Profiles
The siren song of Nathaniel Popkin
from philly1.com
29 July 2002
by Thom Nickels
Recently Beau Monde on 6th Street hosted a reception for first—time author, Nathaniel Popkin, author of “Song of the City,” a different kind of book which takes the reader on a walking tour of many of Philadelphia’s neighborhoods as well as into the lives of several of its residents.
The Beau Monde reception was the second official event for the book; the first was Popkin’s reading at Robin’s bookstore on May 27th. “Song of the City” of course conjures up images of Walt Whitman’s style of listing or cataloging what the poet sees as he ambles about the city and elsewhere. Popkin’s style in “Song of the City” is much like Whitman’s. On the author’s table in Beau Monde were copies of Carlin Romano’s Philadelphia Inquirer review of “Song of the City” in which he called the book “a prose poem.”
“Unlike Whitman,” Romano wrote, “Nathaniel Popkin, 32–year–old urban activist and planner, sings of others. But others who aren’t other. Others who are us. Noi. Nos. Uns. Chung toi. “
The siren song of Nathaniel Popkin
“Others” were clearly present at the Beau Monde affair. Until the reception, I hadn’t heard of “Song of the City” so I introduced myself to Popkin, who happens to have a Masters Degree in City Planning, and asked him for a crash course in “Song of the City” at Beau Monde’s small window bar.
“I wanted to write a book that approached the subject differently than anything that’s been written before. The book is unlike any of the urban literature that is out there. It doesn’t attack policy issues; it doesn’t make a prognosis for anything. It simply tried to step back and tell what I see,” Popkin said.
Some of what Popkin sees is a lot of blight. “I tell what I see, good and bad. The book is neighborhood stories and personal stories held together by this theme of the city as a living entity.”
Apparently the “living entity” of the city has followed Popkin right into Beau Monde. During our brief chat people approached him for autographs or waited in the “body” of the restaurant for the author to return to the book– signing table. Children as well as adults mingled among the tables and chairs even as the author’s own 2 year old daughter, whom he said wasn’t feeling well, eyed the swelling crowd.
“When I talk about the pulse of the city I talk about the meaning of the city that gives all of us energy… then we feed off that energy and then give back to the city; when I talk about the body of the city I talk about the buildings and streets and neighborhoods; when I talk about the soul I talk about depth…”
Already I can tell that Popkin doesn’t have too much time to talk. Others are signaling to him as a woman interrupts, her book opened for an autograph. “Song of the City” took Popkin almost 3 years to write and edit and then another 3 years to sell to a publisher. The book was finally published by Four Walls Eight Windows Press, a literary publisher in New York. He is currently involved in a new project, a novel.
Popkin grew up in suburbia but he has lived in the city for 15 years. He has also worked in a lot of different Philadelphia neighborhoods and lived all over the world. Originally he thought he wanted to do a book about several cities but then he decided to write “about what I really know best”—Philadelphia.
Book signings are demanding experiences and the Beau Monde affair is no exception. When Popkin disappears for a while to attend to the autograph table, I gather my thoughts. As a published author myself, I can see that the Beau Monde signing is quite a success, especially for a first book. Already there’s a line of people in front of the autograph table; most seem to be buying three and four books at a time. For an author’s first book to capture the attention of the mainstream media is also a rare thing.
Every week stacks of new books pile into the offices of WHYY’s “Radio Times” and The Philadelphia Inquirer and most wind up in back door slush piles. The slush pile rejects are never even noted as published works; they are given away or thrown out, never mind netting a review or an author interview.
This often comes as a shock to first time authors who may have spent years on a book only to discover that these author venues don’t have the “room” or the “time” to do something with their work. Because of this shock many first–time authors decide never to write again. The publishing glut is so intense even Philadelphia’s smaller weeklies have their own slush piles. Add to this the complicated and very arbitrary caprices of editors and producers, and you get even bigger slush overloads. I pick up a copy of “Song of the City” on the bar, pick a spot at random and begin reading.
“…Fifteen years ago, I came to the city to go to college. It’s a familiar story here: suburban boy moves to city, finds a true home amidst the ever–changing urban landscape….I’m perennially seduced by architecture, by the whole of the physical city. I am hooked. I want (to possess it, so I buy an old house, rip it apart, make it my own. Then I look outside: my neighbors are all doing the same thing…”
Returning to the bar, Popkin tells me that he chronicled the stories of 15 people in “Song of the City.” “I got down with them and they told me their stories of their life in the city and what the city meant to them. These are very personal stories where people had violence happen to them and yet they were able to maintain their life…”
He writes about interesting things. Harry’s Occult Shop. A Carmelite convent. The Italian market. North Philadelphia and the settling of Germantown. “…The Germans came from Krefeld, a village twelve miles from the Dutch border, in 1688. Quakers and Mennonites mostly, they arrived on a ship called the ‘Concord.’ By standing and occupation they were hermits and revivalists, weavers and tanners. Their names were thick as winter ale: Op den Greff, Arets, Seimens, Strypers, Lensen, Kunders, Tyson, Luckens, Bleiker, Keurlis, and Turner…”
After our chat, I go over to the autograph table and check out the scene. I watch as somebody hands Popkin a magnum of champagne. There’s also a bouquet of flowers near the diminishing stack of books. Popkin does a lot more than just sign his name. He seems to be writing notes in each book he signs. His wife, pregnant with their second child, comes over and whispers in his ear. An attendant counts the money in a yellow envelope by the new books. I watch as a man buys two books and then discreetly hands the author a folded twenty dollar bill. “What’s this for?” the author asks, smiling. “It’s for you, to show my appreciation,” the man says.
“Thank you,” Popkin says, pocketing the gift.
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