Dean Street

The section of Dean Street located between Nevins and Bond Streets serves as the main setting of the first part of the novel, and a place to which Dylan returns to visit in the third part. Dean Street symbolizes childhood and the nostalgia for childhood, and it is a physical manifestation of Dylan’s mental and emotional journey into the past. Dean Street is primarily black and minority in terms of residential makeup. It is physically run-down, with dilapidated and abandoned buildings. Dean Street is part of a revitalization effort begun by sole white resident Isabel Vendle, and later becomes home to several white families. For Dylan, Mingus, and others, Dean Street marks the extent of their world: nothing beyond Dean matters or exists in any significant way.

Mingus goes even further in considering Dean Street an island against the rest of the world. For Dylan, Dean...