Books
Reader John

Cities

A “vastly entertaining” history of urban centers—from the ancient world to today (Time).
From the earliest example in the Ancient Near East to today’s teeming centers of compressed existence, such as Mumbai and Tokyo, cities are home to half the planet’s population and consume nearly three-quarters of its natural resources. They can be seen as natural cultural artifacts—evidence of our civic spirit and collective ingenuity.
This book gives us the ecological and functional context of how cities evolved throughout human history—the connection between pottery making and childbirth in ancient Anatolia, plumbing and politics in ancient Rome, and revolution and street planning in nineteenth-century Paris. This illuminating study helps us to understand how urban centers thrive, decline, and rise again—and prepares us for the role cities will play in the future.
“A superb historical account of the places in which most of us either live or will live.” —Conde Nast Traveller
632 printed pages
Original publication
2007
Publication year
2007
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Quotes

  • Edgar LSLhas quoted3 years ago
    Winston Churchill: ‘We shape our cities, then they shape us
  • Edgar LSLhas quoted3 years ago
    with death rates exceeding birth rates by a considerable margin. Indeed, it was only during the nineteenth century, as medical science and civic planners managed first to contain and later to conquer urban disease, that large cities could sustain numbers and actually begin to generate an increase in population from among their own inhabitants.

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