METROPOLITAN The Character Study column last Sunday, about Rafael Martínez Alequin, a gadfly of the City Hall press room, referred incorrectly to Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's interaction with Mr. Martínez Alequin during news conferences.
Coetzee's project does not permit him to linger at such scenes of metropolitan life; his characters are all incidental to "the story of his life that he tells himself," a concept expressed in "Boyhood" as "the only story he will admit, the story of himself".
There's the story of the New York childhood or the New York romance, often intensely nostalgic, in which the city's pleasurable surfaces mould around the characters – a metropolitan cocoon.
Once upon a time, it was a rare treat to hear someone in one film mention another, and it was usually a sign that the character was a metropolitan culture snob, invariably played by Woody Allen.
The genre also produces romantic comedies whose characters reflect their metropolitan audience.
"Williston Park is one of the few places in the metropolitan area that has maintained its character for the past 75 years," said Roger F. Fay, a former mayor and the village's unpaid co-historian.
Eventually, about forty of these characters emerged in the metropolitan areas of North America.
"It's not unlike 'Law & Order,' " Mr. Handler said, "with the instruments in the orchestra instead of various character actors in the New York metropolitan area".
Moreover, more populous metropolitan areas tend to have a more segregated character (Iceland et al. 2002).
And through it all, no, it isn't a village, really; nor is it metropolitan bohemia, though some of Mackay's flightier characters might fervently wish that it were.
