Named source · 1901

The Making of an American Quotes by Jacob A. Riis: Context & Meanings

1 quotation linked to The Making of an American by or associated with Jacob A. Riis, with source notes, explanations and related topics.

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Jacob A. Riis’s 1901 autobiography The Making of an American

Topics and ideas

Immigration, hope, work, journalism, identity, hardship, reform and retrospective self-understanding.

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my hopes rose high that somewhere in this teeming hive there would be a place for me.

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“my hopes rose high that somewhere in this teeming hive there would be a place for me.”

Jacob A. Riis

Voice: Authorial / signed preface voice · Jacob A. Riis (autobiographical narrator)

Meaning & context

Looking back on arrival in New York, Riis remembers hope that even an overwhelming city might contain a place where he could begin a life.

Source details

The Making of an American, represented by Project Gutenberg #6125. This clause is retained from Riis’s first-person immigrant autobiography as he recalls arriving in New York; it is personal retrospective narrative rather than a general claim about immigration outcomes.

Jacob A. Riis’s 1901 autobiography The Making of an American

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