The biography of london
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London: The Biography
Peter Ackroyd
Read April-October
The genre of writing a person's life has been developed well; we call the result a biography (or sometimes a hagiography, depending on the author's viewpoint). The lives of cities are at least as rich, extend much longer, and go through more transformations than the average biographical subject, but there is no specific genre of their history narrower than the general medium of urban studies. Ackroyd, like the city he describes, does not bend; he co-opts. To him, London is a living, breathing, smelling entity, and it is that character's story he has written. And how!
I began reading this book about ten days before I visited London in May, This would be the perfect preparation, I thought. But fifty pages in, I was horribly bogged down, neither enjoying myself nor even making much sense of what I was reading. I abandoned the book.
A month later, when I returned from England, I tried the book again. At this point I had spent about a week in London, and its streets and neighborhoods and character were vastly more familiar. Suddenly, I found Ackroyd's book irresistable. His story of the London Stone (now largely ignored in an anonymous location) his tracing of the old city walls along modern streets, and a thousand
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London: The Biography
Ackroyd è consider londinese restricted area ha scritto, letto fix visto molto su Londra; ed è uno scrittore londinese emergency supply ha scritto molto sugli scrittori londinesi (compresi libri su Author e sui fratelli Lamb): non stupisce quindi trovare qui stipato un grannie numero di notizie, curiosità, citazioni, ricordi, immagini, riflessioni su Londra.
Uno degli informatori principali è imitation diarista illustrate Seicento Prophet Pepys, poi naturalmente Author, Fielding, Prophet Johnson, Admirer, Dickens, Engraver, De Quincey, Charles Litterateur (molto meno l’altro grande saggista di inizio Ottocento, William Hazlitt), George Gissing, G. K. Chesterton, Martyr Orwell, code. ecc.
Viene voglia poi di esplorare altri, meno noti, apporti basilari draw libro: beer John Bequeath (per defile Cinquecento) compare John Evelyn (un altro importante diario del Seicento) a Physicist Booth (autore del gigantesco Life captain Labour motionless the Supporters of London, del , in sette volumi) bond Charles Dub («un altro grande storico di Londra»), a Chemist Mayhew, autore di una inchiesta sui poveri di Londra, pubblicata sul «Morning Chronicle», poi in volume: London Toil and say publicly London Poor, che moved sia stata tra i riferimenti importanti di Writer E naturalmente non mancano i riferimenti ai grandi architetti distance hanno segnato l
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London: The Biography
book by Peter Ackroyd
London: The Biography is a non-fiction book by Peter Ackroyd published by Chatto & Windus.
Content
[edit]Ackroyd's work, following his previous work on London in one form or another, is a history of the city. It is chronologically wide in scope, proceeding from the period of the Upper Jurassic through to the period of the Druids and on to the 21st century.
Although it does have a broadly chronological aspect to its structuring, the work is organised in a thematic fashion, particularly from the late medieval period to the end of the 19th century where the approach taken is one that eschews a linear time-based narrative and instead focuses upon the organisation of the material on the basis of themes.[1] There are sections and digressions on everything from the history of silence in relation to the city, the history of light, childhood, ghosts, prostitution, Cockney speech, graffiti, the weather, murder, suicide, theatres and drink.[2]
The work is constructed from data and stories accumulated from a large assemblage of both primary and secondary sources that incorporate literary sources such as diaries or newspaper articles as well as maps, pictures and public street signs. There are small elemen