London Uncanny

From Kensington to the East End, under candlelight, gas lamp and then neon signs, London is both a bustling physical metropolis and a stirring psychic encounter. The most depraved depictions of London in fiction, film, poetry, television and theatre have irrevocably merged with the reality of its dark history, creating a phantasmagoria defined by murder, vice and the unnatural. In this panoptic look at the capital at its most eerie and macabre, Clive Bloom takes a tour of Gothic London''s uncanny literature, arcane events and its infamous and imagined geographies. From David Bowie to T S Eliot, Thomas de Quincey to Aleister Crowley, the prophetess Joanna Southcott to the ''ghosts'' of Abba and the worlds of Neil Gaiman and Clive Barker, these are the figures that populate a city lost in fog and blind alleys, where the dead can be raised, the living sacrificed and the clandestine thrive. Suturing together fact and fantasy, London Uncanny presents the urban landscape of the capital as a space of wonder and madness, haunted by its past and haunting the present. Stalking through disease and degeneracy, death and murder, spiritualism, lunacy and the occult, Bloom crafts a singular, integrated concept of a London where dreams and nightmares meet.>

Vorwort
A panoptic exploration of gothic London, tracing its arcane history and darkest fictitious depictions from the 18th century to the present day.

Autorentext
Clive Bloom is Professor in Residence at Hull University, Emeritus Professor at Middlesex University, UK, and a Visiting Fellow at the University of Western Timisoara, Romania. A feature writer for The Financial Times, The Times, The Guardian, The Independent, The Irish Times and the London Evening Standard, he is the author of many books on topics from literature to politics, including the London political histories Violent City (2003) and Riot City (2012). An editor of series on crime and the Gothic for multiple publishers and an international key-note speaker, Bloom has won a Bram Stoker Award, been shortlisted for a World Fantasy Award and curated exhibitions on Jack the Ripper and the Siege of Sidney Street for the Museum of London.

Inhalt

List of Contents
Chapter 1 Edgar Poe in Starbucks ©
Chapter 2 Fumbles in the Fog
Chapter 3 Bowie with a Zebra
Chapter 4 Chat Show Vampires
Chapter 5 Shock and Awe in Anglican Land
Chapter 6 Perverts in the Suburbs
Chapter 7 Joanna has a Baby, Ernest offers a Potato
Chapter 8 Cenobites in Dollis Hill: Intermezzo
Chapter 9 Mysteries at the Bloomberg Building
Chapter 10 ABBA meets the Poltergeist
Chapter 11 Crowley and the Beetle
Chapter 12 Tom Eliot gets the Hoo Haas
Chapter 13 Charles Dickens does not eat Pies
Chapter 14 Mary Barnes paints her picture
Chapter 15 Florence Farr chats with a Mummy
Chapter 16 Mabel Collins entertains Guests
Chapter 17 Mother Sawyer puts a Spell on You
Chapter 18 The Invisible Man goes Shopping
Chapter 19 Dr Zerrfi's Faustian Pact
Chapter 20 Satan takes a stroll with the Bellman
Chapter 21 Gilbert and George have a Take Away
Endnotes
Bibliography
Index