Nairn's London: Difference between revisions
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| Author | Ian Nairn |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Penguin Books |
Publication date | 1966 (reprinted 2014) |
| Pages | 280 |
| ISBN | 0141396164 |
Nairn's London is a 1966 book about the architecture of London by British writer Ian Nairn.
Contents
Just as topographical London is a vast 20-mile saucer of people with a rim of low hills, so human London is a central goulash with its rightful inhabitants forming an unfashionable rim.[1]
— Ian Nairn, page 15
The book is composed of short descriptions of various London buildings, each between a third to half of a page, with the exception of the entry on Westminster Abbey that covers twelve pages.[2]
Reception
As I explored London, Nairn in hand, there was something else I observed in addition to his acute eye and fierce passion. That was his prose style, somehow concise and expansive at the same time. He seemed to be standing beside me, chatting about the building we were both looking at, and yet when I looked at his entry with a writer's eye I was astonished to find how brief it might be, and how it did not seem to contain an unnecessary word.[3]
In 2014, it was republished with identical text and typeface by Penguin to glowing reviews, with The Guardian writing that it was a "Horatian monument in words more lasting than bronze" and a "funny and poetic, highly subjective and slightly mad" depiction of the metropolis.[2][4]
References
- ^ Nairn, Ian (1966). Nairn's London. London: Penguin Books. ISBN 0141396164.
- ^ a b Lezard, Nicholas (28 October 2014). "Nairn's London by Ian Nairn review – each entry is a masterpiece of construction". The Guardian. Retrieved 6 July 2021.
- ^ Ebert, Roger (16 September 2001). "Nairn's London: An Introduction". Retrieved 6 July 2021.
- ^ Cook, Rachel (16 February 2016). "Nairn's London: a grand unflattering tour of the capital in the 50s". Retrieved 6 July 2021.