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A Prayer for the City
Current Affairs/Urban Studies
"An extraordinary book, an insider's account of the daily
workings of a big-city administration."
--Witold Rybczynski, The New York Review of Books
A Prayer for the City is Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Buzz Bissinger's true epic of Philadelphia mayor Ed Rendell, an utterly unique, unorthodox, and idiosyncratic leader who will do anything to...more
"An extraordinary book, an insider's account of the daily
workings of a big-city administration."
--Witold Rybczynski, The New York Review of Books
A Prayer for the City is Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Buzz Bissinger's true epic of Philadelphia mayor Ed Rendell, an utterly unique, unorthodox, and idiosyncratic leader who will do anything to...more
Paperback, 448 pages
Published
December 29th 1998
by Vintage
(first published 1997)
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Community Reviews
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What Bissinger has written is both paean and elegy to the once grand, once thriving American city. The focus is Philadelphia, but the story represents the plight of all the large urban centers across the country - cities whose "revitalized" downtowns are deceptive, "a brocade curtain hiding a crumbling stage set."
It's hard to believe that Ed Rendell, newly elected mayor of Philadelphia, would allow Bissinger to follow him around for four years, giving him access to meetings, policy debates, and...more
It's hard to believe that Ed Rendell, newly elected mayor of Philadelphia, would allow Bissinger to follow him around for four years, giving him access to meetings, policy debates, and...more
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I don't know if a better book has been written about local politics. This book may be one of the best ones I've read about politics, period. It's a dizzying portrayal of a big city mayor trying to navigate the shark-infested waters of public employee unions, the media, state and federal government, job loss, white flight, and more. It's both engrossing and deeply depressing. Not perfect (Bissinger lays it on a bit thick sometimes), but overall I loved it.
I grew up in Philly, spent 16 years of schooling there, and now live in South Jersey and still work in Philly. I learned more about the city during the 1.5 weeks I was reading this book than I did in all that other time combined. The depth of the reporting, the range of stories covered, the ability to sort through reams of information-- it's all really impressive.
But it's not just a Philly book-- it's a book about the slow decay of the American city and the ways people have tried to combat that...more
But it's not just a Philly book-- it's a book about the slow decay of the American city and the ways people have tried to combat that...more
I read this at the same time I was watching the first two seasons of "The Wire" from HBO. Both of them tell stories about post-industrial cities struggling to find a life-line into the 21st century.
A friend of mine assured me the other day that the City will be reborn in the 21st century but I'm not quite so sure. As I live in Milwaukee and see all the problems a City like this faces, it becomes quite daunting.
I think Ed Rendell can be categorized as one of those hero-humans who does the best h...more
A friend of mine assured me the other day that the City will be reborn in the 21st century but I'm not quite so sure. As I live in Milwaukee and see all the problems a City like this faces, it becomes quite daunting.
I think Ed Rendell can be categorized as one of those hero-humans who does the best h...more
As an inside look at how politics gets done in a big city, this is pretty much unparallelled, and all of its observations about how cities have been abandoned and screwed over are pretty much right on the money.
So why didn't I like this? I think Bissinger's writing is pretty unimpressive - the whole thing has these weird macho New Journalism airs about it, which I recognize as an attempt to spice things up but feels a little overcompensating. Nevertheless, it's 100% necessary reading for unders...more
So why didn't I like this? I think Bissinger's writing is pretty unimpressive - the whole thing has these weird macho New Journalism airs about it, which I recognize as an attempt to spice things up but feels a little overcompensating. Nevertheless, it's 100% necessary reading for unders...more
An intimate portrait of philadelphia from 1989-1993, the first term of the Rendell administration. Bissinger covers the experience of Philadelphians from center city to north philly, the navy yard to Chestnut Hill, tracking with Rendell's first-term challenges as examples of the common plight of post-industrial American cities. One upshot is that 20 years later it seems like Rendell's first term represented the nadir of those crises. The industrial jobs never came back, but the tourist industry...more
If you love cities read this. To understand how the American city has been methodically undermined by public policy throughout the 20th century and to see an exceptional pair of men fight the good fight through their own flaws, read this. Very well-written book about the first term of Mayor Rendell in Philadelphia. I live in the city and love the city and this broke my heart, but left me hopeful that there are still people in public service who want cities to survive and maybe, someday, thrive a...more
details of the operations of a unique city and it's unique mayor. details the life and times of ed rendell (then mayor, now governor) and makes you idolize the man- if your a hard working liberal that is. even if you don't like rendell, you'll learn a lot about him and a lot about what has happened to make philadelphia the way it is today.
Nov 29, 2011
Sandi
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
history-military-politics,
read-2011
The author was given complete access to Philadelphia Mayor Ed Rendell during his first term and the book shows the inner workings, both the good and the bad, of running a big city.
Give a great nonfiction writer like Buzz Bissinger unfettered access to a colorful and complicated politician like Ed Rendell and you’re going to get an amazing book.
I don’t hand out five stars too often but “A Prayer for the City” probably deserves six.
This inside look at Rendell’s first term as mayor of Philadelphia is much, much more than a biography of a politician, although it’s a darn good biography. More than anything else, “A Prayer” is a heart-wrenching lamentation about our country’s b...more
I don’t hand out five stars too often but “A Prayer for the City” probably deserves six.
This inside look at Rendell’s first term as mayor of Philadelphia is much, much more than a biography of a politician, although it’s a darn good biography. More than anything else, “A Prayer” is a heart-wrenching lamentation about our country’s b...more
I've heard the rave reviews for this book but honestly didn't expect to love it so much. Firstly, I'm not a big fan of books about politics or the workings of government. I tend to read for pleasure and escape. Secondly, my knowledge of this author is almost solely due to the tv show, which i loathe, based on his other book. So imagine my surprise when i sat down with it and looked up to realize i'd read about 1/4 in my first sitting. Obviously, a big draw is the fact that multiple of the neighb...more
I decided to read this because I don't know much about city-level politics, even less than I know about other types of politics. The author, Buzz Bissinger, spent four years--1992-1995, an entire term in office--following around Ed Rendell and David Cohen, the mayor and chief of staff of Philadelphia. It's a book about Rendell, about his massive and at times almost unbearably painful struggle to rescue his city before it capsized, but it's also a book about Philadelphia and the larger subject of...more
Buzz Bissinger doesn't do things halfway. When he wrote Friday Night Lights, he transplanted his entire family to a small town in Texas for a few years. When he wrote A Prayer for the City, he spent over four years shadowing the mayor of Philadelphia and the mayor's top aides. Bissinger fleshes out Prayer with chapters on other Philadelphians. He includes a displaced dock worker, a prosecutor, a disillusioned member of the Rendell administration, and a woman who had raised her children and her g...more
Jul 13, 2010
Joan
added it
" . . . he understood exactly what a city was about -- sounds and sights and smells, all the different senses, held together by the spontaneity of choreography, each day, each hour, each minute different from the previous one."
Oh, the city, the city! I am an urban person. I lived in the suburbs for years and it was hell. You couldn't walk anywhere because there were no sidewalks. There was too much "new". There was too much alike. Your neighbors were just like you. When I drove into the city, th...more
Oh, the city, the city! I am an urban person. I lived in the suburbs for years and it was hell. You couldn't walk anywhere because there were no sidewalks. There was too much "new". There was too much alike. Your neighbors were just like you. When I drove into the city, th...more
This book could be placed alongside the television series "The Wire" as the sobering tale of why American cities are doomed. Bissinger does more than wade through the politics and bureaucracy of urban areas, he shows the end game - what those politics mean for the citizens who call cities home. Often, its either, too little, too late or both.
While the book chronicles a mayoral term in the early 90s, you could very easily apply the characters and settings to any present-day major metropolitan ar...more
While the book chronicles a mayoral term in the early 90s, you could very easily apply the characters and settings to any present-day major metropolitan ar...more
I thoroughly enjoyed this close examination of 1990s Philadelphia politics. I have a new respect for the progress made during my teenage years to resurrect Philly from the status of dying east coast city. I also felt a strong sense of nostalgia reading about the demise of the naval yard and thinking about how my own grandfather raised a family of 7 children while spending his career there. Buzz Bissinger has an eye for using close observation to craft a story of Rendell's monumental campaign. I...more
In the interest of full disclosure, I must first say that I am a life-long resident of Philadelphia, and I love this city. I also need to say that when I was finally old enough to vote, Ed Rendell is one of the first candidates I helped to elect. And now, if Ed decided to try another public office, I'd vote for him every day of the week and twice on Sundays. Those opinions were only reinforced by Bissinger. I knew that David Cohen was basically the brains behind the Rendell machine, and I found...more
Bissinger's career as a journalist makes him the perfect writer of non-fiction; he does what every journalist should aspire to do--make anything interesting. In his portrayal of Ed Rendell, the mayor of Philadelphia during the 1990s, Bissinger makes the politics, hardships and triumphs of Philadelphia come alive. The story behind the story is even more fascinating, that he was allowed complete access to the mayor and his staff for the five years he compiled information for this book. Bissinger's...more
Before I got through the epilogue, Bissinger had made me tear up, and I realized that this was going to be one of my favorite books.
Bissinger's warts-and-all portrayals of Ed Rendell and David Cohen were a rare insight into what it takes to lead Philly, at its most hopeless, scrappiest, and most loveable. And the portraits of four citizens around the city were the perfect complement to the dilapidated ivory tower of City Hall. If anything, I wanted to hear more about the everyday people: those w...more
Bissinger's warts-and-all portrayals of Ed Rendell and David Cohen were a rare insight into what it takes to lead Philly, at its most hopeless, scrappiest, and most loveable. And the portraits of four citizens around the city were the perfect complement to the dilapidated ivory tower of City Hall. If anything, I wanted to hear more about the everyday people: those w...more
Before reading this review it should be noted that I have very little respect for Bissinger after his vitriolic rants about the progression of new media and because of his journalistic elitism.
Buzz uses the Common Ground template to describe former Philadelphia Mayor Ed Rendell's first term and creates a fascinating look at some of the major events of the administration. Frustratingly, Bissinger doesn't come close to achieving Lukas' level of detail and analysis and leaves the reader wanting mu...more
Buzz uses the Common Ground template to describe former Philadelphia Mayor Ed Rendell's first term and creates a fascinating look at some of the major events of the administration. Frustratingly, Bissinger doesn't come close to achieving Lukas' level of detail and analysis and leaves the reader wanting mu...more
An intense look into the inner workings of a city in crisis. The time is the early '90s and the place is Philadelphia -- an aging industrial city crumbling toward irrelevance as the end of the cold wars renders its military shipping port obsolete and the emergence of new technology and NAFTA threatens it's manufacturing stronghold. Bizzinger tells this story from the perspective of multiple city residents -- a prosecutor, community activist, a church leader and a city bureaucrat. But at the cent...more
Remarkably engaging. Bissinger does a fantastic job humanizing Rendell and Cohen and laying out in stark language the difficulty cities face in our modern age. At times Bissinger's moralizing can seem a little heavy-handed, as he attempts to lay blame for the failure of cities at peoples feet and suggest that these very same people can fix the problem. To some degree this is subtle and to some degree it is not; while his conclusions are well-founded it takes the book in the direction of politica...more
Read for City Politics, Spring 2014.
This is a really great book. And I should probably give it 4 stars (I did feel a bit repetitious at the end). I just made the mistake to watch The Art of the Steal while reading this book and while the book shows Ed Randell as a great mayor the movie shows much clearer his asshole side. I guess the bool alluded to it bur couldn't move beyond how great he is. So yes the book is really good and absolutely worth reading, just either watch the movie before or after reading the book.
I can't believe that as a lover of Philly and a planner that it took me so long to read this book. It made me reconsider some foundational ideas I held about saving the City of Philadelphia, and truly appreciate how difficult its battles are on every front.
The voices of Philadelphia, its struggles and its heart all come through. It is a MUST read for anyone interested in the fate of our struggling cities, and Philadelphia in particular.
The voices of Philadelphia, its struggles and its heart all come through. It is a MUST read for anyone interested in the fate of our struggling cities, and Philadelphia in particular.
This was a book recommended to me from a friend. I am not particularly into Philly politics or Ed Rendell but I found this book well written and interesting. It gives great insight into all the different facets that a mayor has to deal with. It also highlighted a few citizens aroudn the city who loved the city and their struggles. I would recommend this book to anyone even if you have no love for Philadelphia or Ed Rendell.
The American city has been dying for decades. This book - written during the early/mid-90s - chronicles that reality in Philadelphia. It's a fascinating read, especially as we're now going through a similar cycle. Bissinger stitches multiple stories together and offers a multi-faceted look at how federal and local policies and economics affect the people who actually live in and beyond city limits.
Great book about Philadelphia during Ed Rendell's first term as Mayor of Philly in the nineties. Fascinating look at urban decline and attempts at urban renewal, public policy, politics, personality leadership, etc. Read it slowly over the course of a few months and it really shaped my understanding of Philadelphia as a city and sparked my desire to get to the neighborhoods and history more!
This book is a love letter to Ed Rendell, then mayor of Philadelhia, and his chief of staff David Cohen. I liked reading it. The author spend four years with the administration during their first term, while the Mayor turned city government around.
Good stories about working people in the city, and great accounts of political battles with unions and other factions.
Good stories about working people in the city, and great accounts of political battles with unions and other factions.
Sep 18, 2011
Ryan
added it
Manages to be both incredibly inspiring and mortifyingly depressing. Contains the best explanation that I've ever read of how FDR's New Deal intentionally tried (and mostly succeeded) to gut cities in favor of suburbs in the most racist, cruel, and demonstrably calculated ways imaginable. But a fantastic book, and an incredible guide for other failing cities.
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H.G. Bissinger has won the Pulitzer Prize, the Livingston Award, the National Headliner Award, and the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel for his reporting. The author has written for the television series NYPD Blue and is a contributing editor at Vanity Fair. He lives in Philadelphia.
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