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London

3.97 of 5 stars 3.97 · rating details · 1,894 ratings · 158 reviews

London: The Biography is the pinnacle of Peter Ackroyd’s brilliant obsession with the eponymous city. In this unusual and engaging work, Ackroyd brings the reader through time into the city whose institutions and idiosyncrasies have permeated much of his works of fiction and nonfiction.

Peter Ackroyd sees London as a living, breathing organism, with its own laws of growth...more

Paperback, 802 pages

Published April 8th 2003 by Anchor (first published October 5th 2000)

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Jun 13, 2011 Chris rated it 3 of 5 stars

Whither art thou driven, ghostly stranger, by the lamentations that echo in the dales of the lifeless and broken hills from whence thou wert bound? Phantom of breath, buckler of the passed and passing days, into what deep chasm of the forgotten mind of God hast thou found thyself, mewling for the grace that has evaded thy dogged and persistent steps? Look inward, man-child—a succession of stygian wombs hast thou haunted, passing now into life and anon into death. The cry of babes and the rattle...more

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Nov 17, 2012 Andrea rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: london

This book is a massive undertaking, both for the author and the reader, and the amount of extraordinary, fascinating and brilliant detail in here is mind-boggling. It pulls from an awe-inspiring number of primary sources to provide the most delectable quotes on everything from pubs to fashion to murders to popular food. In fact, I can't think of a subject that isn't in here, and it's all woven together in a form that is almost like fiction. It muses, ponders, revels in minutiae. This is the firs...more This book is a massive undertaking, both for the author and the reader, and the amount of extraordinary, fascinating and brilliant detail in here is mind-boggling. It pulls from an awe-inspiring number of primary sources to provide the most delectable quotes on everything from pubs to fashion to murders to popular food. In fact, I can't think of a subject that isn't in here, and it's all woven together in a form that is almost like fiction. It muses, ponders, revels in minutiae. This is the first book I started reading after my father died about a year and a half ago, I hadn't been able to read anything at all for a month or two and this was perfect for getting back into it, reading a couple of chapters at a time, setting down, coming back to. I loved loved loved so much of it, both the tidbits of history, but also the ways in which Ackroyd combined them, sometimes by theme or period or area. It's changed how I walked around London streets, how I see the Thames every time I cross it, the ways I contrast old and new and am always seeking out the echoes of past times. I was a bit that way before, I confess, but now I have a much better feeling for what might be there and understanding of what I find.

It's hard to judge a work of this size and scope with so much that is amazing in it. But as I read I became increasingly critical of the celebration of commercialism. It all comes to a head in the final chapters which left me angry. A sort of mystical view of London had been steadily emerging, a sort of organic living creature of a city with its own requirements and demands of its inhabitants. I liked playing with ideas about the ways in which a city shapes its residents, but was disappointed to find Ackroyd's jubilation at the financial centres surviving the blitz as proof that the living beating heart of London might well be commerce and finance. There is a celebration of Thatcher's big bang of 1986 loosing regulations on bangs -- that would ultimately lead to our current economic crisis. And he writes

If the city had a voice it might be saying: There will always be those who fail or who are unfortunate, just as there will always be those who cannot cope with the world as presently constituted, but I can encompass them all.
...Lincoln's Inn Fields was occupied once more by the homeless, after an interval of 150 years, while areas like Waterloo Bridge and the Embankment became the setting for what were known as 'cardboard cities'. ... Despite civic and government initiatives, they are still there. They are now part of the recognisable population; they are Londoners, joining the endless parade. Or perhaps, by sitting upon the sidelines, they remind everyone else that it is a parade.

How infuriating! As though the homeless and the masses of poor are a natural phenomenon like weather, and not caused by deindustrialisation, the roll back of the welfare state and Thatcher's own policies channeling wealth away from them towards the already wealthy. That Lincoln's Inn field should have been free of the homeless for 150 years was an accomplishment of society hard fought and bitterly won. Their return is an indictment of our current direction, not an ornament to London's wealth, or a gaze that seeks to remind the well-to-do of how wonderful they are. Had I only stopped reading with the Blitz I would have unqualifiedly loved this book, as it is I am torn between giving it a five and giving it a one. I look back and wonder how much of this view seeped into the history. I am sure it did in celebrating trade, muting struggle and resistance. But in terms of how theatre changed over time, the love of jellied eels and pies, the roles of gravediggers, the building of churches, the vast panoply of literary views and all such topics,this is quite wonderful.
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Feb 27, 2012 Kelly added it

Shelves: examined-lives, history, great-and-terrible-men, history-british, londonreadinglist, did-not-finish

Lost interest- too busy living here! Another time when I am feeling nostalgic, probably.

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Jul 06, 2012 Maxym Karpovets rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: urban-culture, essay

зізнаюсь, що не зумів прочитати чималу книгу класика стилізованої історичної прози Пітера Акройда, можливо, навіть одного із улюблених сучасних авторів на рівні із Джуліаном Барнсом, Єном Маклюеном і Салманом Рушді. не зумів не через те, що не дуже цікаво, а через безпросвітну щільність письма, часто енциклопедичного і безпощадно точного. зрозуміло, що мені найбільш сподобались частини, де автор жонглює метафорами ("море людського натовпу"), дивує стилістичними вузлами (до речі, переклад дуже ча...more зізнаюсь, що не зумів прочитати чималу книгу класика стилізованої історичної прози Пітера Акройда, можливо, навіть одного із улюблених сучасних авторів на рівні із Джуліаном Барнсом, Єном Маклюеном і Салманом Рушді. не зумів не через те, що не дуже цікаво, а через безпросвітну щільність письма, часто енциклопедичного і безпощадно точного. зрозуміло, що мені найбільш сподобались частини, де автор жонглює метафорами ("море людського натовпу"), дивує стилістичними вузлами (до речі, переклад дуже часто відходить від оригіналу у бік якоїсь дивної поетики) та бездоганним відчуттям свого міста, яке і є основним героєм, основним тлом, практично основою всього тексту від початку до кінця.

тому готуйтесь, що цей всесвіт поглине вас у темні діккенсівські квартали, брудні і смердючі; тьмяні порти і паби; вікторіанські балкони і прихистки. мені сподобалось, що у Акройда все йде в хід для ілюстрації світу Лондона: записки, тревелінґи, випадкові документи, листи, романи, поезія, графіка, мапи. ось вам справді міждисциплінарний підхід без пафосної претензії ним бути попри все! відтак, інтертекст Лондона дає можливість прочитувати його як завгодно, ламаючи і заново створюючи його хронотоп. мені такий спосіб найбільше сподобався, хоча відчуття якоїсь інтелектуальної втоми не покидало. добре це чи погано - вже немає значення.(less)

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Jan 07, 2012 Liam marked it as i-have-better-things-to-do

Pretty frustrating. It's a history entirely composed of quotes - a lot from novels or poetry, but usually from other peoples books -, and is full of absolute gibberish:

London resembles a prison, and it is is perhaps not surprising to discover that keys have always been an object of taboo. They were associated with magic and the presence of demons; thus 'The art of lock-picking was known as the "Black Art" ', according to Peter Linebaugh in The London Hanged, and 'the most common lock-picking too

...more

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Jan 10, 2009 Robert rated it 3 of 5 stars

London: The Biography is a junkshop of the heart, more or less: Peter Ackroyd's heart, or the heart of anyone else who has fallen in love with London's 2000 year history, its transformations, its theatricality, its poverty, its wit, its preposterousness, its influence on the English language. This is a book that's too densely packed with interesting data, arranged in short, thematic chapters, to be read from front to back, much as London is a city that's too large and infinite to be visited thor...more London: The Biography is a junkshop of the heart, more or less: Peter Ackroyd's heart, or the heart of anyone else who has fallen in love with London's 2000 year history, its transformations, its theatricality, its poverty, its wit, its preposterousness, its influence on the English language. This is a book that's too densely packed with interesting data, arranged in short, thematic chapters, to be read from front to back, much as London is a city that's too large and infinite to be visited thoroughly even during a long, hyperactive visit. Instead, I think most readers will end up doing what I did--skipping around to find items of interest: the history of the stage in London, the experiences of the Londoners during the Blitz, the effects of Henry VIII's decision to break with the Roman Catholic Church, the persistence of Chaucerian character-types.

My experiences in London over 4 decades correspond in some measure to Ackroyd's insistence on the Dickensian quality of the place...the fogs, low ceilings, narrow alleyways...but his book does drop the ball in conveying the influence of parks and gardens on the London experience and fails to convey the full impact of London's cosmopolitanism--its infinity of peoples, costumes, and cuisines, in the post-Imperial, post-Colonial, post-modern era. I also wish there were a more extended meditation in it somewhere on literary London (writers are quoted all the time, but their London lives aren't stitched together in what you might call a cultural appraisal of the life of letters in London).

That said, Ackroyd has no qualms about emphasizing London's dingy quality, its patched-together architecture, and its continuous (for millennia) construction and deconstruction. This is his overriding theme: here's a city with a strong, peculiar personalty with which no one can do anything; it must be accepted as it is for what it is; tear it down and it will twist and torture your plans to build it anew; bomb it and it will survive underground; make it a "fashionable" destination, and it will satirize its own fashionableness.

As a "book," this text strikes me as something of a marketing enterprise: here's the biggest, most comprehensive, last word on London, so you have to have it. It probably would have been more effective had it been edited down a bit. But that's exactly what Akroyd says people have tried to do to London, and in the end, it overflows all measure and restraint(less)

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Jul 20, 2011 David Manns rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

What a book. Ackroyd has created the ultimate portrait of London as a living, breathing entity, not just a collection of old buildings and monuments. Rather than a dry chronological trawl through the history of our nation's capital, instead Ackroyd chooses themes and explores them through time and space, focussing on specific areas or ideas. Thus he paints a picture of an ever evolving city that defies all attempts to change or control it. London is its own master.

Ackroyd ranges back and forth t...more

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Dec 07, 2009 Tony rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: history

Ackroyd, Peter. LONDON: The Biography. (U.K.-2000, U.S.-2001). ****. This massive work traces the history of London from its Roman beginnings – it was supposedly founded by Brutus – to the present day. Chronologically moving from the past to the present, the author, probably the world’s expert on the city, jumps ahead and shows how present names and places reflect the city’s history. This is a book that should be owned by every Londoner who is interested in his city. If you are a casual visitor...more

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Jun 07, 2010 F.G. Cottam rated it 5 of 5 stars

London has always possessed the presence of a character (and a major character at that), in the quite brilliant novels Ackroyd has chosen to set there. His love of and fascination for the city has always been apparent. Here he demonstrates his scholarly expertise on a subject that clearly beguiles him and with what incredibly enjoyable result.
The best praise I can offer this book is that it is worthy of its subject. It is deep, mystical, multi-layered and endlessly fascinating.
I lived in Londo...more

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Dec 16, 2012 Miranda Davis rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: help-me-i-can-t-put-it-down, keeper

Fascinating, brilliant history of London from prehistory, through Roman occupation, Angles, Saxons, Vikings, PIcts, Christians, Kings, Queens, pretenders, plagues, fire, famine, wars, Dickens, bombs. And so forth.

I read this enthralled by layer upon layer of human experience as it was peeled away. Or rather unearthed.

If you enjoy history that makes you feel present at the time discussed, you will be swept up in this. It's not solely chronological but also topical. And the topics themselves reve...more

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Nov 17, 2010 Chris rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: london, history-ww-ii, history-tudors, ackroyd, history-english, favorites

Dear Mr. Ackroyd,

Will you marry me? I know you're gay, and I'm a woman. I understand that such details present wrinkles in the grand scheme, but I'm sure we can arrange bits on the side and whatever.

Truthfully, I don't think you are really good looking, but you sure write sexy.

I wish I had a quarter of your intelligence.

This love poem to London, for love poem it is, is wonderful. It's brillant! It's marvellous!

I think I just want to marry you so I can live in London.

Well, that and your accent.

It...more

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Apr 08, 2013 Arabella rated it 2 of 5 stars

As a native Londoner, I found parts of this book very interesting. For example, I knew there had been other rivers in London such as the long-lost Fleet river, what I hadn't realized is that they are all still there, buried under the city. I also didn't know much of anything about London pre-Romans.

Apart from being really, really long, there were a few things I didn't like about this book. One was the way Ackroyd described things as being unique to London, for example quoting all the references...more

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Jan 29, 2013 sage rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: reviewed

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Atrociously bad. It could be turned into a drinking game -- drink any time Ackroyd uses fallacious logic or uses a completely unrelated and non-universal example to "prove" an absurd point. Of course, then you'd have alcohol poisoning by the end of the first chapter.

If his thesis were that London, as a city, has a particular culture unlike other cities in Britain, then this book might be an interesting amble through different elements of that culture. However, his thesis is that the city itself,...more

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Aug 11, 2011 Elaine rated it 5 of 5 stars

"Характер - это судьба, это рок, это жребий". "Характер - это привычка, которая имеет долгую историю". "Характер - это луна, у которой всегда имеется темная сторона, не видимая другим"...

Позволю себе перефразировать великих - от Плутарха до Марка Твена - только для того, чтобы выразить собственную мысль: нет личности без характера, как нет биографии без личности. Не очень глубокомысленно, но вполне доступно для понимания того предмета, о котором пойдет речь - биографии масштабнейшей из личносте...more "Характер - это судьба, это рок, это жребий". "Характер - это привычка, которая имеет долгую историю". "Характер - это луна, у которой всегда имеется темная сторона, не видимая другим"...

Позволю себе перефразировать великих - от Плутарха до Марка Твена - только для того, чтобы выразить собственную мысль: нет личности без характера, как нет биографии без личности. Не очень глубокомысленно, но вполне доступно для понимания того предмета, о котором пойдет речь - биографии масштабнейшей из личностей, биографии целого города. А именно - Лондона.

Нерон поджег Рим, чтобы стоя на вершине холма над любимым городом и вдохновляясь грандиозным зрелищем, слагать свои вирши. Питеру Акройду не надо было прибегать к таким крайним мерам, чтобы вдохновение подсказало писателю, каким должно быть его следующее творение. Именно как к личности отнесся он к Лондону и решил, что следующей биографией вслед за жизнеописаниями Элиота, Блейка, Чосера и Диккенса будет биография Лондона и его обитателей.

Лондон называют космополитом, пережившим все мыслимые и немыслимые страсти веков. Не раз восставал он из пепла и руин, но сумел сохранить свои древние морщины в виде остовов римской стены, дворцов знати, средневековых трактиров и церквей, наполовину ушедших под землю... Однако морщины не старят этот уникальный город. Ему и по сей день удается выглядеть на тысячу миллионов фунтов стерлингов золотом, словно каким-то загадочным способом когда-то в его руки попало средство Макропулоса.

У Лондона, как у любого человека, есть дата рождения - первые походы Цезаря на остров через Ла-Манш. Есть и колыбель, которую можно вообразить, прогуливаясь вдоль руин Римской крепости. Есть нежный, детсадовский, возраст, совпавший с прибытием англов, саксов и джутов... На отрочество города выпало нормандское завоевание. Период начального образования был связан с наукой установления и ведения дипломатических отношений с вновь завоеванными территориями. Тинейджеровское безумие выразилось восстанием Кромвеля против вековых родительских устоев. Юношеский максимализм, переживший викторианско-пуританскую эпоху, так и остался в характере города, неподвластного времени.

Лондон - это характер, непредсказуемый, вспыльчивый, таинственный. Ему присущ как нарциссизм, так и беспощадное самобичевание. "Подобно морю и виселице, Лондон не отказывает никому. Те, кто пускается в плавание по его просторам, ищут богатства и славы, хотя нередко захлебываются в его волнах", - пишет Питер Акройд. Кажется, что можно захлебнуться в многометровых волнах осязаемых и обоняемых видений прошлого, с тщательностью и скрупулезностью выведенных на страницах "Биографии". Но это лишь обостряет чувство голода, хочется проглотить еще и еще одну порцию - очередную главу, где Лондон, возможно, откроется с еще более таинственной и притягательной точки зрения.

Но Питер Акройд не склонен идеализировать свой город: почти в каждой главе он готовит для читателя ловушку, словно предупреждая наивного обожателя своего кумира. "Лондон всегда славился жестокостью". "В Лондоне всегда было шумно... Шуметь - привилегия лондонцев". "Лондон... не считался "градом Божьим" на земле...". "Тьма принадлежит к самой сути города...". Таких заключений в "Биографии" - десятки. Словно ты вновь и вновь читаешь "Парфюмера" Патрика Зюскинда... Но тут вдруг автор спохватывается и пытается успокоить своего читателя многообещающими словами, как, например: "...в Лондоне не сохранилось ключа, позволяющего постичь его скрытые и таинственные перемены". Ах, значит, перемены все-таки были и есть, а посему тянет побыстрее перевернуть страницу, дабы постичь это "скрытое" и "таинственное". "Биография" читается как роман, в котором, несмотря на постоянную смену персонажей и декораций, все же есть целостность, присущая именно художественному произведению. И все-таки это не роман, и вымышленного в "Биографии" не может быть по существу жанра.

Питера Акройда часто описывают как человека, в котором сочетается устрашающее и комическое. Под стать самому городу, о котором он пишет и который готов воспринимать как человеческую плоть - с изъянами, пороками, гламурностью, комичностью, трагедийностью и прочими чертами, олицетворяющими как светлую, так и темную стороны любой вырванной из толпы личности...

В одном из своих интервью Акройд признался, что по натуре он человек, абсорбирующий все, что может абсорбировать его организм - галлоны чая, спиртного, информации... Но как вода не может вечно застаиваться в организме здорового человека, так и информация стремится сразу же выплеснуться на бумагу...

Возможно, не все из того, что узнает читатель из "Биографии Лондона", останется в его памяти. Не думаю, что кто-либо задастся подобной целью. Разве что для Книги рекордов Гиннесса... Но узнать как можно больше о городе, в котором, как говаривал классик, если не бывал, значит не жил, есть смысл. Причем, не только у тех, кто никогда там не был, но и у тех, кто чувствует себя там, как дома. "Вот она, магическая энергия Лондона, зримая в каждом из его грандиозных превращений...".
(2005)
©Елена Дедюхина
© Copyright: Елена Карпос-Дедюхина, 2005(less)

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Jan 04, 2013 Lyn Elliott rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: history, fiction

I initially gave this four stars, recognising the huge amount of research that Ackroyd has pulled together - anything you want to know about scandals, sewers, executions or thievery in London is here in an exuberant tumble. But ultimately the tumble led to my three star rating - the lack of order in the presentation jars for me and I gave up. It's a book for dipping rather than straight through reading.
The Manchester Guardian review on this link summarises several other reviews that balance amaz...more

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Aug 26, 2012 Fox rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: biography, non-fiction, history, anthropology, sociology, reference, 2012

This book was truly extraordinary.

I was looking for an in-depth history of London, and I certainly found it between this book's covers. Peter Ackroyd truly did write a biography of London, from its sprawling streets to its strange citizens. His writing is fluid, and fascinating to read; his use of primary sources is utterly astounding, and somewhat maddening, as the cockney can be a bit hard on the eyes.

Peter Ackroyd's book is told in a very loose chronology. While the 'story' begins with prehis...more

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Aug 14, 2011 Kotinka rated it 1 of 5 stars

Nobody can doubt the incredible amount of research the author collated to put this mammoth of a book together. His subject matter is fascinating and rewarding.

However, Ackroyd's writing style is very particular and surely a matter of taste - unfortunately this reviewer finds it annoyingly loose, try-hard artistic and peppered with sweeping generalisations and over romanticisation. Small sections of the book stand out for their accuracy and fluency and undeniably, the book is crammed with reams...more

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Aug 17, 2011 Pete daPixie rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: history

Could very well be THE biography of 'London', Peter Ackroyd's 2000 publication is a monumental eight hundred page delight. The scope and coverage is breathtaking, from the last ice age to the domain of wild animals, to the Roman and Saxon foundations to it's present day sprawl. The capital city with all the trials,tribulations,fog and flame from Aeneas to Ziegler.
Ackroyd has produced a masterpiece. It is clearly a life times work, and not just a historical one. The reader is taken by the hand an...more

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Aug 03, 2007 Kay rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: london, social-history, british-history-civ, nonfiction

Dark and juicy biography of the city. Ackroyd's highly personal and imaginative account is not straightforward -- but then neither is London. London is a complex stew that evokes the city not just as a historical entity but as almost an animate thing.

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Jan 23, 2013 Laura Tulloch rated it 4 of 5 stars

Tea is so quintessentially English, and Starbucks on only came to London in the 1980s, so who would have thought that London had coffee houses back in the 1600s?

It also had its tradesmen who were well known for getting drunk and running riot around town - just like tradesmen are known to do today (apologies to any indignant tradesmen out there but you must admit that most tradies have big cars that they like to rev and drive fast, and love to drink beer and fall down drunk).

This book was great...more

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Feb 10, 2012 Mark rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: history, favorite

One of the recommendations on the cover of this book states that “Peter Ackroyd was born to write the biography of London” and it’s quite hard to disagree with that. The scope of this work is immense and almost too much to comprehend in a small review; over 1000 pages including references it details the history of our capital from prehistoric times to today. It is not a narrative history but a broken down series of essays on separate themes, usually moulded around the broad field of social histo...more One of the recommendations on the cover of this book states that “Peter Ackroyd was born to write the biography of London” and it’s quite hard to disagree with that. The scope of this work is immense and almost too much to comprehend in a small review; over 1000 pages including references it details the history of our capital from prehistoric times to today. It is not a narrative history but a broken down series of essays on separate themes, usually moulded around the broad field of social history. We are never to forget that London has been created and shaped by its people.

The passion the author feels for his subject is omnipresent, and while at times he can go overboard with the praise felt for a mere city, those of us who have ever felt attached to a place can share the joy and almost envy Ackroyd’s ability to say what we ourselves often feel. The author has a respect for the pagan mythology built up around London, including the founding story of Brutus and the “watchers” of the city, Gog and Magog from the bible’s book of Genesis. London’s historic beauty is marred by its adjoining history of disaster. The city continually experiences revolt, destruction and natural disaster, and yet always remakes itself anew, though not so new as to be indistinguishable from the past. London as organic organism clutches to its structure and refuses to be cowed in the face of modernity and incessant change, the city will only allow so much.

The author juxtaposes his knowledge of the citizens of the past with what he observes today, and how little changes with regard to the working and middle classes to whom London is a birthright. The people are its key to the survival and regeneration. We learn of the radical history of Clerkenwell, the history of crime and punishment with all its strange macabre connotations. Indeed, the Fleet prison, Newgate and such are always lurking in the background of any London scene waiting to snap up its jettisoned and unwanted cargo. The poor, the immigrants, the beggars, the artists, the rich, the aristocrats, the writers and every other type of person, neatly pigeonholed can be found under the slate grey skies of London, sometimes welcomed, sometimes not, but there nevertheless. The smells and sounds of London jump from the page and its many and varied characters sing their part in its history. I am not a Londoner and found it fascinating and readable in equal measure. This is Ackroyd’s London, but equally it is everybody’s London. It is this living, breathing beast that demands fealty and rewards its subjects with the power of creation and counter-creation.

This book is an absolute pleasure to read. A journey that evokes the spirit of London as well as any piece of writing by de Quincey, Pepys, or any painting by Turner or Canalleto and will rightly be remembered as a monument of London itself, alongside Nelsons Column or the London Stone. Truly, Peter Ackroyd was born to write this book. (less)

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Aug 30, 2011 Candy Wood added it

Hmm. Just noticed that the title is "The" Biography, as though this one does it for all time. Having been fascinated by Ackroyd's novel Hawksmoor, I expected his take on London to emphasize the spooky, and he doesn't disappoint on that front. I also like that his London ranges far beyond the tourist center, with interesting chapters on the East End and the South Bank as well as areas like Clerkenwell and Islington. The book is packed with information, but the avoidance of chronology means that i...more

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Jul 11, 2012 Carlotta rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book was amazing. Not only because it took me 2 months to read it, but for the simple reason i felt the urge to buy a small map and make notes on places in London I have never been to before, and really want to visit and "breath in" now. The author takes you on a voyage not made of the usual historic facts about London, but constructed on details, testimonials, curiosities.

In this Biography, you shall learn that it is truly possible to drown in beer, to keep specific businesses in the same...more This book was amazing. Not only because it took me 2 months to read it, but for the simple reason i felt the urge to buy a small map and make notes on places in London I have never been to before, and really want to visit and "breath in" now. The author takes you on a voyage not made of the usual historic facts about London, but constructed on details, testimonials, curiosities.

In this Biography, you shall learn that it is truly possible to drown in beer, to keep specific businesses in the same locations for over 2000 years, and that not everything that you see in London is really there....

Every chapter is interesting, often funny, and unique. I loved the way the book was subdivided, it took me ages to read only because it is so full of details it really needs full attention.

I recommend this wonderfull book to all the readers that live in and love London, to those that think to move there and to all that want to understand Her better.

***** Italian version ******

La Biografia di Londra di Ackroyd è un opera pazzesca. E non lo dico solo perché mi ci sono voluti 2 mesi per leggere il libro! Ma perché ho sentito l'impulso di leggerlo affiancandolo a una piantina e segnando delle note. L'autore ci racconta la vita di Londra, dalla sua nascita in poi, non come un banale cronista storico, ma come un antropologo del dettaglio.

Non solo narra eventi importanti per la città, ma piccole vite in essa raccolte da secoli. In questo libro, si scopre che è possibile affogare nella birra, avere una via che ospita gli stessi mestieri da 2000 anni, costruire qualsiasi cosa e tanto altro ancora.

Ackroyd racconta la città con un dettaglio impressionante, te la fa amare, criticare, respirare e addirittura annusare! Anche se non hai visto il suo completo evolversi, impari a riconoscere le vie per cosa vi accadde più che per cosa vendono. Le zone assumono significati completamente diversi, la rete metropolitana non è più un mistero, e almeno se vagando per i vicoli di Londra ti imbatterai in qualche fantasma, saprai sempre chi hai davanti!

Sicuramente leggere questa opera in Inglese vi darà il vantaggio di farvi 4 risate quando si capita su trascrizioni di testimonianze reali in dialetti quasi estinti, ma in italiano non perde nulla.

Unico difetto, la pesantezza del mattone che è interessante e avvincente ma un po' ostico se vuoi leggerlo in modo che ti sia veramente utile! L'autore spesso perde il filo, perché ama così tanto la città che si smarrisce nel testo pur di potere descrivere TUTTO quello che reputa interessante (ed è parecchia roba). Ma è talmente carino e appassionato che passa la paura.

Un libro per tutti gli appassionati di storia, antropologia, Londra e per chi pensa di andare a vivere lì.
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Feb 18, 2013 Alex Csicsek rated it 5 of 5 stars

Ackroyd's London The Biography rightfully deserves its place as the defining backstory to the world's greatest city.

Though packed full of information, London The Biography is not a textbook. It's filling in the details of something we all know the broad outline of, and drawing attention to the connections between things you already knew. London The Biography takes you from knowing London, to understanding London.

Ackroyd tells the story of the city thematically, with each chapter jumping around t...more

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Feb 03, 2013 Kristi rated it 2 of 5 stars

OK, so I'm not really finished as in I read the rest of it. I'm finished because I just can't seem to bring myself to keep reading. I want to give the book four stars for the writing - a lot of Ackroyd's language flows like poetry and I find myself submerged in it, just delighting in the vocabulary and imagery - but ultimately this quite well-written book is going to resonate more with the native or current Londoner. Having visited the place helps, but many of the descriptions and back stories w...more

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Aug 28, 2010 Mark Love rated it 3 of 5 stars

You may be forgiven for thinking that my recent paucity of reviews was a due to lack of reading brought about by the birth of our son. Not so. I have been labouring through this beast of a book for the past couple of months, and am now relieved to be able to put it back on the shelf.

Peter Ackroyd's biography of London is impressive in every sense - the length, the breadth, the details and the passionate and scholarly work that went into it, and it has been celebrated by reviewers and middle-clas...more

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May 16, 2013 Dave rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This kept driving me crazy so I stopped reading it and feel much better now--thanks, Annmarie. Note to anyone who would write a "Biography of London": 1) Ending (and sometimes beginning) every paragraph with a resonant statement (e.g., "London is a city that lives for eating" "Everyone in London is aware of the weather"--these are not direct quotes, but you get the idea) gets tiresome quickly; 2) Substituting--or seeming to substitute--the word "London" in paragraphs talking about England, or Eu...more

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Aug 08, 2008 Will rated it 5 of 5 stars

I was quite smitten by this book. I knew I'd find it interesting when I saw the front cover but I didn't know just how good it would be!

Its a big tome, and it will take a while for even the most fascinated reader to plough his/her way through. Every page creaks with the weight of research as Ackroyd weaves the most profound and colourful description of a place that I've ever laid my thirsty eyes upon.

What makes it such an original and compelling work is that the history of the city is delt with...more

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Jan 09, 2009 Lisa rated it 3 of 5 stars

In this lengthy volume, Ackroyd studies various aspects of London--crime & punishment, food, gambling, weather, fire, noise, urban children, disease, beggars, etc., etc.--tracing each theme through time, jumping nimbly from century to century in order to map out how these aspects of London have emerged, evolved, disappeared, or (more often than not) remained eerily the same.

My favorite sections were on fog, noise, silence, and fire. And my favorite fact was that the term "Cockney" actually...more

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Sep 05, 2007 Jeremiah rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Ackroyd takes a mystical approach to the life and times of a city, unabashedly proclaiming London to be not merely an organism - but a person; an individual who is "half of stone, half of flesh". He rejects any conventional narrative of London as being an attempt to subdue the multifarious forms of time found in the city to one, crude, linear progression.

So, instead of detailing events chronologically, or describing the area of the city from a fixed orientation, Ackroyd has approached his subje...more

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About Peter Ackroyd

Peter Ackroyd CBE is an English novelist and biographer with a particular interest in the history and culture of London.

Peter Ackroyd's mother worked in the personnel department of an engineering firm, his father having left the family home when Ackroyd was a baby. He was reading newspapers by the age of 5 and, at 9, wrote a play about Guy Fawkes. Reputedly, he first realized he was gay at the age...more

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