Turns about Town — A Closer Reading

The Essayist as Urban Flâneur

The excerpts reveal Holliday as a keen observer of city life, particularly New York. In "Former Tenant of His Room," he describes a young law student, Richard Day, eating an egg sandwich at a "Dairy Lunch" and walking past an enormous electric sign for "Arthur Pendennis Ten Cent Cigar." The detail is precise: the coffee is "made out of chicory," the sugar taken from a "heaping-full sort of great punch-bowl." Holliday's eye for the mundane—the shape of a coffee cup, the barber-like coat of the server—grounds his essays in the physical reality of early twentieth-century urban America. Yet he also steps back to generalize, as when he asserts that "the time to come up to a great city is when one is young." This blend of specific observation and reflective commentary is a hallmark of his style.

Humor and Self-Deprecation

Several essay titles in the table of contents signal Holliday's comic approach: "A Humorist Misfits at a Murder Trial," "The Haircut that Went to My Head," "Queer Thing, 'Bout Undertakers' Shops." The excerpts do not include these pieces in full, but the foreword and the dedication correspondence suggest a playful tone. The dedication is a mock-serious exchange with John Bunker about proofreading, ending with Bunker's theatrical line, "Produce your proofs!" Holliday's humor often turns on his own awkwardness or the absurdity of social situations, as when he writes about "Our Last Social Engagement as a Fine Art." The essays are not merely comic sketches, however; they also contain moments of genuine pathos, as in the reflection on youth and poverty in "Former Tenant of His Room."

Literary and Theatrical Connections

The table of contents includes essays on G.K. Chesterton ("Seeing Mr. Chesterton" and "Bidding Mr. Chesterton Good-Bye"), as well as pieces on literature and theater: "Literary Lives," "So Very Theatrical," "Three Words about Literature." The foreword notes that "Literary Lives" was expanded from a review of the Dictionary of National Biography. This suggests that Holliday moved between journalism and literary criticism, and that Turns About Town collects work from different contexts. The excerpts do not reveal the content of these literary essays, but the range of topics—from traffic cops to the "Sexless Camera"—indicates a writer interested in both high and low culture. The book's structure, with 26 chapters, mirrors the miscellany of a newspaper column.

Readers approaching Turns About Town should expect a loose, essayistic collection rather than a unified narrative. The excerpts suggest that Holliday's strength lies in his ability to find significance in small details—a shaving-mug coffee cup, a garret room, a cab horse sliding on pavement. The book rewards those who enjoy early twentieth-century urban vignettes and the gentle, ironic voice of a writer who is both participant and observer. The catalog subject "Essays" is accurate, but the essays are best read as period pieces that capture a specific moment in American city life.

Sometimes Holliday’s 1921 New York feels impossibly distant, yet his eye for how people settle into their rooms—and their silences—lingers. I found that same patient attention in Letters from Port Royal Written at the Time of the Civil War (1862-1868) — Themes and Context, though the world there is far harder. Both books are, in their way, about listening to a place’s quiet hum.