books to do so and, again, is this really a children's book, it was sort of a borderline thing because already, this is a parody of something that was already not quite.
00:43:00.090 --> 00:43:19.350 David V. Griffin: And although both apparently of eloise and the beatnik conceit the book really kind of is treated as a genuine work of literature, I think it's very much appreciated and although it's a book that I think is not widely known, it is much sought after our websites so.
00:43:20.670 --> 00:43:25.140 David V. Griffin: I actually have an order in for a copy myself, but my interest is piqued by this.
00:43:26.160 --> 00:43:42.870 David V. Griffin: So fits you as a very talented illustrator and she had a very distinctive style, which really gave her work, I think a poignancy the fell outside of a lot of photos patient and that a lot of the drawings, because we have somehow a child done.
00:43:44.190 --> 00:43:50.490 David V. Griffin: they're done with a very you know incredible depth of detail, but the detail is the detail a child.
00:43:51.840 --> 00:43:53.790 David V. Griffin: it's not quite caricature.
00:43:54.930 --> 00:43:58.530 David V. Griffin: Sometimes draw figures are you know they're drawn a bit out of proportion.
00:43:59.580 --> 00:44:15.060 David V. Griffin: there's something about them that suggests would cut work illustration, and she illustrated her own worksheet illustrated Harriet spy and I think her drawings and Harriet in some way or almost as the text as the drawings that.
00:44:16.980 --> 00:44:20.670 David V. Griffin: john perennial created for Lewis Carroll Dallas.
00:44:22.200 --> 00:44:28.710 David V. Griffin: Tonio is equally hours and that's you can't this is her book.
00:44:29.580 --> 00:44:43.410 David V. Griffin: The drawings are equally area I can't imagine Harriet the spy not illustrated by Louise fitzhugh and the funny thing is, is when I was a kid and I first read this book I got these are the ugliest illustrations i've ever seen know what the hell.
00:44:43.950 --> 00:44:55.140 David V. Griffin: I mean, because they're not ready they're not they're not fun to look at their they're angry, in a way they're the they're like the drawings that a child, would make when she was upset.
00:44:56.190 --> 00:45:00.510 David V. Griffin: And you know Harriet the spy the titular character.
00:45:01.740 --> 00:45:20.880 David V. Griffin: becomes very upset during the course of this book and it's It really is a very stunning look into as I remember one noted children's book historians thing it might be the first children's book to really address however obliquely mental illness that these people are not well.
00:45:21.900 --> 00:45:29.400 David V. Griffin: And the things are not going well for them, because of that and Harry being a child doesn't have the capacity to understand quite what's happening.
00:45:30.180 --> 00:45:40.620 David V. Griffin: And she's very intelligent, but she still doesn't have a vocabulary for what's happening, and she walls herself off of it there's a sort of a hint I think somehow that she's.
00:45:41.670 --> 00:45:48.690 David V. Griffin: she's not associate path, but she is lacking a certain amount of empathy and it's not because she doesn't want it.
00:45:49.110 --> 00:45:57.240 David V. Griffin: it's just some switched has not yet gone on she's a late bloomer in that sense, so when she observes people she does so very cruel.
00:45:57.900 --> 00:46:04.560 David V. Griffin: And she writes all of her findings down and her books into she wants to be a spice spice do they watch before and they write down what they think.
00:46:05.130 --> 00:46:11.670 David V. Griffin: And what she writes down, as you know, it's not flattering it's her own lots of the moment, so for those unfamiliar with the book.
00:46:12.120 --> 00:46:15.570 David V. Griffin: let's just saying what her classmates find her notebook.
00:46:16.170 --> 00:46:22.260 David V. Griffin: It doesn't go particularly well because it's not like she put it to her notebook all the wonderful things about them.
00:46:22.560 --> 00:46:29.100 David V. Griffin: She put down all the things about them, that you thought were awed or stupid or didn't make sense or ugly or flagrant or protest.
00:46:29.730 --> 00:46:37.950 David V. Griffin: And they respond, the way the children would I mean it's like you know i'm just found writing all this nasty graffiti about me except was only in a book for her.
00:46:39.420 --> 00:46:46.290 David V. Griffin: So, in a way it's a very disturbing book to encounter and I read it, you know fairly early age, I remember thinking.
00:46:47.160 --> 00:46:56.760 David V. Griffin: I thought to myself something's going on here that I just can't understand I all know i'll understand it when I get older because I knew again that there was a slight concept.
00:46:57.750 --> 00:47:11.820 David V. Griffin: of something mentally wrong some of these people, but I didn't know what that was you know I think I had I had begun, perhaps to observe it at that age, I met people who had had some kind of a.
00:47:12.990 --> 00:47:15.210 David V. Griffin: Mental trauma but.
00:47:16.260 --> 00:47:18.390 David V. Griffin: Never in the context of a children's book.
00:47:21.210 --> 00:47:32.580 Jeff Goodman: table we're going to take a short break I do want to continue this topic with you and talk about Harriet the spy we're going to be back in a moment you're listening to rediscovering New York on talk radio done in yc.
00:49:34.800 --> 00:49:42.690 Jeff Goodman: wow I have gotten so much into the content of this David that halfway through the show I forgot to mention our sponsors, which I will do now.
00:49:43.260 --> 00:49:56.880 Jeff Goodman: Support from the program comes from these important businesses Sherlock modi mortgage strategist at freedom mortgage for assistance in any kind of residential mortgage to rod can be reached at 718-210-1167.
00:49:57.420 --> 00:50:09.360 Jeff Goodman: and support also comes from Jacqueline hartford interior design specializing in residential and commercial innovation and decorating Jacqueline can be reached at 34748 to one 700.
00:50:10.950 --> 00:50:21.450 Jeff Goodman: David was there something about fits us life that may have impacted how she depicted her subjects, both in Suzuki being and Harriet the spy do you think.
00:50:21.480 --> 00:50:33.150 David V. Griffin: Well uh she was a lesbian and she was very open about it and the time when Obviously this was not considered acceptable by other people.
00:50:33.540 --> 00:50:36.570 Jeff Goodman: And Harry Potter was written was published in 64 was.
00:50:36.630 --> 00:50:47.820 David V. Griffin: The early 60s 1964 and you know the the book did appear on the list 1964 list of the year's best juveniles in the New York Times book review.
00:50:48.240 --> 00:50:55.830 David V. Griffin: 1965 there was a critic who called it a brilliantly written and unsparingly realistic story super portrait of an extraordinary child.
00:50:56.460 --> 00:51:09.000 David V. Griffin: and other newer found that out and captures the feelings thoughts and situation of a modern city child with a remarkable clarity of dimension and none of these reviews ever address the concept of harriet's.
00:51:10.020 --> 00:51:13.770 David V. Griffin: Potential sexuality and, of course, you know she's too young to really.
00:51:15.180 --> 00:51:28.680 David V. Griffin: You know, perhaps possess that thing in terms of consciously knowing what it is, but it was really sort of remarkable that she is always depicted in boys clothes that was very, very rare back in that time period.
00:51:29.250 --> 00:51:38.070 David V. Griffin: And she has never you know shown is particularly hankering after dresses and things of that nature that doesn't interest, and so, in some ways, I think you know.
00:51:39.660 --> 00:51:48.270 David V. Griffin: I don't think fits he was trying to say anything about Harriet, but I think she's also remembering what she herself may have been like at that age.
00:51:48.690 --> 00:52:00.930 David V. Griffin: And she put a remarkable amount of that into into area, and I think the book has been in some ways kind of a sort of seen as a landmark for the.
00:52:01.500 --> 00:52:07.260 David V. Griffin: You know gay or lesbian trans Community because Harriet is an outsider in some sense.
00:52:07.710 --> 00:52:15.630 David V. Griffin: And she does not conform to gender norms, you know, whatever her own sexuality turns out to be she's not interested in acting like feminine role.
00:52:16.020 --> 00:52:23.760 David V. Griffin: And there's also another character of the book sport, who is Harriet supposes male friend and it's interesting that you know again Louise.
00:52:24.510 --> 00:52:33.360 David V. Griffin: Actually gifts what a lot of the feminine traits that Harriet does not possess he cooks he cleans easy sort of a warrior he's a very.
00:52:34.110 --> 00:52:45.540 David V. Griffin: mothering type is very sensitive she's quite emotional he cries several times in the book he's physically depicted as being somewhat fragile and.
00:52:46.260 --> 00:52:57.210 David V. Griffin: In some sense, you know, again I don't think lee's fits you wants to you know brought up a rainbow flag over the character necessarily that's not that's not her purpose.
00:52:57.780 --> 00:53:06.990 David V. Griffin: But she is suggesting the gender itself might be something that's fluid and knocked about it doesn't need to be sorted out so early so.
00:53:07.800 --> 00:53:17.820 David V. Griffin: I think that a lot of children's clothing and we've forgotten this in the modern world, but a lot of children's clothing prior to let's say the 1970s was extraordinarily generous.
00:53:19.020 --> 00:53:38.340 David V. Griffin: Girls wear dresses wise war, you know little pants then they wore you know big pants or whatever and that's kind of gone away, but Louise was there to witness those years, when I was still there and her characters are not playing that game so it's a very interesting kind of.
00:53:39.360 --> 00:53:42.720 David V. Griffin: crossover I think from her own identity.
00:53:45.000 --> 00:53:52.560 Jeff Goodman: Do you think there's something about Harriet the spy that is really about New York and emblematic of New York.
00:53:53.130 --> 00:53:55.920 Jeff Goodman: Or is it a story that could take place anywhere in the country.
00:53:55.950 --> 00:54:04.470 David V. Griffin: No, no, because New York, the thing about parents world is that it's it's actually quite specific she's on the upper East side she's in an actual location.
00:54:04.860 --> 00:54:10.170 David V. Griffin: Most of the places and things that she goes to are based on things that are observable there.
00:54:10.710 --> 00:54:16.740 David V. Griffin: But the thing about it is that she's what she's doing in the question of the book she's going into people's you know dumb waiters.
00:54:17.130 --> 00:54:25.980 David V. Griffin: into the alleyways and behind the backs of things just listening in on conversations and you can't do that in a small town someplace that's some of those.
00:54:26.550 --> 00:54:34.470 David V. Griffin: And you couldn't do it that easily In most places the thing is that New York to her as a kind of in personality about it and.
00:54:34.800 --> 00:54:40.170 David V. Griffin: Because of its impersonal nature, she has been loaded the thing with the people move through this world.
00:54:40.950 --> 00:54:45.540 David V. Griffin: Maybe they don't really matter I mean they're just things to be observed, I think that's a very nice.
00:54:46.380 --> 00:54:59.160 David V. Griffin: thing to think I think you know you do feel it in some of the other really major cities world i'm sure, but it sounds sounds harriet's world is a product of a certain type of alienation that people I think we're experiencing during that time very.
00:55:00.750 --> 00:55:11.460 David V. Griffin: she's also dealing with issues of class that I think exists everywhere, but in New York there concentrated, in other words there's a family that owns the delicatessen.
00:55:12.000 --> 00:55:21.360 David V. Griffin: There is the kind of teenager who just works so there's the old guy who spends his entire time making product pages, whatever he does he has 5000 cats.
00:55:21.780 --> 00:55:27.870 David V. Griffin: there's the you know stuffy Bridgewater couple that's a sits alone and never talks about anything stuff what they buy.
00:55:28.290 --> 00:55:42.690 David V. Griffin: there's the wealthy kind of eccentric socializes lying in bed all day and nurtures 40 he hasn't had a job today and I like these people are all recognizably new Yorkers but the thing is that it's not just that they're urban types that close together.
00:55:43.710 --> 00:55:51.870 David V. Griffin: This is a novel about proximity, in other words Harry couldn't run from one end of the town to the other, to work with this all this stuff someplace else.
00:55:52.860 --> 00:56:00.900 David V. Griffin: and New York she can see all these different people within a few blocks, because most aristocratic department house in town still has a Deli next door.
00:56:01.830 --> 00:56:07.140 Jeff Goodman: And there's something very New York about it, one thing that comes to mind hearing you describe, that is, the film rear window.
00:56:07.500 --> 00:56:08.190 Jeff Goodman: which has.
00:56:08.220 --> 00:56:18.840 Jeff Goodman: pretty much all these different kinds of people, except the character that that James to replace can actually see the BAT is window and not hear them so Harry has listened to them and records them and.
00:56:18.900 --> 00:56:19.170 David V. Griffin: Yes.
00:56:19.680 --> 00:56:26.520 David V. Griffin: And just have them murder each other or her, although you feel that they want to buy the book.
00:56:27.870 --> 00:56:37.260 David V. Griffin: um yeah so she's she's sort of she's in an environment that is conducive to this it's an environment that's helping her create this persona for herself.
00:56:37.770 --> 00:56:50.520 David V. Griffin: And, in some ways it's a very liberating environment, I mean she is a very sophisticated child as her friends are friends are quite sophisticated they're all intelligent know in is presented in this book is being particularly dumb.
00:56:51.780 --> 00:56:55.860 David V. Griffin: But it's not the fun world of eloise it's it's something that's more.
00:56:57.450 --> 00:57:11.310 David V. Griffin: damaging, and you know you have the feeling that, if Harriet had been given the cold bath of realizing that when you write down everything about your friends somewhere and leave it for them to read later they're not going to like you very much.
00:57:12.570 --> 00:57:15.900 David V. Griffin: She could have very well turned into an incredibly cool first.
00:57:16.800 --> 00:57:29.280 David V. Griffin: You know somebody who really did just judge everybody by what they happen to be wearing or eating or how they talk to the first few minutes of a company, and we know that there are plenty of those people in New York, because that's the way that people make decisions about things.
00:57:30.270 --> 00:57:35.010 Jeff Goodman: Well i'm not going to ask you how the book ends don't want to do a spoiler alert let people read Harriet the spy.
00:57:36.480 --> 00:57:39.300 Jeff Goodman: In a minute or so we have left How was the book received.
00:57:40.590 --> 00:57:43.710 David V. Griffin: It was received I think quite well.
00:57:44.790 --> 00:57:47.820 David V. Griffin: There was a certain amount of controversy about it.
00:57:49.440 --> 00:57:57.960 David V. Griffin: Because any critics and many teachers felt the characters were far from admirable.
00:57:59.280 --> 00:58:04.860 David V. Griffin: But according to her New York Times of dictionary, which is published, when she died at a very young age of.
00:58:05.700 --> 00:58:24.030 David V. Griffin: 1974 quote the book helped introduce a new realism children's fiction and has been widely imitated I mean I think a lot of what we see that's good and children's literature comes up comes because the parent the spine, because this is, this is a book that's not cute hmm.
00:58:25.380 --> 00:58:33.810 Jeff Goodman: Well, unlike eloise and, unlike Suzuki been David Thank you so much for another wonderful episode in a wonderful journey, this time into fiction.
00:58:35.730 --> 00:58:45.060 Jeff Goodman: This episode, and it is 128 I checked it it's the second in our series in New York between hardcovers how authors and fiction depict life in the city, this time through children.
00:58:45.420 --> 00:58:52.500 Jeff Goodman: My guest has been David Griffin of landmark branding David is to show special consultants and he's the founder and CEO of his amazing company.
00:58:53.460 --> 00:58:59.940 Jeff Goodman: If you have comments or questions about the show, or if you'd like to get her on mailing list, please email me Jeff at rediscovering New York that nyc.
00:59:00.480 --> 00:59:07.770 Jeff Goodman: You can like us on Facebook, you can also follow me on instagram and Twitter my handle is on all three are Jeff good been nyc I wonder how I got that for.
00:59:07.770 --> 00:59:07.980 All.
00:59:09.480 --> 00:59:16.080 Jeff Goodman: Once again i'd like to thank our sponsors to rock modi more constraints of freedom mortgage and Jacqueline hospital interior design.
00:59:16.500 --> 00:59:21.390 Jeff Goodman: One more thing, before we sign off i'm Jeff Goodman a real estate agent have brown hair Stevens in New York City.
00:59:21.840 --> 00:59:38.430 Jeff Goodman: And whether you're selling buying leasing or renting my team and I provide the best service and expertise in New York City real estate to help you, with your real estate needs, you can reach us at 646-306-4761 a producer Israel story or our engineer this evening is kyle mcallister.
00:59:40.290 --> 00:59:54.690 Jeff Goodman: Our special consultant of the program, as you all know by now is David Griffin of landmark branding stay tuned at 8pm right here on talk radio dot nyc for coffee talk excel with my fellow hosts Kevin Barbara thanks for listening, everyone will see you next time.
00:59:55.440 --> 00:59:55.980 David V. Griffin: Thanks a lot.
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