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    The Victorian City: Everyday Life in Dickens' London
    The Victorian City: Everyday Life in Dickens' London
    The Victorian City: Everyday Life in Dickens' London
    Audiobook16 hours

    The Victorian City: Everyday Life in Dickens' London

    Written by Judith Flanders

    Narrated by Corrie James

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    About this audiobook

    The nineteenth century was a time of unprecedented change, and nowhere was this more apparent than London. In only a few decades, the capital grew from a compact Regency town into a sprawling metropolis of 6.5 million inhabitants, the largest city the world had ever seen. Technology-railways, street-lighting, and sewers-transformed both the city and the experience of city-living, as London expanded in every direction. Now Judith Flanders, one of Britain's foremost social historians, explores the world portrayed so vividly in Dickens' novels, showing life on the streets of London in colorful, fascinating detail. From the moment Charles Dickens, the century's best-loved English novelist and London's greatest observer, arrived in the city in 1822, he obsessively walked its streets, recording its pleasures, curiosities, and cruelties. Now, with him, Flanders leads us through the markets, transport systems, sewers, rivers, slums, alleys, cemeteries, gin palaces, chop-houses, and entertainment emporia of Dickens' London, to reveal the Victorian capital in all its variety, vibrancy, and squalor.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTantor Media, Inc
    Release dateMar 28, 2017
    ISBN9781541470118
    Author

    Judith Flanders

    Judith Flanders is the author of the bestselling ‘The Victorian House’ (2003) and ‘Consuming Passions’ (2006), as well as the critically acclaimed ‘A Circle of Sisters’ (2001) – a biography of Alice Kipling, Georgiana Burne-Jones, Agnes Poynder and Louisa Baldwin – which was nominated for the Guardian First Book Award. She is a frequent contributor to the ‘Daily Telegraph’, the ‘Guardian’, the ‘Evening Standard’, and the ‘Times Literary Supplement’. She lives in London.

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    Reviews for The Victorian City

    4/5

    84 ratings9 reviews

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    • 4/5
      A fascinating history of many elements of daily life during Dickens' lifetime (from roughly 1812-1870, which Flanders acknowledges is not completely within the Victorian era). Covering everything from streets to commutes to evening entertainments, Flanders' work is dense but highly readable. Filled with fascinating small insights into what existing in London was like during the time period, the book is an excellent read for history buffs. While Dickens' lifetime is used as the framing device and Flanders highlights many elements of his novels that are similar to (or divergent from) her findings in the historical record, it is not necessary to be a Dickens fan to enjoy the work.
    • 5/5
      This was not a page turner, but it wasn't dry as dust either, and was very, very informative. I think it would be an invaluable resource for anyone writing a book set in London during this time period, but is also interesting just for anyone curious about life in that time and place. Lots of history books focus on the nobility and political leaders and such, and this book does have some information about them too, but this is primarily about the poor and working class. Everyday people were the majority of society but were frequently ignored, even in their own time, and rarely given the opportunity to be noted and recorded for posterity. Dickens had personally experienced both poverty and a certain degree of wealth, so I think he had a better understanding and more empathy for the poor than the average person of note. He also had a deep curiosity and keen observation of others. Combined with his tendency to wander the streets at all hours, and be frequently published, he was uniquely positioned to be a particularly good witness and recorder of life in his city. The only Dickens I've read is A Christmas Carol, so I did not get the references made to his other characters, but they still had some value as examples of the history they were discussing and how he incorporated it into his writing.
    • 5/5
      This is a fascinating overview of what life was like in London during Dicken's lifetime/writing period. The author has done extensive research and refers to Dicken's work as a tie-in. I have not read most of Dicken's writing, yet had no problem appreciating this book. The information focuses on the working and working poor so we see how hard it was just to make enough money to stay fed and sheltered. The lives of the street workers (food vendors etc) were horrific, and yet they were not the worst off...

      The author divides book into sections and then chapters. The Sections are labelled THE CITY WAKES, STAYING ALIVE, ENJOYING LIFE, and SLEEPING AND AWAKE. The information is detailed but never dull! It really made me appreciate the little things like indoor plumbing and an oven, not to mention a bed! There is humour here as well (believe it or not!). There are some reproduced historical illustrations and maps, my copy was an ARC and the quality of the illustrations was quite poor, and I really wish there had been more of them. The maps really helped, and it was fun reading about parts of London that I know are now so expensive, which were huge slums in Dicken's time!

      I read this book in small increments, 2-3 chapters a day, after that I found the facts all started to blur together, but that may just be my tolerance level for this type of reading material!

      Many thanks to St. Martin's Press for the early copy of this book!
    • 4/5
      Read for #NonfictionNovember2017Another great book by Judith Flanders. While still focused on Victorian history this one focuses on London as a whole. In this book she writes more about the lower classes, only touching on the upper classes when discussing the poor laws and the various relief projects of the time. She uses Dickens' works as an example of the various things the lower classes have to go through in their lives, the workhouse, debtor's prison, menial and extremely dangerous jobs as well as child labor and the beginning of required schooling. I enjoyed listening to this book, and learned more than I thought I would since I have read quite a bit on this era in history.
    • 4/5
      THE VICTORIAN CITY is a meticulously researched and very detailed book about London life during the time Charles Dickens walked its streets. The focus is mainly on the mechanics of daily life, and it gives an in depth look at everything, from how the streets were paved to the little amount of water each family had to take care of all their needs. This book puts you there, surrounded by the constant movement and bothersome noise.The author blends in snippets from Dickens’ work to show where his inspirations came from. In truth I haven’t read much Dickens, maybe just A Christmas Carol years ago, but I love historical fiction set in the Victorian times, so I was interested in learning more. The book could be a bit dry at times, but also eye-opening. Made me appreciate living in modern times even more.Audiobook • 16 hrs, 5 mins • Corrie James, NarratorI listened to the audiobook narrated by Corrie James, and I thought that she was a good fit for this book. Even though this is nonfiction, she was able to add inflection and flair in the reading, especially with the voices of the different Londoners.Disclosure: I received a copy of this audiobook from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
    • 4/5
      An excellent book of readable history. Although the book's title connotes Victorian London, it is more Dicken's London, and in terms of politics it is Ayn Rand's London. Dicken's novels chronicled the dark side of the industrial revolution in London and this book tracks it. We are reminded of what raw , unregulated capitalism looks like: unspeakable air and water pollution caused by unregulated industry; the inability to solve health and safety issues caused by pollution because of fractionated local control, no overiding federal authority, and political dominance of politicians who made money from polluting industries and ownership of slum tenanments. I was reminded of the teabaggers and far right who blamed the plight of the poor on the poor. They "chose" to live in filth and misery. Child labor, sweatshops, and debtors' prison brought to mind Rand Paul, while the blaming of cholera on "miasma" , notwithstanding the fact that there was science that linked it to bad water, reminded me of the climate change deniers. Every teabagger should be required to read this, if they can read, and if they can understand this.
    • 4/5
      This 520 page book is huge in scope, although the last 100 pages are notes, index, and bibliography. It covers the London roads, theaters and entertainments, eating habits and places, the huge number of street sellers (and how specialized they were!), the waterways, rail (above and underground), the fire brigades, the nearly complete lack of sanitation, and more. The London of Dickens’ day was a horrible place (I knew it was bad, so that was no surprise; the surprise was the degree of badness) if you were poor. And it is mostly through the lens of poverty or near poverty that we look through to see this old London; Dickens’ stories were full of the poor. We see the prisons, the slums, the places where the poor ate, the horrible living conditions. This is not ‘Victorian London’ in general (Dickens’ life & writing started well before Victoria ascended the throne). These are the places that we now think of as ‘Dickensian’- oddly enough; when he was alive, a Dickensian story was one with humor in it. It wasn’t until the horrible conditions were alleviated that ‘Dickensian’ came to mean what it does today. This is a very well researched volume with almost 20 pages of bibliography- the majority of it primary sources- that brings old London to vivid, unpleasant life. While Flanders writes clearly and fluidly, the amount of detail can make this book slow reading. It’s interesting enough to read it cover to cover (I did) but it’s indexed so well and goes into such depth that it would make a great research book for someone writing fiction about the era. It would also be a good companion volume for someone reading Dickens and wants more detail. While, as I said, it was a slow read, it was fascinating. I just won’t be able to think about a Dickens Fair with the same amount of cheerfulness as before!
    • 4/5
      The title of this book is somewhat misleading; it is a detailed look at everyday life in the London Charles Dickens knew so well, but this London was not strictly Victorian as Queen Victoria only came to the throne midway through Dickens' life in 1837 and this book covers life in London from 1810 through to 1870, ending well before Victoria's reign did.That aside, this book gives a fascinating look at life in London throughout the period: from methods of transport, to street sellers and from entertainment to sewerage (or lack of). For lovers of 19th century literature Flanders references 19th century novels at relevant points and provides the context needed to understand them; mainly Dickens' novels but Trollope, Thackeray and other writers are also mentioned (Mr Harding's visit to a cigar-divan from The Warden gets a mention).There is a vast amount of information in this book and I wasn't entirely convinced by the way Flanders chose to organise it (she attempts to take you through a day in the life of the city but this didn't really hold together for me). I would also have appreciated more clarity over the changes to London within the time period covered in the book as this was all rather jumbled together. But nevertheless, an entertaining and informative read.
    • 4/5
      Entertaining and informative.