Low Life: Lures and Snares of Old New YorkLuc Sante's Low Life is a portrait of America's greatest city, the riotous and anarchic breeding ground of modernity. This is not the familiar saga of mansions, avenues, and robber barons, but the messy, turbulent, often murderous story of the city's slums; the teeming streets--scene of innumerable cons and crimes whose cramped and overcrowded housing is still a prominent feature of the cityscape. Low Life voyages through Manhattan from four different directions. Part One examines the actual topography of Manhattan from 1840 to 1919; Part Two, the era's opportunities for vice and entertainment--theaters and saloons, opium and cocaine dens, gambling and prostitution; Part Three investigates the forces of law and order which did and didn't work to contain the illegalities; Part Four counterposes the city's tides of revolt and idealism against the city as it actually was. Low Life provides an arresting and entertaining view of what New York was actually like in its salad days. But it's more than simpy a book about New York. It's one of the most provocative books about urban life ever written--an evocation of the mythology of the quintessential modern metropolis, which has much to say not only about New York's past but about the present and future of all cities. |
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—David Rieff, Times Literary Supplement “Makes the stories of Edgar Allan Poe
seem less the products of dark imaginings than efficient reportage . . . [Sante]
strews his pages with fabulous bits of offbeat erudition. Colorful, elegant, and
witty .
THE TENEMENT IS THE BASIC FAQADE IN NEW YORK, THE FACE OF THE
SLUMS, A SLAB OF TOMBSTONE PROPORTIONS, FOUR TO SIX STOries,
pocked by windows. Above is the towering tin cornice, a confection of scallops
and ...
The density of population is difficult to imagine by present-day standards;
nineteenth-century statistics do not sound terribly inflated until one realizes that
there were no residential structures more than seven or eight stories high, and
that the ...
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LibraryThing Review
Comentariu Utilizator - EricCostello - LibraryThingA generally good book, with a handful of flaws. Sante, in this volume, gives an oversight of what New York City was like from roughly the 1830s to the end of World War I, going through various aspects ... Citiți recenzia completă
LibraryThing Review
Comentariu Utilizator - William345 - LibraryThingThis is a fascinating tour of New York's Bowery which in the late 19th and early 20th centuries was a hotbed of gambling, prostitution, and nefarious cons working every conceivable angle on the city's ... Citiți recenzia completă
Cuprins
| xxv | |
Part 2 Sporting Life | ciii |
Part 3 The Arm | ccxxxix |
Part 4 The Invisible City | 107 |
Afterword | 363 |
A Note on Sources | 381 |
Notes | 391 |
Index | 403 |