Author: Richard B. Schwartz
Publisher: Univ of Wisconsin Press
ISBN: 9780299094942
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 220
Book Description
"A rich, fascinating, enlightening if sometimes slightly terrifying tableau of real life in one of the world's most celebrated cities."--Los Angeles Times
Daily Life in Johnson's London
Author: Richard B. Schwartz
Publisher: Univ of Wisconsin Press
ISBN: 9780299094942
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 220
Book Description
"A rich, fascinating, enlightening if sometimes slightly terrifying tableau of real life in one of the world's most celebrated cities."--Los Angeles Times
Publisher: Univ of Wisconsin Press
ISBN: 9780299094942
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 220
Book Description
"A rich, fascinating, enlightening if sometimes slightly terrifying tableau of real life in one of the world's most celebrated cities."--Los Angeles Times
Dr. Johnson's London
Author: Liza Picard
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 9780312291532
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 420
Book Description
The practical realities of everyday life are rarely described in history books. To remedy this, and to satisfy her own curiosity about the lives of our ancestors, Liza Picard immersed herself in contemporary sources - diaries and journals, almanacs and newspapers, government papers and reports, advice books and memoirs - to examine the substance of life in mid-18th century London. The fascinating result of her research, Dr. Johnson's London introduces the reader to every facet of that period: from houses and gardens to transport and traffic; from occupations and work to pleasure and amusements; from health and medicine to sex, food, and fashion. Stops along the way focus on education, etiquette, public executions as popular entertainment, and a melange of other historical curiosities. This book spans the period from 1740 to 1770-very much the city of Dr. Johnson, who published his great Dictionary in 1755. It starts when the gin craze was gaining ground and ends just before America ceased being a colony. In its enthralling review of an exhilarating era, Dr. Johnson's London brilliantly records the strangeness and individuality of the past--and continually reminds us of parallels with the present day.
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 9780312291532
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 420
Book Description
The practical realities of everyday life are rarely described in history books. To remedy this, and to satisfy her own curiosity about the lives of our ancestors, Liza Picard immersed herself in contemporary sources - diaries and journals, almanacs and newspapers, government papers and reports, advice books and memoirs - to examine the substance of life in mid-18th century London. The fascinating result of her research, Dr. Johnson's London introduces the reader to every facet of that period: from houses and gardens to transport and traffic; from occupations and work to pleasure and amusements; from health and medicine to sex, food, and fashion. Stops along the way focus on education, etiquette, public executions as popular entertainment, and a melange of other historical curiosities. This book spans the period from 1740 to 1770-very much the city of Dr. Johnson, who published his great Dictionary in 1755. It starts when the gin craze was gaining ground and ends just before America ceased being a colony. In its enthralling review of an exhilarating era, Dr. Johnson's London brilliantly records the strangeness and individuality of the past--and continually reminds us of parallels with the present day.
Johnson's Life of London
Author: Boris Johnson
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1101585684
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 269
Book Description
The exhilarating story of how London came to be one of the most exciting and influential places on earth—from the city’s colorful, witty, and well-known mayor. Once a swampland that the Romans could hardly be bothered to conquer, over the centuries London became an incomparably vibrant metropolis that has produced a steady stream of ingenious, original, and outsized figures who have shaped the world we know. Boris Johnson, the internationally beloved mayor of London, is the best possible guide to these colorful characters and the history in which they played such lively roles. Erudite and entertaining, he narrates the story of London as a kind of relay race. Beginning with the days when “a bunch of pushy Italian immigrants” created Londinium, he passes the torch on down through the famous and the infamous, the brilliant and the bizarre—from Hadrian to Samuel Johnson to Winston Churchill to the Rolling Stones—illuminating with unforgettable clarity the era each inhabited. He also pauses to shine a light on innovations that have contributed to the city’s incomparable vibrancy, from the King James Bible to the flush toilet. As wildly entertaining as it is informative, this is an irresistible account of the city and people that in large part shaped the world we know.
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1101585684
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 269
Book Description
The exhilarating story of how London came to be one of the most exciting and influential places on earth—from the city’s colorful, witty, and well-known mayor. Once a swampland that the Romans could hardly be bothered to conquer, over the centuries London became an incomparably vibrant metropolis that has produced a steady stream of ingenious, original, and outsized figures who have shaped the world we know. Boris Johnson, the internationally beloved mayor of London, is the best possible guide to these colorful characters and the history in which they played such lively roles. Erudite and entertaining, he narrates the story of London as a kind of relay race. Beginning with the days when “a bunch of pushy Italian immigrants” created Londinium, he passes the torch on down through the famous and the infamous, the brilliant and the bizarre—from Hadrian to Samuel Johnson to Winston Churchill to the Rolling Stones—illuminating with unforgettable clarity the era each inhabited. He also pauses to shine a light on innovations that have contributed to the city’s incomparable vibrancy, from the King James Bible to the flush toilet. As wildly entertaining as it is informative, this is an irresistible account of the city and people that in large part shaped the world we know.
Elizabeth's London
Author: Liza Picard
Publisher: Weidenfeld & Nicolson
ISBN: 1780226500
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 356
Book Description
'Reading this book is like taking a ride on a marvellously exhilarating time-machine, alive with colour, surprise and sheer merriment' Jan Morris Elizabethan London reveals the practical details of everyday life so often ignored in conventional history books. It begins with the River Thames, the lifeblood of Elizabethan London, before turning to the streets and the traffic in them. Liza Picard surveys building methods and shows us the interior decor of the rich and the not-so-rich, and what they were likely to be growing in their gardens. Then the Londoners of the time take the stage, in all their amazing finery. Plague, smallpox and other diseases afflicted them. But food and drink, sex and marriage and family life provided comfort. Cares could be forgotten in a playhouse or the bull-baiting of bear-baiting rings, or watching a good cockfight. Liza Picard's wonderfully skilful and vivid evocation of the London of Elizabeth I enables us to share the delights, as well as the horrors, of the everyday lives of our sixteenth-century ancestors.
Publisher: Weidenfeld & Nicolson
ISBN: 1780226500
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 356
Book Description
'Reading this book is like taking a ride on a marvellously exhilarating time-machine, alive with colour, surprise and sheer merriment' Jan Morris Elizabethan London reveals the practical details of everyday life so often ignored in conventional history books. It begins with the River Thames, the lifeblood of Elizabethan London, before turning to the streets and the traffic in them. Liza Picard surveys building methods and shows us the interior decor of the rich and the not-so-rich, and what they were likely to be growing in their gardens. Then the Londoners of the time take the stage, in all their amazing finery. Plague, smallpox and other diseases afflicted them. But food and drink, sex and marriage and family life provided comfort. Cares could be forgotten in a playhouse or the bull-baiting of bear-baiting rings, or watching a good cockfight. Liza Picard's wonderfully skilful and vivid evocation of the London of Elizabeth I enables us to share the delights, as well as the horrors, of the everyday lives of our sixteenth-century ancestors.
London, and The Vanity of Human Wishes
Author: Samuel Johnson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 96
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 96
Book Description
The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.
Author: James Boswell
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Authors, English
Languages : en
Pages : 478
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Authors, English
Languages : en
Pages : 478
Book Description
Samuel Johnson
Author: Peter Martin
Publisher: Hachette UK
ISBN: 0297856162
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 353
Book Description
The first new biography for a generation of one of the great figures of English literature Poet, essayist, biographer, lexicographer, critic, conversationalist and wit, Dr Johnson is one of the great figures of English literature, perhaps the most quoted English writer after Shakespeare. Our view of Johnson has been overwhelmingly shaped by James Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson, published in 1791, the most famous biography in the English language. But invaluable as Boswell is as a source, he should not be the last word. This new biography illuminates the Johnson that Boswell never knew: the awkward youth, the unsuccessful schoolmaster, the eccentric marriage, his early years in London in the 1740s scratching a living, the epic struggle to produce the Dictionary. Very much the outsider, rather than the supremely confident dispenser of robust common sense. Using material unknown to previous biographers, Peter Martin describes the psychological knife-edge on which Johnson felt he lived, caused by his severe melancholia and his physical diseases. He explores Johnson's role in the publishing and printing world of the time and he reveals how important women were to Johnson throughout his life. The Samuel Johnson that emerges from this enthralling biography is still the foremost figure of his age but a more rebellious, unpredictable and sympathetic figure than the one that Boswell so memorably portrayed.
Publisher: Hachette UK
ISBN: 0297856162
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 353
Book Description
The first new biography for a generation of one of the great figures of English literature Poet, essayist, biographer, lexicographer, critic, conversationalist and wit, Dr Johnson is one of the great figures of English literature, perhaps the most quoted English writer after Shakespeare. Our view of Johnson has been overwhelmingly shaped by James Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson, published in 1791, the most famous biography in the English language. But invaluable as Boswell is as a source, he should not be the last word. This new biography illuminates the Johnson that Boswell never knew: the awkward youth, the unsuccessful schoolmaster, the eccentric marriage, his early years in London in the 1740s scratching a living, the epic struggle to produce the Dictionary. Very much the outsider, rather than the supremely confident dispenser of robust common sense. Using material unknown to previous biographers, Peter Martin describes the psychological knife-edge on which Johnson felt he lived, caused by his severe melancholia and his physical diseases. He explores Johnson's role in the publishing and printing world of the time and he reveals how important women were to Johnson throughout his life. The Samuel Johnson that emerges from this enthralling biography is still the foremost figure of his age but a more rebellious, unpredictable and sympathetic figure than the one that Boswell so memorably portrayed.
Charlotte
Author: Kathryn Shevelow
Publisher: Henry Holt and Company
ISBN: 1429936738
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 450
Book Description
The life of actress Charlotte Charke transports us through the splendors and scandals of eighteenth-century London and its wicked theatrical world Her father, Colley Cibber, was one of the eighteenth century's great actor/playwrights-the toast of the British aristocracy, a favorite of the king. When his high-spirited, often rebellious daughter, Charlotte, revealed a fondness for things theatrical, it was thought that the young actress would follow in his footsteps at the legendary Drury Lane, creating a brilliant career on the London stage. But this was not to be. And it was not that Charlotte lacked talent-she was gifted, particularly at comedy. Troublesome, however, was her habit of dressing in men's clothes-a preference first revealed onstage but adopted elsewhere after her disastrous marriage to an actor, who became the last man she ever loved. Kathryn Shevelow, an expert on the sophisticated world of eighteenth-century London (the setting for classics such as Tom Jones and Moll Flanders), re-creates Charlotte's downfall from the heights of London's theatrical world to its lascivious lows (the domain of fire-eaters, puppeteers, wastrels, gender-bending cross-dressers, wenches, and scandalous sorts of every variety) and her comeback as the author of one of the first autobiographies ever written by a woman. Beyond the appealingly unorthodox Charlotte, Shevelow masterfully recalls for us a historical era of extraordinary stylishness, artifice, character, interest, and intrigue.
Publisher: Henry Holt and Company
ISBN: 1429936738
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 450
Book Description
The life of actress Charlotte Charke transports us through the splendors and scandals of eighteenth-century London and its wicked theatrical world Her father, Colley Cibber, was one of the eighteenth century's great actor/playwrights-the toast of the British aristocracy, a favorite of the king. When his high-spirited, often rebellious daughter, Charlotte, revealed a fondness for things theatrical, it was thought that the young actress would follow in his footsteps at the legendary Drury Lane, creating a brilliant career on the London stage. But this was not to be. And it was not that Charlotte lacked talent-she was gifted, particularly at comedy. Troublesome, however, was her habit of dressing in men's clothes-a preference first revealed onstage but adopted elsewhere after her disastrous marriage to an actor, who became the last man she ever loved. Kathryn Shevelow, an expert on the sophisticated world of eighteenth-century London (the setting for classics such as Tom Jones and Moll Flanders), re-creates Charlotte's downfall from the heights of London's theatrical world to its lascivious lows (the domain of fire-eaters, puppeteers, wastrels, gender-bending cross-dressers, wenches, and scandalous sorts of every variety) and her comeback as the author of one of the first autobiographies ever written by a woman. Beyond the appealingly unorthodox Charlotte, Shevelow masterfully recalls for us a historical era of extraordinary stylishness, artifice, character, interest, and intrigue.
Regulating Confusion
Author: Thomas Reinert
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 0822382423
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 207
Book Description
With the urbanization of eighteenth-century English society, moral philosophers became preoccupied with the difference between individual and crowd behavior. In so doing, they set the stage for a form of political thought divorced from traditional moral reflection. In Regulating Confusion Thomas Reinert places Samuel Johnson in the context of this development and investigates Johnson’s relation to an emerging modernity. Ambivalent about the disruption, confusion, perplexity, and boundless variety apparent in the London of his day, Johnson was committed to the conventions of moral reflection but also troubled by the pressure to adopt the perspective of the crowd and the language of social theory. Regulating Confusion explores the consequences of his ambivalence and his attempt to order the chaos. It discusses his critique of moral generalizations, concept of moral reflection as a symbolic gesture, and account of what happens to the notion of character when individuals, having lost the support of moral convention, become faces in a crowd. Reflecting generally on the relationship between skepticism and political ideology, Reinert also discusses Johnson’s political skepticism and the forms of speculation and action it authorized. Challenging prevalent psychologizing and humanistic interpretations, Regulating Confusion leaves behind the re-emergent view of Johnson as a reactionary ideologue and presents him in a theoretically sophisticated context. It offers his style of skepticism as a model of poise in the face of confusion about the nature of political truth and personal responsibility and demonstrates his value as a resource for students of culture struggling with contemporary debates about the relationship between literature and politics.
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 0822382423
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 207
Book Description
With the urbanization of eighteenth-century English society, moral philosophers became preoccupied with the difference between individual and crowd behavior. In so doing, they set the stage for a form of political thought divorced from traditional moral reflection. In Regulating Confusion Thomas Reinert places Samuel Johnson in the context of this development and investigates Johnson’s relation to an emerging modernity. Ambivalent about the disruption, confusion, perplexity, and boundless variety apparent in the London of his day, Johnson was committed to the conventions of moral reflection but also troubled by the pressure to adopt the perspective of the crowd and the language of social theory. Regulating Confusion explores the consequences of his ambivalence and his attempt to order the chaos. It discusses his critique of moral generalizations, concept of moral reflection as a symbolic gesture, and account of what happens to the notion of character when individuals, having lost the support of moral convention, become faces in a crowd. Reflecting generally on the relationship between skepticism and political ideology, Reinert also discusses Johnson’s political skepticism and the forms of speculation and action it authorized. Challenging prevalent psychologizing and humanistic interpretations, Regulating Confusion leaves behind the re-emergent view of Johnson as a reactionary ideologue and presents him in a theoretically sophisticated context. It offers his style of skepticism as a model of poise in the face of confusion about the nature of political truth and personal responsibility and demonstrates his value as a resource for students of culture struggling with contemporary debates about the relationship between literature and politics.
Elizabeth's London
Author: Liza Picard
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
ISBN: 1466863463
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 412
Book Description
Liza Picard immerses her readers in the spectacular details of daily life in the London of Queen Elizabeth (1558-1603). Beginning with the River Thames, she examines the city on the north bank, still largely confined within the old Roman walls. The wealthy lived in mansions upriver, and the royal palaces were even farther up at Westminster. On the south bank, theaters and spectacles drew the crowds, and Southwark and Bermondsey were bustling with trade. Picard examines the Elizabethan streets and the traffic in them; she surveys building methods and shows us the decor of the rich and the not-so-rich. Her account overflows with particulars of domestic life, right down to what was likely to be growing in London gardens. Picard then turns her eye to the Londoners themselves, many of whom were afflicted by the plague, smallpox, and other diseases. The diagnosis was frequently bizarre and the treatment could do more harm than good. But there was comfort to be had in simple, homely pleasures, and cares could be forgotten in a playhouse or the bull-baiting and bear-baiting rings, or watching a good cockfight. The more sober-minded might go to hear a lecture at Gresham College or the latest preacher at Paul's Cross. Immigrants posed problems for Londoners who, though proud of England's religious tolerance, were concerned about the damage these skilled migrants might do to their own livelihoods, despite the dominance of livery companies and their apprentice system. Henry VIII's destruction of the monasteries had caused a crisis in poverty management that was still acute, resulting in begging (with begging licenses!) and a "parochial poor rate" paid by the better-off. Liza Picard's wonderfully vivid prose enables us to share the satisfaction and delights, as well as the vexations and horrors, of the everyday lives of the denizens of sixteenth-century London.
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
ISBN: 1466863463
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 412
Book Description
Liza Picard immerses her readers in the spectacular details of daily life in the London of Queen Elizabeth (1558-1603). Beginning with the River Thames, she examines the city on the north bank, still largely confined within the old Roman walls. The wealthy lived in mansions upriver, and the royal palaces were even farther up at Westminster. On the south bank, theaters and spectacles drew the crowds, and Southwark and Bermondsey were bustling with trade. Picard examines the Elizabethan streets and the traffic in them; she surveys building methods and shows us the decor of the rich and the not-so-rich. Her account overflows with particulars of domestic life, right down to what was likely to be growing in London gardens. Picard then turns her eye to the Londoners themselves, many of whom were afflicted by the plague, smallpox, and other diseases. The diagnosis was frequently bizarre and the treatment could do more harm than good. But there was comfort to be had in simple, homely pleasures, and cares could be forgotten in a playhouse or the bull-baiting and bear-baiting rings, or watching a good cockfight. The more sober-minded might go to hear a lecture at Gresham College or the latest preacher at Paul's Cross. Immigrants posed problems for Londoners who, though proud of England's religious tolerance, were concerned about the damage these skilled migrants might do to their own livelihoods, despite the dominance of livery companies and their apprentice system. Henry VIII's destruction of the monasteries had caused a crisis in poverty management that was still acute, resulting in begging (with begging licenses!) and a "parochial poor rate" paid by the better-off. Liza Picard's wonderfully vivid prose enables us to share the satisfaction and delights, as well as the vexations and horrors, of the everyday lives of the denizens of sixteenth-century London.