The Literary and Cultural Spaces of Restoration London [Hardcover]

This book explores the literary and cultural rebuilding of London after the Great Fire of 1666.In September 1666 the Great Fire destroyed four-fifths of the ancient commercial City of London. All that had been familiar, settled, known, was suddenly swept away, and Londoners faced an emptiness that was not only physical but also historical, social, financial, and conceptual. In this study Cynthia Wall reads the literature of Restoration and early eighteenth-century London in the context of other texts such as sermons, royal proclamations, maps, and topographies, and shows how literature attempts to reinvest the city with 'modern' meaning and create new spaces for new genres.In September 1666 the Great Fire destroyed four-fifths of the ancient commercial City of London. All that had been familiar, settled, known, was suddenly swept away, and Londoners faced an emptiness that was not only physical but also historical, social, financial, and conceptual. In this study Cynthia Wall reads the literature of Restoration and early eighteenth-century London in the context of other texts such as sermons, royal proclamations, maps, and topographies, and shows how literature attempts to reinvest the city with 'modern' meaning and create new spaces for new genres.In September 1666 the Great Fire destroyed four-fifths of the ancient commercial City of London. All that had been familiar, settled, known, was suddenly swept away, and Londoners faced an emptiness that was not only physical but also historical, social, financial, and conceptual. In this study Cynthia Wall reads the literature of Restoration and early-eighteenth-century London in the context of other texts such as sermons, royal proclamations, maps, and topographies, and shows how literature attempts to reinvest the city with modern meaning and create new spaces for new genres.Preface; Acknowledgments; Part I. Describing London: 1. The Great Fire and rhetorics of loss; 2. Londini renascenti: the spaces of rebuilding; 3lÓ&