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London: City of Disappearances
'A book full of richness, unexpected enticements, short sharp shocks and breathtaking writing' Guardian Welcome to the real, unauthorised the disappeared, the unapproved, the unvoiced, the mythical and the all-but forgotten. The perfect companion to the city. 'Exhilarating, truly wonderful, a cavalcade of eloquent writing. London demands an anthology like this to remind us of the irascible quirkiness of its residents, and we have Sinclair to thank for marshalling such a perverse and ultimately pleasurable exercise' Independent on Sunday
672 pages, Hardcover
First published October 26, 2006
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909 people want to read
About the author
Iain Sinclair
120 books341 followersIain Sinclair is a British writer and film maker. Much of his work is rooted in London, most recently within the influences of psychogeography.
Sinclair's education includes studies at Trinity College, Dublin, where he edited Icarus, the Courtauld Institute of Art (University of London), and the London School of Film Technique (now the London Film School).
His early work was mostly poetry, much of it published by his own small press, Albion Village Press. He was (and remains) closely connected with the British avantgarde poetry scene of the 1960s and 1970s – authors such as J.H. Prynne, Douglas Oliver, Peter Ackroyd and Brian Catling are often quoted in his work and even turn up in fictionalized form as characters; later on, taking over from John Muckle, Sinclair edited the Paladin Poetry Series and, in 1996, the Picador anthology Conductors of Chaos.
His early books Lud Heat (1975) and Suicide Bridge (1979) were a mixture of essay, fiction and poetry; they were followed by White Chappell, Scarlet Tracings (1987), a novel juxtaposing the tale of a disreputable band of bookdealers on the hunt for a priceless copy of Arthur Conan Doyle's A Study in Scarlet and the Jack the Ripper murders (here attributed to the physician William Gull).
Sinclair was for some time perhaps best known for the novel Downriver (1991), which won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and the 1992 Encore Award. It envisages the UK under the rule of the Widow, a grotesque version of Margaret Thatcher as viewed by her harshest critics, who supposedly establishes a one party state in a fifth term. The volume of essays Lights Out for the Territory gained Sinclair a wider readership by treating the material of his novels in non-fiction form. His essay 'Sorry Meniscus' (1999) ridicules the Millennium Dome. In 1997, he collaborated with Chris Petit, sculptor Steve Dilworth, and others to make The Falconer, a 56 minute semi-fictional 'documentary' film set in London and the Outer Hebrides about the British underground filmmaker Peter Whitehead. It also features Stewart Home, Kathy Acker and Howard Marks.
One of his most recent works and part of a series focused around London is the non-fiction London Orbital; the hard cover edition was published in 2002, along with a documentary film of the same name and subject. It describes a series of trips he took tracing the M25, London's outer-ring motorway, on foot. Sinclair followed this with Edge of the Orison, a psychogeographical reconstruction of the poet John Clare's walk from Dr Matthew Allen's private lunatic asylum, at Fairmead House, High Beach, in the centre of Epping Forest in Essex, to his home in Helpston, near Peterborough. Sinclair also writes about Claybury Asylum, another psychiatric hospital in Essex, in Rodinsky's Room, a collaboration with the artist Rachel Lichtenstein.
Much of Sinclair's recent work consists of an ambitious and elaborate literary recuperation of the so-called occultist psychogeography of London. Other psychogeographers who have worked on similar material include Will Self, Stewart Home and the London Psychogeographical Association. In 2008 he wrote the introduction to Wide Boys Never Work, the London Books reissue of Robert Westerby's classic London low-life novel. Hackney, That Rose-Red Empire: A Confidential Report followed in 2009.
In an interview with This Week in Science, William Gibson said that Sinclair was his favourite author.
Iain Sinclair lives in Haggerston, in the London Borough of Hackney, and has a flat in Hastings, East Sussex.
Sinclair's education includes studies at Trinity College, Dublin, where he edited Icarus, the Courtauld Institute of Art (University of London), and the London School of Film Technique (now the London Film School).
His early work was mostly poetry, much of it published by his own small press, Albion Village Press. He was (and remains) closely connected with the British avantgarde poetry scene of the 1960s and 1970s – authors such as J.H. Prynne, Douglas Oliver, Peter Ackroyd and Brian Catling are often quoted in his work and even turn up in fictionalized form as characters; later on, taking over from John Muckle, Sinclair edited the Paladin Poetry Series and, in 1996, the Picador anthology Conductors of Chaos.
His early books Lud Heat (1975) and Suicide Bridge (1979) were a mixture of essay, fiction and poetry; they were followed by White Chappell, Scarlet Tracings (1987), a novel juxtaposing the tale of a disreputable band of bookdealers on the hunt for a priceless copy of Arthur Conan Doyle's A Study in Scarlet and the Jack the Ripper murders (here attributed to the physician William Gull).
Sinclair was for some time perhaps best known for the novel Downriver (1991), which won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and the 1992 Encore Award. It envisages the UK under the rule of the Widow, a grotesque version of Margaret Thatcher as viewed by her harshest critics, who supposedly establishes a one party state in a fifth term. The volume of essays Lights Out for the Territory gained Sinclair a wider readership by treating the material of his novels in non-fiction form. His essay 'Sorry Meniscus' (1999) ridicules the Millennium Dome. In 1997, he collaborated with Chris Petit, sculptor Steve Dilworth, and others to make The Falconer, a 56 minute semi-fictional 'documentary' film set in London and the Outer Hebrides about the British underground filmmaker Peter Whitehead. It also features Stewart Home, Kathy Acker and Howard Marks.
One of his most recent works and part of a series focused around London is the non-fiction London Orbital; the hard cover edition was published in 2002, along with a documentary film of the same name and subject. It describes a series of trips he took tracing the M25, London's outer-ring motorway, on foot. Sinclair followed this with Edge of the Orison, a psychogeographical reconstruction of the poet John Clare's walk from Dr Matthew Allen's private lunatic asylum, at Fairmead House, High Beach, in the centre of Epping Forest in Essex, to his home in Helpston, near Peterborough. Sinclair also writes about Claybury Asylum, another psychiatric hospital in Essex, in Rodinsky's Room, a collaboration with the artist Rachel Lichtenstein.
Much of Sinclair's recent work consists of an ambitious and elaborate literary recuperation of the so-called occultist psychogeography of London. Other psychogeographers who have worked on similar material include Will Self, Stewart Home and the London Psychogeographical Association. In 2008 he wrote the introduction to Wide Boys Never Work, the London Books reissue of Robert Westerby's classic London low-life novel. Hackney, That Rose-Red Empire: A Confidential Report followed in 2009.
In an interview with This Week in Science, William Gibson said that Sinclair was his favourite author.
Iain Sinclair lives in Haggerston, in the London Borough of Hackney, and has a flat in Hastings, East Sussex.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
February 15, 2014
I loved this book, and I love this approach to trying to capture the meaning, the feeling, the experience of a city through a multiplicity of voices and words. I can't think of a better way to do it actually, and would love a whole series of volumes to sit alongside this theme of disappearance. I loved the blend of fiction and fact, storytelling and autobiography, the wildly different styles and stories. I mourned the 60s--not the self-indulgence of it so much, though that comes across so strongly--but the way that cheap flats and counter-culture spaces opened up a place where very different people could and did meet. That to me was the greatest disappearance.
Which I like, but is also why it's not 5 stars. That past world also somehow seemed to ensure that this was a rich and varied tapestry of mostly white fairly well-off men. The exceptions only seem to highlight their exceptionality but London is such a huge vibrant place and to capture it in this way strangely truncates it. Women and communities of colour are hardly here at all, so while I loved the book immediately I started growing impatient, I wanted all of London's voices. When I found them, a handful of them, they shone out to me.
Which I like, but is also why it's not 5 stars. That past world also somehow seemed to ensure that this was a rich and varied tapestry of mostly white fairly well-off men. The exceptions only seem to highlight their exceptionality but London is such a huge vibrant place and to capture it in this way strangely truncates it. Women and communities of colour are hardly here at all, so while I loved the book immediately I started growing impatient, I wanted all of London's voices. When I found them, a handful of them, they shone out to me.
February 4, 2018
A low 4 stars but still a 4. So Sinclair called up every writer he knows, gave them the subjects 'London' and 'Disappearance' and asked them to send him something.
So this isn't some organized decisive breakdown of london through the ages its a random collection of personal anecdotes, biography, history, poem, short story, essay and other odds and ends. I doubt more than a couple of pieces were written specifically for this collection.
The mix of writing styles is quite cool, although your bound to find one or two you can't stand.
Also if i was an english teacher grading these assignments a lot of people would be getting F's as many have very tenuous connections to the word 'Disappearance' :P.
There is a lot to like here. Literally a LOT, this thing is really long. I have an ebook but a hardcopy might be better, its the sort of book you leave lying around and randomly open and read.
But i do have some gripes, both to do with Sinclair's editing. He's made two attempts to add some sort of structure to this mess.
First he's corralled the pieces into various groupings based on their geographic location in London, not the worst idea. However in effect this has led to a very uneven reading experience as some groups are heavy on fact or fiction, history or biography, long entries or short ones etc.
The other attempt at structure is a piece of ligament called the 'Gazetteer of Disappearances and Deletions' a recurring piece that appears in each grouping. Having some sort of repeating section sounds good. This is made up of short entries mostly by either Sarah Wise, who does what seems to be well researched historical bits or Michael Moorcock who does bullshit.
You see Moorcocks entries here are all fiction but presented as fact. Now this might make sense to Sinclair, 'oh look at the thin line between fact and fiction'. But for me this felt insulting to the reader, insulting to Sarah Wise, insulting to history and even insulting to Moorcock. Especially since these entries are not just fictional but are references to other Moorcock stories, making him seem like an underhanded self promoter.
Anyway that was my biggest problem, apart from that its interesting stuff. I mean most of the best parts are biographical or historical and with that sort of thing its not going to blow your mind or anything best you can say is 'oh that was very interesting' :lol .
So this isn't some organized decisive breakdown of london through the ages its a random collection of personal anecdotes, biography, history, poem, short story, essay and other odds and ends. I doubt more than a couple of pieces were written specifically for this collection.
The mix of writing styles is quite cool, although your bound to find one or two you can't stand.
Also if i was an english teacher grading these assignments a lot of people would be getting F's as many have very tenuous connections to the word 'Disappearance' :P.
There is a lot to like here. Literally a LOT, this thing is really long. I have an ebook but a hardcopy might be better, its the sort of book you leave lying around and randomly open and read.
But i do have some gripes, both to do with Sinclair's editing. He's made two attempts to add some sort of structure to this mess.
First he's corralled the pieces into various groupings based on their geographic location in London, not the worst idea. However in effect this has led to a very uneven reading experience as some groups are heavy on fact or fiction, history or biography, long entries or short ones etc.
The other attempt at structure is a piece of ligament called the 'Gazetteer of Disappearances and Deletions' a recurring piece that appears in each grouping. Having some sort of repeating section sounds good. This is made up of short entries mostly by either Sarah Wise, who does what seems to be well researched historical bits or Michael Moorcock who does bullshit.
You see Moorcocks entries here are all fiction but presented as fact. Now this might make sense to Sinclair, 'oh look at the thin line between fact and fiction'. But for me this felt insulting to the reader, insulting to Sarah Wise, insulting to history and even insulting to Moorcock. Especially since these entries are not just fictional but are references to other Moorcock stories, making him seem like an underhanded self promoter.
Anyway that was my biggest problem, apart from that its interesting stuff. I mean most of the best parts are biographical or historical and with that sort of thing its not going to blow your mind or anything best you can say is 'oh that was very interesting' :lol .
December 27, 2011
You can read my contribution to this anthology here (wide main column): http://www.stewarthomesociety.org/luv...
July 15, 2008
Very nice for psychogeographers, Anglophiles, particularly if you know London or just love London. Wonderful contributors include Michael Moorecock, Patrick Keiller and Alan Moore.
August 31, 2021
A truly fascinating, if somewhat laborious, read. Like most anthologies, it was a little uneven, but never bad. Some things were simply more enjoyable than others. And the stuff that was less fun, for me, at least, was stuff like Iain Sinclair's prose, which I've always found completely impenetrable. This is a great read for anyone that really wants to understand London on a truly granular level.
January 20, 2016
This book deals with disappearances of many kinds: via death, moments in time, buildings, urban legends, eras; even things that never were. Essays, poems, (fictional) short stories, excerpts from longer works, and anecdotes are all included in this anthology, which is basically held together only by the theme of all these things disappearing from London. Given the breadth of subjects and styles, it's only natural that readers will find some bits more interesting than others; this was certainly true for me, tho overall I found everything intriguing enough to read, and some things that didn't at first appeal quickly became a new source of interest. I don't think you have to be crazy about London (I'm not) to enjoy this book, but it would be a great read for someone who is.
Note: It might also appeal to some of my friends who are Alan Moore fans, as one of the longer entries is written by him.
Note: It might also appeal to some of my friends who are Alan Moore fans, as one of the longer entries is written by him.
December 30, 2009
An anthology of fragments and glimpses befitting it's subject. Sinclair has collected myriad prose which captures the London I live in-- a place of ghosts, absences and markers of what might have been.
Worth reading for De Quincey's ode to his first opium dealer: "The Disappeared Pharmacist."
Worth reading for De Quincey's ode to his first opium dealer: "The Disappeared Pharmacist."
July 3, 2023
An uneven collection with some absolutely fantastic insights into London's disappearing past present and future .
April 10, 2022
Recopilación de artículos desde los años 70 hasta prácticamente nuestros días que giran alrededor de la ciudad de Londres. Desde la psicogeografía de los primeros, que inspiraría a escritores como Moore (que aparece en un artículo posterior) hasta los desastres urbanísticos que trajeron los juegos olímpicos.
https://liblit.com/iain-sinclair-la-c...
https://liblit.com/iain-sinclair-la-c...
December 26, 2014
C2006: FWFTB: anthology, poets, bibliomanes, gazetteer, haunted.
This one is definitely for armchair Londonophiles – of which I am one.
I didn’t quite know what to expect when I ordered this book as there is not much blurb on the back of the book other than praise from the like of Peter Ackroyd for The Times and an unnamed reviewer from the Sunday Telegraph. As with most anthologies, some of the contributions are either a hit or a miss. I particularly liked the piece titled “Death of a Cleaner”. On the whole, though, I found this quite a depressing book with the pages littered with recollections of dead people. Certainly to me, it started to read as more of the deaths (aka disappearances) of people who happened to be famous (to a certain extent in a particular sphere of the literary/academic world) and that had a passing (sometimes a bit more) relationship to the contributors rather than a disappearance of places in London. And that was why, ultimately, I was disappointed with the book. There were indeed a few small paragraphs on actual geographic disappearances but these were more marking the end of a particular chapter rather than the main focus. Annoyingly, the contributors are only named at the end of their particular piece and, being a complete barbarian, had no idea of who some of them were. No dedication as such just an arty, running block of the contributors’ names with the Christian name in small letters and the surnames in Capitals. Reminiscent of various war memorials which was probably deliberate.One of the more obscure compliments came from The Scotland on Sunday who is quoted as “Manages to be much like the London it portrays: full of surprises but never less than a land of lost content” What on earth does than actually mean? I would recommend to those ardent Londonophiles in my normal crew with a caution that it is not really about London at all.“Personality clashes influenced his decision to leave the community,
This one is definitely for armchair Londonophiles – of which I am one.
I didn’t quite know what to expect when I ordered this book as there is not much blurb on the back of the book other than praise from the like of Peter Ackroyd for The Times and an unnamed reviewer from the Sunday Telegraph. As with most anthologies, some of the contributions are either a hit or a miss. I particularly liked the piece titled “Death of a Cleaner”. On the whole, though, I found this quite a depressing book with the pages littered with recollections of dead people. Certainly to me, it started to read as more of the deaths (aka disappearances) of people who happened to be famous (to a certain extent in a particular sphere of the literary/academic world) and that had a passing (sometimes a bit more) relationship to the contributors rather than a disappearance of places in London. And that was why, ultimately, I was disappointed with the book. There were indeed a few small paragraphs on actual geographic disappearances but these were more marking the end of a particular chapter rather than the main focus. Annoyingly, the contributors are only named at the end of their particular piece and, being a complete barbarian, had no idea of who some of them were. No dedication as such just an arty, running block of the contributors’ names with the Christian name in small letters and the surnames in Capitals. Reminiscent of various war memorials which was probably deliberate.One of the more obscure compliments came from The Scotland on Sunday who is quoted as “Manages to be much like the London it portrays: full of surprises but never less than a land of lost content” What on earth does than actually mean? I would recommend to those ardent Londonophiles in my normal crew with a caution that it is not really about London at all.“Personality clashes influenced his decision to leave the community,
July 4, 2017
Lo doy por perdido a falta tan solo de 40 páginas para terminarlo. Es una única estrella no porque sea un libro malo del que debáis huir como de la peste, sino porque no me ha interesado lo más mínimo lo que se cuenta en él (una serie de análisis psicogeográficos de Londres a través de diferentes ensayos). Para mí es excesivamente espeso, demasiado cuajado de referencias que desconozco; tengo la sensación de que no estoy entendiendo ni la mitad de la mitad. Solo llegó a interesarme el ensayo sobre la Experiencia del Milenio, pero es solo una gota en un mar de aburrimiento. Obligatorio ir con un mapa de Londres en la otra mano.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews