I am just back from a week's vacation in New York.
This was my first visit; I've been to lots of other bits of the US (24 states plus DC, I think) but never to the Big Wahoonie itself. (Hat-tip to Sir Terry.)
One of those debates which gets kicked around is which city can claim to be the most cosmopolitan or global, with New York and London usually being the two candidates for the title.
Now, we had a great time, and clearly NY has all sorts of wow! and glitz factors. But after a few days I still found myself thinking "Naah, I prefer London," and then I wondered why.
I felt there was something both empty and ephemeral about New York, in comparison to London. London has been there for 2000 years or so, and has been about being and making history, as well as making money. NY has only been in existence for 400 years, and the making and spending of money is basically all it has done.
This seemed a bit trite and harsh, so I thought a bit more.
For one thing, there is the curious American habit of separating their political centres from their commercial ones. Most of the political symbology and mythologising about America's purpose and contribution to the world - they would say "freedom" and they're not far wrong, although both ourselves and the French would have the right to snort a bit at that - is concentrated in DC, and magnificently done it is too.
But it leaves the "normal" places like NY, Chicago and so on sort of standing as symbols of nothing but themselves.
Thinking about it a bit more, though, this isn't such a bad thing. NY's status as a place where people have been able to come from all over the world and make something of themselves is no bad thing to symbolise (although,, of course, it was a lot easier to do that if you weren't black or Chinese, until fairly recently). And if you go back to the 70s, it looked then as if NY might not even survive, given the riots, chaos and general deindustrialisation that was going on. So simply standing as a monument to itself is no bad thing.The further thought occurs that it's actually given to very few cities to stand as symbols of anything more than places where lots of people happen to live and work. London is one of the few.
13 comments:
Did you visit Greenwich Village?
All a bit cryptic here Sm753, what is that makes London any more special than other cities, what is it that is more that a 'monument to itself.'
All very architectural.
Oh, we were all over.
As for city "specialness" I think a lot of it comes down to capital status - because capitals are where countries put up their monuments and things which say "this is what we are about".
So London is effectively NY and DC all rolled into one.
So are Paris, Berlin, Madrid and so on, but to a lesser extent as they are not "world cities" in the way that NY and London are.
Then there's history; you can't walk more than a few hundred yards in central London before you find yourself on a spot where something momentous happened centures ago.
This doesn't really happen in America because they haven't been around long enough to have proper history and traditions, they only really have habits. (Hee!)
Another thing about Britain is that because our history has had a bit more of continuity and gradual change about it, it's easier for us to embrace all of it.
The French have the issue of deciding whether they're really republicans or if the likes of Louis XIV and Napoleon were national heroes after all; the Spanish have the whole 1936-75 thing to get embarrassed about, and as for the Germans...
(I quite like the fact that most of Berlin's monuments commemorate victory over the French in 1871. And they quite clearly like maintaining it all in excellent condition; they just don't talk about it much - you can feel a sort of wry amusement going on there).
A beautiful sight. 1 of 5.
http://www.businessinsider.com/pictures-of-london-after-global-warming-2010-10#spring-tides-flood-london-2
Excellent, CH, you have just conformed to the England-hating stereotype of the Cybernat.
Keep it up, the Union thanks you for your witless help.
Explain how my hate of Westminster is anti English or is it as usual your own bias towards the Scots that causes you to speak for others. Just because its beyond your 'intelligence' to understand anything outside your preconcieved bubble which is about to burst, get real.
"Explain how my hate of Westminster is anti English "
Er, you just described an image of London flooded as "A beautiful sight."
I don't need to add anything to that, do I?
I'd say Paris and Berlin have the same historical significance as London, and more than New York. Berlin was the world's pivot for most of the last century.
Colin
I'd certainly agree Paris and Berlin have the same order of historicals significance as London (although in Berlin they have this dilemma about which bits of the past to highlight and which bits to rub out. I love the place though; by far the most relaxing of the three, and I think the KDW dept store beats Harrods hands down.)
But London is the one which combines the history with both ethnic diversity and being a current, vibrant centre of global commercial and financial activity.
Berlin just does government these days; Paris does it all, but not on London's scale.
I've had an idea.
Why don't you preselect some 'nationalist myths' for busting, have some 'nats' extrapolate on them rather then you writing half truths and then have your response to those.
A kind of structured guest posting™
To me it's a toss up between London & Paris which is the better city.
But, like Boris Johnson, I am a tad concerned about the effects of the imposed exodus that the Con Dems are planning.
The good thing about London is that there are ordinary working class districts a footfall away from the historic locations you speak of.
I fear the Tories are about to change the nature of London to please their rich pals, & that would be a mistake.
If you want to control housing benefit control rents. Evicting poor people (& that will include the working poor) from the central districts will change the nature of London - for the worse.
"If you want to control housing benefit control rents."
Er...
"The analysis of rent control is among the best-understood issues in all of economics, and -- among economists, anyway -- one of the least controversial. In 1992 a poll of the American Economic Association found 93 percent of its members agreeing that ''a ceiling on rents reduces the quality and quantity of housing.'' Almost every freshman-level textbook contains a case study on rent control, using its known adverse side effects to illustrate the principles of supply and demand. Sky-high rents on uncontrolled apartments, because desperate renters have nowhere to go -- and the absence of new apartment construction, despite those high rents, because landlords fear that controls will be extended? Predictable. Bitter relations between tenants and landlords, with an arms race between ever-more ingenious strategies to force tenants out -- what yesterday's article oddly described as ''free-market horror stories'' -- and constantly proliferating regulations designed to block those strategies? Predictable. "
Paul Krugman.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F02E4DF153FF934A35755C0A9669C8B63
In real life when the markets go mad you regulate them.
The market in housing in central London has gone mad, & rather than regulate rents David Cameron is going to abolish the principle of social housing as well as evict tens of thousands of Londoners from their homes.
Kindly don't attempt to pass yourself off as a friend of London again as clearly you know nothing about the place.
"A
ceiling
on
rents
reduces
the
quality
and
quantity
of
housing."
Kindly don't attempt to pass yourself off as someone with any knowledge of economics as clearly you know nothing about the subject.
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