Awards

• Commended for Laura Shannon Prize in Contemporary European Studies 2010
• Commended for Laura Shannon Prize in Contemporary European Studies 2010.

Overview

States that speculation and capital, commodity, crowd, traffic, and the street, often thought to be historically specific to 19th-century urban culture, were already at work in early modern London and Paris. This book challenges the notion of a rupture between premodern and modern societies and shows how London and Paris became cultural capitals.

Full Product Details

9780691127545

Table of Contents

Reviews

Newman's handsomely produced volume is a true work of cultural history: wide-ranging and purposefully interdisciplinary. Newman boldly attempts to locate the beginnings of the 'ways of thinking, believing, and acting that we have come to call modern' in the early modern city. In bringing early modern London and Paris together so productively, she has, as she intended, made those scholars familiar with one or the other, or even both, reconsider what they thought they knew. -- Tracey Hill Renaissance Quarterly In Cultural Capitals, Karen Newman sets out to explore what this dramatic urban transformation meant for those who lived in [London and Paris]... Through close readings of the representations made of these cities--in maps, engravings and surveys, as well as in plays and poetry--Newman seeks out the points of tension and contention in these early modern urban societies. -- Miles Ogborn London Journal Witty, yet substantiated with serious footnotes, Newman joins scholarship with the irony of the post-modern critic in such a way as to make us all wish to know better early modern Paris and London. -- Ronald C. Rosbottom French Review Cultural Capitals is a worthy effort, but it is not the last word, it is only the beginning of what should prove a new avenue of study. Professor Newman has presented her readers with a number of intriguing ideas that other scholars may in the future explore in greater depth and with new insights. -- Clifton W. Potter Jr. Review of English Studies Karen Newman's fascinating study contests the idea that the urbanization of Europe is a 19th-century phenomenon. The Guardian

Author Information

Karen Newman is Professor of English at New York University. Her books include Fetal Positions: Individualism, Science, Visuality ; Fashioning Femininity and English Renaissance Drama ; and Essaying Shakespeare .

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available