Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

London, Paris, Venice, New York, Rome, Constantinople - the cities of the world have captured man's imagination for generations. In this lively, sumptuously illustrated book, the author of the best-selling 'Life In The English Country House' takes us on a tour of cities and their people through the centuries. Focusing on carefully selected cities at crucial periods in their history, Mark Girouard looks at their architecture and design in the light of the needs of the men and women who lived in them.

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Library Journal Review

Girouard, author of a dozen well-re ceived books on English architecture, here is concerned with Western cities from the Middle Ages to the present. He aims to show why selected cities grew and developed as they did, with first a potted history of the revival of urban life, then discussions of the great preindustrial cities, and finally a consideration of industry (Manches ter), suburbs (London), and the sky scraper. Although Girouard writes well, his subject is too broad and the treatment too episodic for the book to amount to much, even at an introduc tory level. The author provides exposi tion, but no synthesis. Only for com prehensive collections, or where Girouard's name will create a de mand. Jack Perry Brown, Art Int. of Chicago Libs. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

CHOICE Review

Girouard evokes vivid images of cities from medieval Constantinople through Baroque Rome to modern Los Angeles in his chronological survey of urban life. The title of the third and last part of the volume, ``Exploding City'' (following ``City Reborn'' and ``City Triumphant''), may suggest disintegration to the harassed, city-dwelling reader. But the author's vision of modern cities is no less positive than his presentation of the great towns of earlier periods. Although his view may be romantic, Girouard does not depict cities simply as museums of fine architecture patronized by the wealthy. On the contrary, the author renders the city as populated and empowered by the poor as well as the rich. The numerous superbly chosen and reproduced paintings, drawings, and photographs present slums as well as palaces; in the illustrations as in the text these industrial wastelands are hauntingly beautiful. The cities of this book are largely Western and many are treated too briefly. Nevertheless, this work serves both as an appropriate sequel to Girouard's best-selling Life in the English Country House (CH, Feb '79) and as a complement to Lewis Mumford's still excellent survey, The City in History (1961). Recommended for undergraduates, all levels, graduate students, and general readers.-A.W. Epstein, National Humanities Center