Reading Hamill’s Downtown – My Manhattan is like listening to your Irish grandfather telling you a bedside story. It is full of details, colors, experiences, sometimes you can’t get enough, other times you become restless of his nostalgia.
Hamill, a Brooklyn born New Yorker, writes his book from his point of view as the son of an immigrant who called downtown Manhattan home for the majority of his life. The characters and stories are not just from Hamill’s time, his rich knowledge of the history of the city and the people of the city makes this book more than just his memoir. Each street has a character, a group of people, a story behind it. To Hamill, the Bowling Green is not just a tiny park in downtown Manhatten, it is the oldest park, it is the remains of the Dutch town, it is the home of Willem Verhulst, the first governor. Although his abundance of knowledge seems overbearing at times, it illustrates how much the city is constantly changing. Being a New Yorker means having a “fatalistic acceptance of the permanent presence of loss,” and it seems that there is not much to do but become nostalgic.
Downtown- My Manhatten takes you back to the first day you came to the city, when you were awed by the buildings, the lights, or as Hamill described it “Oz”. The book makes you remember why you were so amazed by this city, so full of history yet so cutting edge.
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