Speak, Hoyt-Schermerhorn

In Jonathan Lethem's autobiographical essay, "Speak, Hoyt-Schermerhorn," the subway and the station represent a multitude of things simultaneously. As a child growing up, the station "Was the most famous subway station in the world" (73) to Lethem because it was his local one. In the historical context of the neighborhood, Lethem describes the station as giving "Testimony to the lost commercial greatness of the area" (73) due to the station's reflection of the decline in the world above. In his time growing up Lethem states how the station was "Synonymous with crime" (73). For Lethem, the subway has always been a personal place to "Colonize [his] dreams" (74), in terms of both his imagination and the ceaseless bounds the subway took to create eerie realities for him. Lethem describes the origins of the subway as reflecting "A bastard convergence of utopian longing and squalid practicality" (75). Growing up, the A train "Out of Hoyt-Schermerhorn was now [his] twice daily passage" (75) that represented the journey to and from school. The station is also symbolic for Lethem of how he "Slid briefly across the separation line" (78) between identifying with the "harsher truths of the street" (78), and carrying "His parents' sensitivities and standards, with him" (78). The station encapsulates the struggle of these conflicting identities as a result of where he happens to live. The subway and the station are not one thing to him, but many.