COLUMNS
Talk Show 24 with Leah Hager Cohen, Joshua Ferris, Alice Mattison, and Ann Packer
/ Jaime Clarke
04.30.09
––Why did you rent it?
Cohen: I was all but panting with the desire to play grown-up. That’s what it felt like: I was twenty, fresh out of college, desperate to put on the clothes of independence. What to do? It was a bit like that folk song: “When I first came to this land, I was not a wealthy man. So I got myself a farm; I did what I could.” Well, I got myself a job; I did what I could. That turned out to mean working at the African American Studies department and renting an apartment for $340 a month.
Ferris: I didn't have much choice in the matter, though I don't have many complaints. The smoking, as I've mentioned. But in general, the landlord was solicitous, the neighbors were supportive, the area of town secluded and warm, and there was ample space to grow.
Mattison: I was in graduate school at Harvard, studying English literature and working as a teaching fellow. I’d been living in a series of university-owned buildings in which a bunch of women would each have her own room but share a living room, kitchen, and bathroom. At the end of my third year, four of us from the house decided to rent an apartment together. We wanted more independence than we had with the university as our landlord, we enjoyed one another, and I think we were ready to get past enforced friendliness with whoever else happened to be in the house with us.
Packer: There were some definite disadvantages to this apartment, probably the most significant of which was that it was a fifth-floor walkup, no elevator. But it had exposed brick walls and a working fireplace, and across the air shaft an apartment with a kitchen I could see into at night, to admire my unknown neighbor's collection of tiny painted animals, arrayed on every available shelf and ledge. It was in a great location, I could afford it––those were reasons aplenty to rent in Manhattan.
Cohen: I was all but panting with the desire to play grown-up. That’s what it felt like: I was twenty, fresh out of college, desperate to put on the clothes of independence. What to do? It was a bit like that folk song: “When I first came to this land, I was not a wealthy man. So I got myself a farm; I did what I could.” Well, I got myself a job; I did what I could. That turned out to mean working at the African American Studies department and renting an apartment for $340 a month.
Ferris: I didn't have much choice in the matter, though I don't have many complaints. The smoking, as I've mentioned. But in general, the landlord was solicitous, the neighbors were supportive, the area of town secluded and warm, and there was ample space to grow.
Mattison: I was in graduate school at Harvard, studying English literature and working as a teaching fellow. I’d been living in a series of university-owned buildings in which a bunch of women would each have her own room but share a living room, kitchen, and bathroom. At the end of my third year, four of us from the house decided to rent an apartment together. We wanted more independence than we had with the university as our landlord, we enjoyed one another, and I think we were ready to get past enforced friendliness with whoever else happened to be in the house with us.
Packer: There were some definite disadvantages to this apartment, probably the most significant of which was that it was a fifth-floor walkup, no elevator. But it had exposed brick walls and a working fireplace, and across the air shaft an apartment with a kitchen I could see into at night, to admire my unknown neighbor's collection of tiny painted animals, arrayed on every available shelf and ledge. It was in a great location, I could afford it––those were reasons aplenty to rent in Manhattan.