Unavailable
Unavailable
Unavailable
Ebook663 pages9 hours
Nightwalking: A Nocturnal History of London
By Matthew Beaumont and Will Self
Rating: 0 out of 5 stars
()
Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this ebook
A captivating literary portrait of London explored at night by some of the city’s most iconic writers throughout history
“Cities, like cats, will reveal themselves at night,” wrote the poet Rupert Brooke. Before the age of electricity, the nighttime city was a very different place to the one we know today – home to the lost, the vagrant and the noctambulant. Matthew Beaumont recounts an alternative history of London by focusing on those of its denizens who surface on the streets when the sun’s down. If nightwalking is a matter of “going astray” in the streets of the metropolis after dark, then nightwalkers represent some of the most suggestive and revealing guides to the neglected and forgotten aspects of the city.
In this brilliant work of literary investigation, Beaumont shines a light on the shadowy perambulations of poets, novelists and thinkers: Chaucer and Shakespeare; William Blake and his ecstatic peregrinations and the feverish ramblings of opium addict Thomas De Quincey; and, among the lamp-lit literary throng, the supreme nightwalker Charles Dickens. We discover how the nocturnal city has inspired some and served as a balm or narcotic to others. In each case, the city is revealed as a place divided between work and pleasure, the affluent and the indigent, where the entitled and the desperate jostle in the streets.
With a foreword and afterword by Will Self, Nightwalking is a fascinating literary exploration of the writers who traverse the city at night and the people they meet.
“Cities, like cats, will reveal themselves at night,” wrote the poet Rupert Brooke. Before the age of electricity, the nighttime city was a very different place to the one we know today – home to the lost, the vagrant and the noctambulant. Matthew Beaumont recounts an alternative history of London by focusing on those of its denizens who surface on the streets when the sun’s down. If nightwalking is a matter of “going astray” in the streets of the metropolis after dark, then nightwalkers represent some of the most suggestive and revealing guides to the neglected and forgotten aspects of the city.
In this brilliant work of literary investigation, Beaumont shines a light on the shadowy perambulations of poets, novelists and thinkers: Chaucer and Shakespeare; William Blake and his ecstatic peregrinations and the feverish ramblings of opium addict Thomas De Quincey; and, among the lamp-lit literary throng, the supreme nightwalker Charles Dickens. We discover how the nocturnal city has inspired some and served as a balm or narcotic to others. In each case, the city is revealed as a place divided between work and pleasure, the affluent and the indigent, where the entitled and the desperate jostle in the streets.
With a foreword and afterword by Will Self, Nightwalking is a fascinating literary exploration of the writers who traverse the city at night and the people they meet.
Unavailable
Read more from Matthew Beaumont
Nightwalking: A Nocturnal History of London Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Walker: On Finding and Losing Yourself in the Modern City Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNightwalking: A Nocturnal History of London Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Nightwalking
Related ebooks
Runaway: Poppet Cycle, #2 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLondon Peculiar and Other Nonfiction Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Constellation of Genius: 1922: Modernism Year One Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Agents & Spies Short Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Short Stories of the British Isles - A Chronological History - Complete in Ten Volumes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsUlysses Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5No Name Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Novel Destinations: Literary Landmarks From Jane Austen's Bath to Ernest Hemingway's Key West Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Mystery at Stowe Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5When Winter Comes to Main Street Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Humorless Ladies of Border Control: Touring the Punk Underground from Belgrade to Ulaanbaatar Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5My Aunt Margaret's Mirror Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMurder by Matchlight Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Shadows Before Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Grail: Relic of an Ancient Religion Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFootprints in Wet Cement Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Books They Gave Me: True Stories of Life, Love, and Lit Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5James Joyce: A New Biography Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Celtic Dawn: A Portrait of Irish Literary Renaissance Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Time Travel Short Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Book About Everything: Eighteen Artists, Writers and Thinkers on James Joyce's Ulysses Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMaiden Voyage Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Afterlife of Enclosure: British Realism, Character, and the Commons Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEugene O'Neill: A Life in Four Acts Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Religious Sonnets of Dylan Thomas: A Study in Imagery and Meaning Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTheodore Watts-Dunton: Poet, Novelist, Critic Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe strange lockdown life of Alice Henry Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Gap in the Curtain Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWhen Winter Comes to Main Street Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIn Flanders Fields and Other Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Literary Criticism For You
The 48 Laws of Power: by Robert Greene | Conversation Starters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Verity: by Colleen Hoover | Conversation Starters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Art of Seduction: by Robert Greene | Conversation Starters Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/512 Rules For Life: by Jordan Peterson | Conversation Starters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5One Hundred Years of Solitude: A Novel by Gabriel Garcia Márquez | Conversation Starters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dare to Lead: Brave Work. Tough Conversations. Whole Hearts.by Brené Brown | Conversation Starters Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Speed Reading: How to Read a Book a Day - Simple Tricks to Explode Your Reading Speed and Comprehension Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Court of Thorns and Roses: A Novel by Sarah J. Maas | Conversation Starters Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Man's Search for Meaning: by Viktor E. Frankl | Conversation Starters Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Circe: by Madeline Miller | Conversation Starters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself by Michael A. Singer | Conversation Starters Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Book of Virtues Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking by Susan Cain | Conversation Starters Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5The Power of Habit: by Charles Duhigg | Conversation Starters Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Killers of the Flower Moon: by David Grann | Conversation Starters Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Letters to a Young Poet Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Just Kids: A National Book Award Winner Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5SUMMARY Of The Plant Paradox: The Hidden Dangers in Healthy Foods That Cause Disease and Weight Gain Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Great Alone: by Kristin Hannah | Conversation Starters Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Between the World and Me: by Ta-Nehisi Coates | Conversation Starters Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5
Reviews for Nightwalking
Rating: 0 out of 5 stars
0 ratings
0 ratings0 reviews