In fact there are no trees on this street corner, and in fact, there is no vision even of the night sky. Hopper’s painting is devoid of the vitality of nature. Thoreau was writing during a time when he felt American society had lost touch with nature, and the rise of the factories were forcing men to work and to be disconnected with the vitality of a lived experience.
It is not that sitting in a diner alone connotes desperation, but rather it is the juxtaposition of nice suits, a crisp, brightly lit diner set against the backdrop of night that creates a dissonance between life and death, conversation and silence, together and loneliness. He has just looked up as if to say something, but it could just be a simple, “Would you like another cup of coffee, sir?” The man and the woman are not in conversation, and the lone man sitting to the side is by himself. No one seems to be in conversation with one another, except the waiter. Yet it is in the faces that we can read Thoreau’s quote of quiet desperation. The two men wear hats, coats and ties, and the one woman is attired in a red dress.
The diners, all of three of them are relatively nicely dressed. He has cleaned the area and its walls are nicely absent of clutter. The waiter wears a crisp uniform and his hair is cut short.
The shiny coffee machine is nicely polished. From the look of appearances the diner is clean. It is interesting that in the painting the point of view of the work is as if one is walking by the diner, looking inside.
#Nighthawks by edward hopper windows
Although it is ironic, because if the eyes are the windows to the soul, then these windows are open but it is not the soul that is laid bare, but rather the emptiness of the American inner life. There are no curtains and the viewer is able to see inside without obstruction. The window is the only transparent object in the painting. Their expressions lack affect, and it is difficult to pinpoint emotion in the scene. Hopper’s painting is hardly one of a crowd it is rather a depiction of four individuals, but oddly they do not seem individuated in the painting, and it could very well be faces in a crowd. By desperation Thoreau meant desperation in the sense of striving to achieve something in life, but the desperation is quiet, it is hidden, and one must put on a front to pleases the masses. All of humanity lives a life where suffering is not allowed to be openly recognized, and only appearances are acceptable ways to present oneself. Thoreau writes that it is the mass of men who live like this and he means it is all of us. They keep it hidden, and put on a smiling face instead. People suffer and they hide their suffering from others. If they do realize it, they do not articulate it. Thoreau meant that most people live out their lives everyday without realizing their own suffering. In this paper, it will be argued that Edward Hopper’s painting visually captures the writer Henry David Thoreau’s thought that “the mass of men leads lives of quiet desperation” (8). It is late at night, presumably, and only the nighthawks are on the town. The streets are empty and seem to wrap around the diner which is occupied by its four solitary individuals in a brightly lit diner that is harshly set against the night. The painting’s point of view is from the outside looking in, and the connecting street is empty. It depicts a diner occupied by three lonely customers and a waiter who serves them. Edward Hopper’s painting ‘Nighthawks’ (1942) hangs in the Art Institute of Chicago.
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