an unexpected treat
Judith Thurman’s collection of New Yorker essays, Cleopatra’s Nose, is really esoteric and wonderful, though so often the essays are distanced and chilly. Except for (so far) “This Old House,” about the completely relatable lust Thurman has for beautiful New York row houses, the type of which line streets in neighborhoods as disparate as Greenwich Village, Brooklyn Heights, Harlem and Yorkville, where Thurman now has her own brownstone. This piece is, if not so warm as Anne Fadiman’s familiar essays, at least more comfortable and relatable than the others. Anyone who has ever wandered down the block directly across from Washington Square Park and peeked into the first floor windows of the brownstones that line it will love this essay.
