Destruction of Gotham: The Mushroom

The word from the passage on page 34 of the text that i would focus on is "mushroom".  The word is used to describe Matherson.  Miller talks about how "mushrooms grow, and from reeking compost of it".  What this means is exactly what it sounds like Matherson came from a "reeking compost" a lower class, but even in this type of environment where nothing else could grow, Matherson was like a "mushroom" he was able to grow in the bleakest of conditions. Earlier in the story when we are in the city for the first time, Miller uses it to describe the citizens of New York, the conditions in which people must live and try to thrive in. This was probably more literal, since at this point there was no plumbing so people threw feces out their widows down below, and garbage overflowed, there were rat problems, yet people still lived and grew in these conditions.