Nightwalking: A Nocturnal History of London

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Their number include Samuel Johnson and Richard Savage, who spent impoverished parts of the 1730s engaged in various “midnight rambles”, or what Johnson’s Dictionary would later define as “noctivagation” (“the act of rambling or wandering in the night”), and William Blake, whose nocturnal wanderings seem to have been designed to discover the limits of the Enlightenment. In conclusion, Nightwalking is an excellent addition to the burgeoning field of psychogeography as well as the established domains of literary criticism and historical narrative. Es gibt immer mehr Licht, die die Nacht zwar nicht zum Tag macht, aber trotzdem wird es zum Beispiel immer schwieriger, nachts die Sterne zu sehen.

Beaumont uses examples of literature from different periods throughout London’s history - from Shakespeare to Dickens - to show how these poets and authors - in their work and their lives - reflected these changes in society. By using the Web site, you confirm that you have read, understood, and agreed to be bound by the Terms and Conditions. Uncomplicated, reassuring, and makes you want to head out to the nearest patch of dark countryside to see what nocturnal adventures you might discover for yourself. I enjoyed his style of writing, a combination of first hand experience, and a wealth of knowledge all mixed with historical knowledge and quotations. Just when you start to think it's getting dull, it picks up pace and you don't want the ride to end.The cover may have some limited signs of wear but the pages are clean, intact and the spine remains undamaged. Clearly there are people who enjoy this type of writing because there are some good reviews on here but I think it's awful, just not for me. Another highlight was the final two chapters, which reveal that Charles Dickens’s frequent night walks were an essential aspect of his writing method (in an apparently similar way to Haruki Murakami’s use of long-distance running to sustain his writing).

Things don't always have to be linked up scrupulously, and enthusiasm is allowed to stand in for argument: we get the usual assortment of Benjamin and Adorno references, and a perfunctory passing reference to Louis Aragon and the Surrealists, that serves mainly to permit the odd wild inclusion of continental examples that may have significantly different cultural backstories. In this brilliant work of literary investigation, Beaumont shines a light on the shadowy perambulations of poets, novelists and thinkers: Chaucer and Shakespeare; William Blake and his ecstatic peregrinations and the feverish ramblings of opium addict Thomas De Quincey; and, among the lamp-lit literary throng, the supreme nightwalker Charles Dickens. After all, wouldn't that have been more to the point of the purpose of this book, than for example describing De Quincy walking around in Wales with a tent on his back, that he used to sleep in at night? Similarly, this book’s own title and Beaumont’s discussion personify the night as it haunts London in perpetuity. And basing a book around every time someone wrote the words “night” or “nightwalker” throughout history became very repetitive.

Out beyond the cities, it is still possible to see the night sky full of stars, or witness a moonbow, an arch of white light in the heavens. It can even be seen as a kind of dictionary in which, like Byron's nightwandering Manfred, we can learn 'the language of another world'. Even in a newly illuminated city they were thought to carry little pools of darkness around inside themselves.

The others are Dark Skies by Tiffany Francis, Under the Stars by Matt Gaw (the overall best), and Nightwalk by Chris Yates. This book's title is pretty accurate description of it: a sociological, anthropological, and literary history of walking at night in the City of London. So here we have narratives about walking at night, on or near his Shropshire farm or in France, in each of the four seasons. I struggled to get into this book, then I struggled to get through it and I struggled to absorb the information within it.These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.