THE MAKING OF MODERN LONDON 1815-1914

Softcover. 3rd Reprint. In this superbly illustrated book published to coincide with LWT's series, the authors examine the social and economic forces that shaped 19th-century London and caused it to become the huge metropolis that we know and live in today. They plot the transformation of the City from a merchants' stronghold into the world's leading financial centre. They trace the way in which 'Society' with its 'Season' laid the foundations for the immense growth of the West End, pushing westwards into the countryside and developing areas like Kensington and Notting Hill. They show how the fate of the East End was to be quite different: the building of the docks, the development of sweated industries and massive immigration transformed this rural, seafaring community into a vast expanse of mean streets which came to symbolise the terrible poverty of imperial London. Finally, they look at the making of the suburbs: the early, clerkish areas of Hackney, Islington and Camberwell and the later growth, aided and abetted by the horse and the railway of such suburbs as Ealing, Clapham and Brixton. Profusely Illus. + Further Reading and Index. 176pp. 8vo. softcover. Vg.