The English Urban Renaissance: Culture and Society in the Provincial Town, 1660-1770 (Oxford Studies in Social History) - Hardcover

Borsay, Peter

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0198200021 ISBN 13: 9780198200024

Publisher: Clarendon Press, 1989

Synopsis

In the century after the Restoration of 1660, English provincial towns experienced a cultural renaissance. This book offers a guide to some of the most striking features of that revival, including the transformation of the urban landscape under the influence of classical architecture, the emergent forces of planning and expansion in the provision of fashionable public leisure, embracing the performing and intellectual arts, arenas of display and sport. The author also penetrates behind the new culture's elegant facade to explore its economic origins and the contrasting forces which stimulated it: wealth, self-interest, idealism and snobbery. Drawing on the disciplines of architecture, music, historical geography, English literature and urban studies as well as history, this book concentrates on the interaction between urban culture and society as a whole. It not only examines the development of the early modern town, with detailed discussion in the text and reference material in a town-by-town appendix, but also the relatively neglected history of England between the Civil War and the Industrial Revolution.

About this title

Review

excellent ... an exciting and imaginative book, which does a marvellous job of welding social and architectural history. (Times Higher Education Supplement)

a book which is both an education and a delight ... This is a deeply learned, splendidly argued, beautifully written and wonderfully stimulating volume. It is unquestionably one of the best urban studies we have had for many a long day. (Angus McInnes, University of Keele, History, No.245, Oct 1990)

From the Back Cover

In the century after the Restoration of 1660, English provincial towns experienced a cultural renaissance. This book offers a guide to the transformation of the urban landscape and the remarkable expansion in the provision of fashionable public leisure. Peter Borsay penetrates behind the new culture's elegant facade to explore its economic origins and the mixture of social forces which stimulated it: wealth, self-interest, idealism, and snobbery.

Edition details

• Publisher: Clarendon Press
• Publication date: 1989
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0198200021
• ISBN 13: 9780198200024
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 438