The Last Word in Impressionism

The only thing I cannot tell from the tone of "In Search of Local Color" is which morality Brander Matthews ascribes to. Is he one of the ones who admires the impression of existence, of raw, natural life that the poverty-stricken seem to emanate? Or is he instead guilty of the voyeuristic feeling of dirty quaintness and charm that Suydam and De Ruyter get from the tenements? What is Matthews' last word?

I was reminded of Dickens while reading this short little story. Dickens was not the first writer to draw attention to the life of the poor, but he did draw much of his fame from his social commentary on that point. "In Search of Local Color" does things similar to the subjects presented in Dickens' novels, in fewer words. You get the feeling of muted awe when a well-to-do narrator or character confronts the rough-and-tumble poor of a large city. There is awe at the constant activity, the number and wildness of the children, at the squalor, at the variety of faces and cultures.

Unlike Dickens, though, there is a bizarre sense of voyeuristic curiosity in the novelist and the recent college graduate, who toss subjects such as Harvard readings, college degrees, and inheritances large enough to live on around as easily as so many pennies. "Say," says the novelist to the grad, "Can you show me to the poor section of the city? I'm in need of inspiration, of local color." Obligingly the two head to the poor quarter -- or should I say half -- of New York City. All I can say for these two is that they evidently have no idea that they are snobbish, classist, and egotistical. The awe and curiosity of De Ruyer is almost childish enough to excuse him as an artist nearly in touch with what's in front of him. Suydam, as the guide, is less forgivable. Why is he such an avid visitor to this section of the city? He obviously has no personal connection in the quarter. The people they intrude upon ("And of course I try never to intrude,") simply look on the two gentlemen quietly and go back to their business.

"Most of them have no sense of home," Suydam says, "Most of them don't know what privacy means." Of course, everyone whose place of abode is occasionally barged in upon by men of better fortune have no right to privacy, or else they could have a sense of home.

Interestingly, Matthews' turns the finger on the reader too, it seems. Aren't we all guilty of feeling pity for those less fortunate? Of course we are. We're taught to. Is that snobbish? Probably. We could be learning in childhood that fortune doesn't define people, but we're not. It's not a good story until the poor young orphan gets a rich benefactor. Why aren't people who are poor allowed to be happy, cultured, independent, free, respected? Why are they treated as the unfortunate animals in a dingy, broken-down zoo?

Points of view in this story come in two dual parts. First, you get the impressions of the life of the poor: the smells of rotting food, the swarms of children, the ugly but cultured features of the Italian women, the increasingly smaller rooms, and the casual occurrence of heinous crimes all paint a realistic picture of how tenement life was/could have been. Then concurrently you get the points of view of the graduate and the novelist. They discuss the Romantic presentation of the poor, but conclude that "They are not half so picturesque and so pathetic as the sensational newspapers make them out." Is this realism, or a firm refusal to face facts? They journey into the tenements and boldly stroll through the streets and into the apartments of the residents there. All they see are uneducated, foreign people, with nothing to do but sell cheap wares, sometimes families at a time, to get by. They are not people; they are curiosities.

Finally, our point of view as the reader, and probably of Matthews' as the writer: what are we to make of these men? These people? Just who is the poorer set? Maybe, because we're so blinded, we are.