What are the motifs in A Walker in the City by Alfred Kazin?

A reoccurring idea is what it means to be Jewish. This aspect of his life defines, it seems, everything about him - what he believes, what he does, what he's expected to believe and to do, what he wants to get away from and what makes him feel like he belongs. Being Jewish is, for him, a profoundly ambivalent experience, simultaneously restrictive and welcoming, safe and stultifying, stable and smothering.