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Ragtime Chapter 6 Summary

  • Doesn't everyone like a vacation to America? Not Freud. Traveling with his disciples Jung and Ferenczi, he thinks New York doesn't have enough bathrooms and is too noisy. Sounds like NYC today: some things never change.
  • Down on the Lower East Side, Freud watches a street artist at work (Tateh) as he makes a miniature street portrait of a beautiful woman (Evelyn) using only scissors and paper. Jung notices Little Girl standing behind Tateh.
  • Freud tours Coney Island and Niagara Falls. When he returns to Vienna he tells a friend that America is a huge mistake.
  • It's not a good time to work in a factory, coal or tobacco fields in America. Workers have no rights. Oh, and kids work too. The whole system is pretty dang corrupt.
  • Meanwhile, the very rich hold parties in which they mock the working class, pretending to be meat packers or coal miners. Talk about adding insult to injury.