Cities: A Magisterial Exploration of the Nature and Impact of the City from it's beginnings to the mega-conurbations of today

by John Reader

Reader reveals how cities came to be, what made them thrive, how they declined, and how they remade themselves. He debunks long-held theories and shows that the first cities actually preceded and inspired the growth of farming, that trees grow better in cities, and that even though three thousand years separated Imperial Rome from the Sumerian cities, evidence shows that their everyday lives were similar and had something in common with our lives today. Investigating cities' parasitic relationship with the countryside, the webs of trade, and how they feed and water themselves and dispose of their wastes, Reader proves a marvelous tour guide through these "defining artifacts of civilization.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Cities, World History, Sociology, Urban Studies, Anthropology

384 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

An author and photojournalist with more than forty years' professional experience. He holds an Honorary Research Fellowship in the Department of Anthropology at U.C.L.

Reviews

[Max · Rating 4 out of 5]

John Reader's Cities is more of a collection of essays about different aspects of urbanism than it is a coherent statement about the city in history. The fact that you don't, by any means, need to read this one cover to cover from front to back to get into it was a pleasant surprise. Things learned: the economic centrality of small-scale urban gardening in Cuba due to trade embargos, Nairobi is sinking because it was built on a river bed, Stockholm's utopically planned suburbs have actually offered more collectivity than its inhabitants have desired....

Reader's text is interesting and, while its heavy on the data and statistics, it's extremely readable. But, it is most pointedly NOT a history of "the city" (as some amazon reviewers were quick to point out and completely miss the point of the book). True, Reader starts in Mesopotamia, dabbles a bit in greece and rome and then moves on to more modern stories about cities, but each chapter or essay in the book remains a discrete statement about aspects of urbanism studied in different contexts: urban food economies, urban housing, migration into cities, the relationship between the urban and the rural, city planning, cities, contagation and disease, etc. And this approach underlies well one of Reader's main points: that the city is an ancient and integral part of human habitation, that it is by no means a "new" formation, and that we should not see our booming metropolises of today as some sort of apex of the development of urbanism.

[Fiona]

I only read a few chapters of this book. What I read was interesting but I didn't think I could ever complete reading this book. I was interested in this subject matter but apparently only on the surface.

This book is about cities of the world. How they were formed, why, and how they declined.

I discovered that the first world city was Catal Huyuk which was founded some 9000 years ago in what is now southern Turkey.

I found the life of the Sumerians fascinating. They lived 4000 years ago in Mesopotamia. Archeologists have discovered writings on tablets about Sumerian life. Their lives were similar to ours except for the technology. There was one tablet from a father to son about how disappointed he was for his son to be loitering in the streets. They also found a math word problem that was worked in the schools. They knew of Pythagorean equation before Pythagorus was even born.

It took me a couple years to read the 4 chapters and I barely touched the meat of this book so I knew I would never finish it.

[Artzi Hiltunen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great Analysis.

A book I like to return to again and again.

A great source of useful information.

[Patrick Lum (Jintor) · Rating 3 out of 5]

More a collection of essays on cities than a work with a single considered through-line, Cities is a good and solid look through various considerations about cities ancient and modern, but doesn't particularly leave me with any truly strong impressions (aside from a gnawing sense of fatalism). I do find individual case studies interesting (Cuban urban agriculture, Venitian and Italian merchant empires during the feudal era, the ancient world's reliance on shipping as opposed to land-based transport, the urban blight of Berlin at the end of the Industrial Revolution), and the writing is strong enough on a per-essay basis to keep me reading, but the work doesn't necessarily hang together as strongly as you might wish.

[Valerie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is not really a history of the city, though it does start with an examination of some of the world's first cities. Instead, each chapter is basically a stand-alone, sometimes loosely organized examination of a particular theme of city formation or life. The book is dense at points, but the author has a talent for making things like the problems of sanitation in medieval London fascinating.

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very dense, ramble-y, and fascinating book about why cities exist, how they function, and the many problems they have solved and created. I learned about urban farming, city transportation, housing projects, and more. I only wish it had focused a little less on Western cities — I was looking forward to more information about cities in Africa and South America.

[Greta · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent and absorbing history and overview of cities and societies throughout time.

[Baldvin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ágæt yfirferð á hvað borgir eru. Afar hjálpleg ef maður er að skrifa um borgir og vantar innblástur að inngangi.

[Salahuddin Hourani]

ملاحظة لي: لم اقرا الكتاب بعد -
كيف ان المدن الحديثة لاحياة فيها وان هذا المقصد يكون متعمدا اثناء تصميمها

[Vysloczil · Rating 2 out of 5]

John Read is a good storyteller, but not a scholar of cities. The book is nice to read, but does not display academic rigor. One example: when he puts forward that Sumerian farmers might have obtained yields as high as 76(!) times (an incredibly high amount) the weight of seed sown, the interested reader of course immediately jumps to the back to check where that number comes from, only to find the source being a documentary called "Mesopotamia", which supposedly was aired on Channel4 in 2001.
In general I find his way of referencing not very compelling.
He doesn't even mention the groundbreaking (academic)-classics from Paul Bairoch and Jan de Vries from the 1980's.

It is a light read, helps refreshing some bits of history. Overall I enjoyed it and would recommend anyone who is interested in cities and their history to pick it up (since there are not many books out there on that topic)!

[Grady · Rating 4 out of 5]

Best understood as a collection of essays on different aspects of the city in history, this book is slog to read cover to cover, and a delight to dip in and out of by chapter. The paragraph summaries at the start of each chapter give a good feel for the contents. It’s ‘topics urban history’ for a nonspecialist audience of intelligent lay readers.

[Michelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

Scarcely have I read a more fact-filled book. Fact fact fact fact. Fact.

That said, I did persevere the many weeks it took of bedside reading to get through Cities. The major themes of the book (disease, environmentalism, sprawl) were interesting in a "how'd they do that" kind of way, and were conveyed by someone clearly passionate about the subject. I was wishing for a more conversational style and impassioned appeal (picked it up in the first place because hey, I like cities too), instead got a fairly balanced look at both the beneficial and consumptive aspects of city life through the ages.

Although, I did wonder why everything, even modern day area, was expressed as ha. Huh?

[Justin Covey · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book lacks any kind of central thesis or overarching structure, and that's okay. Not every subject calls for a Silent Spring style polemic and I found John Readers amiable, tangent following style engrossing. Of course he's only able to pull this off because no matter what unexpected turn he takes the subject remains engrossing and informative. Almost every page of this book I learned something fascinating and new, and more than anything else that's what I'm looking for in non-fiction.

[Shrita]

It's fine so far, but a bit general. Interesting cities, but I dislike his use of '6,000 years ago, 4,000 years ago, etc' instead of real dates. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I wish it were more academic (!).

Yeah...not going to finish this book. next.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

good review of trash in London in the 1700s ... but there are other good qualities of the book as well. part of the city reading.

[Mike]

Interesting, but not very cohesive.

[sy]

http://verspaetet.blogspot.de/2012/05...

[AskHistorians]

A social history of the development of cities - particularly good chapters on the Renaissance and Mexico City stick in my mind.