[Y]ou run into two breeds of gypsies, the nomad coppersmith and the Boyasch...The Boyasch are what you might call Serbo-Rumanian gypsies... They are small and dark and strange, and if you saw some on the street you'd notice them but it probably wouldn't occur to you they were gypsies. They're cleaner and neater than the nomads, and their women don't dress gypsy style any more, although a few of the real old ones still wear gold-coin necklaces. At the same time, they're tougher-looking. I guess hard is more the word. They look hard. It's something in their eyes. They have curious cold, hard eyes, and they watch you every second, and they rarely ever smile.
Joseph Mitchell, Up in the Old Hotel (1992)
Joseph Mitchell is wondeful, wonderous. The blurb says: "His accounts are like what Joyce might have written had he gone into journalism." I sense in him a precurser of Chatwin's. (Especially Chatwin's earlier, short pieces on strange encounters.) This book was sent me by my friend Q in NYC. She's one of the most interesting philosophers working today. Thank you, Q, for your continuous enlightment of my ignorance!
