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Cities In Fiction

Started by Serge, October 10, 2017, 09:33:22 PM

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Serge

I love it when a novel takes time to establish its setting so graphically that you can imagine every inch of every street that the characters walk along. Although I've never been to New York, I've been living there vicariously in the pages of books by Paul Auster, taking a trip back to look at it in the seventies via Jonathan Lethem's 'Fortress Of Solitude', making shorter visits in the works of Elizabeth Strout (who also makes you want to live in a small New England town) and wanting to swap lives with Mr. Martin in James Thurber's 'The Catbird Seat', mainly so I could go to Schraffts for my dinner every night. Even if I had the chance to go to New York, I'd almost be scared that it wouldn't live up to the image I have of it in my head from these books (admittedly, this image has also been formed by non-fiction books and all of those New York bands that I love, not to mention 'Home Alone 2'.)

One of my favourite examples of a city being a major part of a book can be found in pretty much all of George Pelecanos' novels. Starting in the eighties, he has written a series of crime novels with overlapping characters, sometimes in trilogies and quartets, all of them set in his hometown of Washington DC. Most of these are set at the time that he was writing each book, but occasionally he will jump back in time - to the forties, sixties and seventies, most notably - and show the changing face of DC over the years. In the books he wrote during the '80s and '90s, DC was a city that seemed to be filled with danger, the poverty pushing people into desperate situations and making the lives of his characters that bit more lively.

More recently, you can see the effects of gentrification on the city via his books, and the fact that he's not sure whether it's necessarily a good thing. But he will often have characters walking around the streets of the city, with the descriptions so vivid that you feel you are right there beside them, whether they're just out walking their dog or strangling a mob hitman in a deserted car park.

I haven't read enough fictional books based in London, but two which evoked the city as I knew it are Melissa Harrison's 'Clay' and John Lanchester's 'Capital'. Both are set mainly in South London, which was my stomping ground for most of the time I lived there, and both are recognisable as the place I lived for nearly two decades, in all of its glory.

buttgammon

I love city novels that give a real sense of a city; I've just started a PhD and one of the main components is urban space in literature. Expect me to come back to this thread in a year or two complaining about how much I hate books about cities!

Obviously, Ulysses is one of the most masterful urban novels. There's hardly a part of the city that it doesn't explore one way or another and even today, I can see so much of the city I know in it.

London is a very interesting city to me, but I'm struggling to think of one novel that stands out in how it represents it, but that said, there are plenty of good London books. I liked Lanchester's Capital too. Martin Amis' London Fields is an interesting book that looks at a couple of very different (but intersecting) sides of London life, and Money has some good London bits too (although a lot of it is set in New York). There's also Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway, which is similar to Ulysses in some ways but ultimately, I find it more interesting in the way it deals with time.

Realise it's a graphic novel but I always enjoyed Moore's depiction of London in From Hell, again realise it's not a "proper" book but still.

To stick with Moore, his depiction of Northampton through the ages in Voice of the Fire is fucking brilliant in my humble. Really really enjoyed that book. Haven't got around to Jerusalem yet (long backlog) but I'm incredibly interested to see him narrow down his focus to just a small area of Northampton.

And yeah Ulysses is the obvious example and for good reason. Don't want to get into a loving rant about how much I love it though.


Serge

Quote from: Foggy Buntwhistle on October 11, 2017, 01:23:09 PMRealise it's a graphic novel but I always enjoyed Moore's depiction of London in From Hell, again realise it's not a "proper" book but still.

That counts as a proper book! That reminds me that I did like the look of Chicago from its appearances in Chris Ware's 'Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid In The World'.

Prez

Quote from: buttgammon on October 10, 2017, 10:30:30 PM
I love city novels that give a real sense of a city; I've just started a PhD and one of the main components is urban space in literature. Expect me to come back to this thread in a year or two complaining about how much I hate books about cities!

Obviously, Ulysses is one of the most masterful urban novels. There's hardly a part of the city that it doesn't explore one way or another and even today, I can see so much of the city I know in it.

London is a very interesting city to me, but I'm struggling to think of one novel that stands out in how it represents it, but that said, there are plenty of good London books. I liked Lanchester's Capital too. Martin Amis' London Fields is an interesting book that looks at a couple of very different (but intersecting) sides of London life, and Money has some good London bits too (although a lot of it is set in New York). There's also Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway, which is similar to Ulysses in some ways but ultimately, I find it more interesting in the way it deals with time.

Have you read Bely's Petersburg or Döblin's Berlin Alexanderplatz?

Sebastian Cobb

I rather liked the depiction of London in Hangover Square.

It's really quite easy to forget that the book was set in the 20's, some of the talk of politics and the fact he goes to train stations to phone people are the biggest giveaways, but you soon forget.

Twit 2

Invisible Cities by Calvino!

ASFTSN


buttgammon

Quote from: Prez on October 11, 2017, 03:57:42 PM
Have you read Bely's Petersburg or Döblin's Berlin Alexanderplatz?

I've been meaning to read both for ages, and am now at the point where there's really no excuse for the fact that I haven't got round to reading either of them. I have a big list of reading that is tangentially related to my PhD (but is really just stuff I want to read) and both are on it.

Glebe

Quote from: buttgammon on October 10, 2017, 10:30:30 PMObviously, Ulysses is one of the most masterful urban novels. There's hardly a part of the city that it doesn't explore one way or another and even today, I can see so much of the city I know in it.

I've never read it but it's lying around the house, and funnily enough I was just flicking through it last week. It's funny seeing all these local places in such a famous book.

Serge

Quote from: Prez on October 11, 2017, 03:57:42 PMDöblin's Berlin Alexanderplatz?

This has reminded me that Hans Fallada's 'Alone In Berlin' and 'Nightmare In Berlin' both do a fantastic job of evoking wartime and post-war Berlin.

holyzombiejesus

Quote from: Serge on October 11, 2017, 03:53:39 PM
That reminds me that I did like the look of Chicago from its appearances in Chris Ware's 'Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid In The World'.

Have you seen Lost Buildings?
https://vimeo.com/12814735

colacentral

"Bonfire of the Vanities" is another big New York book, and Wolfe is obviously very Dickensian in his writing. The inciting incident hinges on a character getting lost in (I think) the Bronx, so obviously a big element of the book is evoking that sense of place. It's been years since I read it though so I don't remember much of it.

Another 80's New York book: American Psycho, which opens with graffiti scrawled on the side of a bank building. I think the earlier comment upthread about Mrs Dalloway is worth bringing up because in all 3 of these books there's a sense that characters do the wrong thing as they get lost in the sprawl of their city. Paul Auster similarly has characters getting lost, disappearing and changing identity in his New York books.

shh

Perdido Street Station by China Mieville, if we're including fictional cities.

Serge

We were talking about Alexei Sayle at work today - he has a new book out, based on his Imaginary Sandwich Bar radio show - and it struck me that one book that really captures London well is the graphic novel he did with Oscar Zarate, 'Geoffrey The Tube Train And The Fat Comedian' - the artwork is fantastic throughout, and you get a real sense of what London was like in the eighties. And lots of great jokes.

greenman

To lower the tone again into fantasy the first volume of The Book of the New Sun comes to mind with the Citadel/Nessus, not just in terms of being evocative but rather in throwing in progressive hints of the nature of locations that undermines the more standard pre modern fantasy of the location its easy to fall into.

Phil_A

Unthank and Glasgow in Alisdair Gray's Lanark - they could be one and the same but the novel is somewhat ambiguous on that point.

Quote"Glasgow is a magnificent city," said McAlpin. "Why do we hardly ever notice that?"

"Because nobody imagines living here...think of Florence, Paris, London, New York. Nobody visiting them for the first time is a stranger because he's already visited them in paintings, novels, history books and films. But if a city hasn't been used by an artist not even the inhabitants live there imaginatively."

thraxx

Quote from: Phil_A on October 15, 2017, 10:18:42 PM
Unthank and Glasgow in Alisdair Gray's Lanark - they could be one and the same but the novel is somewhat ambiguous on that point.

Lanark, despite the rave reviews, is one of the worst books I've ever read.  Interminable.  One of the few books I've given up on reading.

Phil_A

Quote from: thraxx on October 15, 2017, 10:36:13 PM
Lanark, despite the rave reviews, is one of the worst books I've ever read.  Interminable.  One of the few books I've given up on reading.

Sorry you feel that way. I think it's a masterpiece. Opinions!

Serge

Yeah, I love Lanark, though prefer Books One & Two (in Glasgow) to Three & Four (in Unthank). I remember reading it in the space of about three days after I'd had a wisdom tooth out, when I was feeling fairly groggy anyway, so that probably added to unreal feeling of the Unthank parts.

nedthemumbler

Probably not very fashionable a reference now (at least compared to the raves at the time) but White Teeth evoked North London, multi cultural life well I thought.  To a provincial pleb anyway.

thraxx

Quote from: Phil_A on October 16, 2017, 12:10:12 AM
Sorry you feel that way. I think it's a masterpiece. Opinions!

I very badly wanted to like it, but it came so highly rated that it didn't get anywhere near my expectation.  I found the prose opaque, dull and hard to absorb.  The structure was confusing.  I like bleak, but was bleak in such a sour and unpleasant fashion that I was dreading having to open the book up.  I wonder if it helps to be familiar with Glasgow.  Perhaps I'll give it another read.