Dirty old London
by Lee Jackson
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2HN commenters
2015–2018first – last mentioned
50% recommend50% neutral
"In Victorian London, filth was everywhere : horse traffic filled the streets with dung, household rubbish went uncollected, cesspools brimmed with 'night soil', graveyards teemed with rotting corpses, the air itself was choked with smoke. In this intimately visceral book, Lee Jackson guides us through the underbelly of the Victorian metropolis, introducing us to the men and women who struggled to stem a rising tide of pollution and dirt, and the forces that opposed them." --from inside jacket flap.
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If you're interested in the history that provided the jumping-off point for this story, a good overview can be found in Lee Jackson's 2014 book Dirty Old London (https://www.npr.org/2015/03/12/392332431/dirty-old-london-a-...), which goes into great detail on Victorian London's long struggle to clean up its filthy streets, air and water.
on “A piece of Victorian science fiction considered first tale of urban apocalypse” ↗According to the author of Dirty Old London, these urine deflectors in Clifford's Inn Passage[1] are among the last of what was once a very common feature. [1] http://catsmeatshop.blogspot.com/2013/07/urine-deflectors-in...
on “When peeing in public in this German city, beware walls that pee back” ↗