The Street (1946) by Ann Petry

 1,001 Novels: A Library of America

The Street (1946)

by Ann Petry

Harlem, New York City

New York: 44/105

Harlem: 10/14

    The Street was a very rough but very powerful Audiobook- 13 hours, I think?  I really need a break from Audiobooks dealing with the day-to-day life in Harlem during the mid 20th century because man, this book was rough.  The Street is, I guess, a minor classic- it made this list, and it also made the recent Atlantic Monthly Great American Novel list (136 titles).  Considering it was published in 1946- not a great decade for fiction because of, well, you know, there is also an argument that this could be on the 1,001 Books to Read Before You Die list.   As a 1/14 in the Harlem chapter of the 1,001 Novels: A Library of America it is a solid top 5 pick- maybe a top 3.   Petry combines work-a-day realism with episodes that evoke both surrealism and expressionism.

   Lutie Johnson is the character at the center of The Street- in the present of the novel she is a single mother, separated but not divorced from her cheating husband and living in a gritty Harlem apartment on 116th street. The Street is very much the kind of book I thought I would be getting all the time on the 1,001 Novels: A Library of America list:  A minor/forgotten canon level classic that exposes me to a place a time with which I was previously unfamiliar.   Petry doesn't shy away from the grittier side of life- the rapey super in Johnson's apartment building is stopped just short of rape on more than one occasion, and Petry gives us a look inside his head- a harrowing look- I might add.  

   The Street was very good- a top 3 for Harlem, I think.  Probably a top ten for all of New York?  Certainly a top 15.