City Essence Quotes

Cities are like gentlemen, they are born, not made. You are either a city, or you are not, size has nothing to do with it. I bet San Francisco was a city from the very first time it had a dozen settlers. New York is "Yokel", but San Francisco is "City at Heart".

London is a riddle. Paris is an explanation.

A great city is not to be confounded with a populous one.

I can't stand it when restaurants don't have a sense of place in a city. When I'm in London, I want to know I'm in London. When you're sitting in my joint, you know you're sitting in Seattle.

In the end, the only thing the true New Yorker knows about New York is that it is unknowable.

London, Ontario, sits halfway between Detroit and Buffalo, a description that applies as much to its soul as to its geographical coordinates.

People are the nature of the city, and you can feel it in the pavement.

Chicago has definitely played a part in my character development. I love the essence of the city, the personalities of the people, the hard-working spirit that you need to get through the winters. And every neighborhood has its great restaurants and the local hot-dog stand.

Maybe every city has a unique sensibility, but we don't have names for what they are or haven't identified them all. We can't pinpoint exactly what makes each city's people unique yet.

It's a tradition that a writer will try to plant his flag in a certain city and protect that. The way to get your rep is to find the essence of the city and get it down on paper.

For myself, I always write about Dublin, because if I can get to the heart of Dublin I can get to the heart of all the cities of the world. In the particular is contained the universal.