London: City of Disappearances

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London: City of Disappearances

Even granting that an anthology will never please all the people all the time, there are many inclusions here that should have been edited down, and some that could have been left out altogether without weakening the richness of the whole. Six hundred and fifty pages might be a physical statement of intent, but a volume of half that length might well have made a better book. Sinclair's organising principle is deceptively simple. Fame - sometimes fleeting or lost fame - is the book's recurrent theme.

London: City of Disappearances - Iain Sinclair - Google Книги

The natural inclination of many contributors has been to write not so much about disappearance as about appearance. The famous and infamous abound. London is not a vanishing point so much as a grand stage, crowded - riddled - with actors, as in Gareth Edwards' description of posthumous fame "You might become a hospital, a school, a park" , Ann Baer's small-world collisions with Mervyn Peake, and Peter Carpenter's evocation of the London music scene.

Powering much of this writing is an interest not in the missing but in the omnipresence of the famous.

You might become a park

It is an interest that is reflected elsewhere in Sinclair's own writing, as in his study of Jeffrey Archer in Lights Out for the Territory; but Sinclair is merciless and acute in his portrayals of the powerful, and not all the writing he has found is equal to his own in this regard. Too many writers rely on the power of celebrity to generate interest, and here and there the book is weakened by contributions which are little more than Hello!

Chapters such as Northern Lines dissect the city according to geography, while others, such as Old Times and Bibliomania, do so by history or common obsession. Sinclair's organisation of material is adept, with adjacent fragments, essays and transcripts playing off and enriching one another: Ruth Valentine on Schmidt's of Charlotte Street, "Staffed entirely by lawyers from Vienna"; Chris Petit on the mis-recognition of an ex-wife; Sarah Wise on the "Specialist trade, now defunct" of the resurrectionists, the anatomists' bodysnatchers of the 18th century.

One chapter with considerable and largely unfulfilled potential is Edge-lands, which examines suburbia and the thin green line beyond - a territory Sinclair has made peculiarly his own. I can't think of a better way to do it actually, and would love a whole series of volumes to sit alongside this theme of disappearance.

I loved the blend of fiction and fact, storytelling and autobiography, the wildly different styles and stories. I mourned the 60s--not the self-indulgence of it so much, though that comes across so strong I loved this book, and I love this approach to trying to capture the meaning, the feeling, the experience of a city through a multiplicity of voices and words. I mourned the 60s--not the self-indulgence of it so much, though that comes across so strongly--but the way that cheap flats and counter-culture spaces opened up a place where very different people could and did meet.

That to me was the greatest disappearance. Which I like, but is also why it's not 5 stars. That past world also somehow seemed to ensure that this was a rich and varied tapestry of mostly white fairly well-off men.

The exceptions only seem to highlight their exceptionality but London is such a huge vibrant place and to capture it in this way strangely truncates it. Women and communities of colour are hardly here at all, so while I loved the book immediately I started growing impatient, I wanted all of London's voices. When I found them, a handful of them, they shone out to me. Feb 03, Wreade rated it really liked it Shelves: A low 4 stars but still a 4. So Sinclair called up every writer he knows, gave them the subjects 'London' and 'Disappearance' and asked them to send him something.

So this isn't some organized decisive breakdown of london through the ages its a random collection of personal anecdotes, biography, history, poem, short story, essay and other odds and ends. I doubt more than a couple of pieces were written specifically for this collection. The mix of writing styles is quite cool, although your bound A low 4 stars but still a 4.

The mix of writing styles is quite cool, although your bound to find one or two you can't stand. Also if i was an english teacher grading these assignments a lot of people would be getting F's as many have very tenuous connections to the word 'Disappearance': There is a lot to like here. Literally a LOT, this thing is really long. I have an ebook but a hardcopy might be better, its the sort of book you leave lying around and randomly open and read. But i do have some gripes, both to do with Sinclair's editing.

He's made two attempts to add some sort of structure to this mess. First he's corralled the pieces into various groupings based on their geographic location in London, not the worst idea. However in effect this has led to a very uneven reading experience as some groups are heavy on fact or fiction, history or biography, long entries or short ones etc.

The other attempt at structure is a piece of ligament called the 'Gazetteer of Disappearances and Deletions' a recurring piece that appears in each grouping. Having some sort of repeating section sounds good.

See a Problem?

This is made up of short entries mostly by either Sarah Wise, who does what seems to be well researched historical bits or Michael Moorcock who does bullshit. You see Moorcocks entries here are all fiction but presented as fact. Now this might make sense to Sinclair, 'oh look at the thin line between fact and fiction'. But for me this felt insulting to the reader, insulting to Sarah Wise, insulting to history and even insulting to Moorcock.

Especially since these entries are not just fictional but are references to other Moorcock stories, making him seem like an underhanded self promoter. Anyway that was my biggest problem, apart from that its interesting stuff. I mean most of the best parts are biographical or historical and with that sort of thing its not going to blow your mind or anything best you can say is 'oh that was very interesting': You can read my contribution to this anthology here wide main column: Se hace algo complicado de leer al estar lleno de referencias locales a Londres y su entorno.

Una rareza que por momentos he disfrutado aunque se me ha hecho algo ardua. Obligatorio ir con un mapa de Londres en la otra mano. This book deals with disappearances of many kinds: Essays, poems, fictional short stories, excerpts from longer works, and anecdotes are all included in this anthology, which is basically held together only by the theme of all these things disappearing from London. Given the breadth of subjects and styles, it's only natural that readers will find some bits more interesting than others; this was certainly t This book deals with disappearances of many kinds: Given the breadth of subjects and styles, it's only natural that readers will find some bits more interesting than others; this was certainly true for me, tho overall I found everything intriguing enough to read, and some things that didn't at first appeal quickly became a new source of interest.

I don't think you have to be crazy about London I'm not to enjoy this book, but it would be a great read for someone who is.


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It might also appeal to some of my friends who are Alan Moore fans, as one of the longer entries is written by him. Dec 18, Allyson Shaw rated it liked it Shelves: An anthology of fragments and glimpses befitting it's subject.

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Sinclair has collected myriad prose which captures the London I live in-- a place of ghosts, absences and markers of what might have been. Worth reading for De Quincey's ode to his first opium dealer: Jul 09, Sheila rated it liked it. Very nice for psychogeographers, Anglophiles, particularly if you know London or just love London.

This one is definitely for armchair Londonophiles — of which I am one. As with most anthologies, some of the contributions are either a hit or a miss. On the whole, though, I found this quite a depressing book with the pages littered with recollections of dead people. And that was why, ultimately, I was disappointed with the book.

There were indeed a few small paragraphs on actual geographic disappearances but these were more marking the end of a particular chapter rather than the main focus. Annoyingly, the contributors are only named at the end of their particular piece and, being a complete barbarian, had no idea of who some of them were. Reminiscent of various war memorials which was probably deliberate. I would recommend to those ardent Londonophiles in my normal crew with a caution that it is not really about London at all. Dec 07, Adam rated it it was ok Shelves: On the whole full of interesting perspectives on London.

If you love the city this is certainly a worthwhile read. Chus Martinez rated it it was amazing Sep 05,