The Ideal City, attributed to Fra Carnevale, c. 1482. Walters Art Museum, Baltimore.

The Ideal City, attributed to Fra Carnevale, c. 1482. The Walters Art Museum, Baltimore.

The City

Volume III, Number 4 | fall 2010

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Painting of a sunlit plaza with people and a bell tower.

Preamble

City Light

By Lewis H. Lapham

When it comes to the medieval cathedral and mosque, the modern skyscraper and the slum, world history is city history.

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Painting of people and carriages in the road next to a park.

Urban Scrawl

By Jamie James

The city novel begins with a young person arriving from the provinces—and the world rising up to greet them.

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Map

City Narratives

The tumultuous histories of Algiers, Istanbul, Beijing, and Mexico City.

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1905 | New York City

Honest Graft

How politicians make money.More

1949 | Boston

Fare Hike

Trapped in the Boston subway.More

c. 25 BC | Rome

Blueprint

Building a better forum.More

Charts & Graphs

Official and unofficial city slogans,

Welcome to...

Official and unofficial city slogans.

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Engraving of the medieval Arab traveler Ibn Battuta.

Black and white photograph of French writer and film director Marguerite Duras.

Essayist and novelist Pico Iyer.

Photograph of Italian writer Italo Calvino.

Painting of François Rabelais.

Swiss traveler and writer Nicolas Bouvier.

The first requisite to happiness is that a man be born in a famous city.

—Euripides, c. 415 BC

Engraving of Roman author and administrator Pliny the Younger.

German sociologist and philosopher Georg Simmel.

Pliny the Younger & Georg Simmel

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