The Princess of 72nd Street

Books

A provocative and thoroughly feminist "cult classic" (The New Yorker) about a smart and sensitive yet deeply troubled young woman fighting to live on her own terms-now returning to print for the first time in over a decade "Almost half a century after it was first published, The Princess of 72nd Street sounds like a contemporary cry for freedom from the expectations of others."-The Atlantic I am glad I have the radiance. This time I am wiser. No one will know. . . . The radiance drifts blue circles around my head. If I wanted to I could float up and through them. I am weightless. My brain is cool like rippling waves. Conflict does not exist. For a moment I cannot see-the lights are large orange flowers. Ellen has two lives. A single artist living alone on New York's Upper West Side in the 1970s, she periodically descends into episodes of what she calls "radiances." While under the influence of the radiance, she becomes Princess Esmeralda, and West 72nd Street becomes the kingdom over which she rules. Life ...