Sunday, October 19, 2014

The top ten modernizers in literature

John Grindrod is the author of Concretopia: A Journey Around the Rebuilding of Postwar Britain.

At the Guardian he tagged ten books--half are novels, half biographies--that "give a flavour of what the modern movement in architecture and planning was up to, particularly in postwar Britain." One entry on the list:
The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York by Robert A Caro (1974)

Robert Moses planned much of New York from the 1920s to the 60s. His epic J Edgar Hoover-like tenure was chronicled – and shredded – in this suitably colossal book. Tales of racism and dirty dealing are entwined with an enormous legacy of expressways and housing. From the era of All The President’s Men, Caro’s investigative storytelling is gripping throughout – and at over 1,000 pages, it needs to be.
Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue