Waterloo Sunrise - by John Davis (Paperback)

About the Book

"This is an urban history of London during the pivotal years of the 1960s and 1970s, when the metropolis was transformed from an industrial city that the Victorians might have recognised to an embryonic modern 'world city.' Previous work on London in these years has tended to focus upon the 1960s -in particular the 'Swinging London' phenomenon. Mary Quant, Carnaby Street and the King's Road, Chelsea, all appear in these pages, but it is argued that the 'swinging moment' of the mid-sixties was a passing symptom of a much broader transformation from an industrial to a service-based city, and it is that transformation which this book examines. London is too complex and diverse a city to be comprehended in a simple linear narrative; this book adopts instead an innovative approach to urban history, by which London life and London's transformation are examined through a number of case studies looking at specific themes and areas of the city. Consumerism and the 'experience economy', home ownership and gentrification, deindustrialisation and deprivation, racial tension and unemployment, the attrition of public services and the steady loss of confidence in public agencies - national and local - emerge as overarching themes from the individual case studies in this book. Their combined effect, it is argued, was to prepare the ground for the Britain that Margaret Thatcher is usually held to have created after 1979 - without Thatcher herself having anything to do it"--

Book Synopsis

A kaleidoscopic history of how the 1960s and 1970s changed London forever

Waterloo Sunrise is a panoramic and multifaceted account of modern London during the transformative years of the sixties and seventies, when a city still bearing the scars of war emerged as a vibrant yet divided metropolis. John Davis paints lively and colorful portraits of life in the British capital, covering topics as varied as the rise and fall of boutique fashion, Soho and the sex trade, eating out in London, cabbies and tourists, gentrification, conservation, suburbia and the welfare state.

With vivid and immersive scene-setting, Davis traces how 'swinging London' captured the world's attention in the mid-sixties, discarding postwar austerity as it built a global reputation for youthful confidence and innovative music and fashion. He charts the slow erosion of mid-sixties optimism, showing how a newly prosperous city grappled with problems of deindustrialisation, inner-city blight and racial friction. Davis reveals how London underwent a complex evolution that reflected an underlying tension between majority affluence and minority deprivation. He argues that the London that had taken shape by the time of Margaret Thatcher's election as prime minister in 1979 already displayed many of the features that would come to be associated with 'Thatcher's Britain' of the eighties.

Monumental in scope, Waterloo Sunrise draws on a wealth of archival evidence to provide an evocative, engrossing account of Britain's ever-evolving capital city.

Review Quotes

"A marvellous compendium. . . .Readable, stimulating and a great contribution to debate."---Alan Dent, The Penniless Press

"[A] landmark volume that will shape the way we interpret postwar metropolitan culture."---Rohan McWilliam, The London Journal ​​​​​​​

"Waterloo Sunrise invites us to think in broader, less teleological ways about the terrain of modern Britain. . . . This readable history wears its historiography lightly but is notable for its extraordinarily wide-ranging use of primary sources, and thus its powerful sense of immersive placemaking."---Lucy Delap, American Historical Review

"Waterloo Sunrise, an original, superbly written, and immaculately researched book by John Davis, has the merit not only of being a serious work of social history but also of being one that lifts up the stone to reveal aspects of London life between the early 1960s and the advent of Mrs. Thatcher. . . . Davis is as perceptive in describing the decline of the 1970s as he is in detailing the excitement of London in the 1960s."---Simon Heffer, New Criterion

"

Within its 434 pages some alchemy turns the drab 1970's into London's apotheosis. . . . I love the book--it's a 400-page plus page turner.

"---Barry Coidan, The London Society

"A beautifully written account of the arrival of trattorias, Carnaby Street, tower blocks and gentrification, as the capital was developed after the destruction of the war."---Simon Heffer, Daily Telegraph

"A Daily Telegraph Best History Book of the Year"

"Davis is a magnificent tour guide for the world he has reconstructed. . . . He shows us how London stopped being so boring, what we gained and what we lost."---Florence Sutcliffe-Braithwaite, London Review of Books

"Davis weaves two decades of social, physical, economic, cultural, and political change into a coherent tapestry. . . . A welcome, well-written resource."-- "Choice Reviews"

"Entertaining and affecting."---John Gapper, Financial Times

"It is one of the pleasures of Waterloo Sunrise that it leaps from race and urban reorganization to fashion and fun. Mr. Davis is a wizard of the archives. The general reader will delight in his excavation of local newspapers in pursuit of treasures that illuminate whatever topic is under discussion."---James Campbell, Wall Street Journal

"John Davis charts the complexities of these important decades in London's recent history with great brilliance. . . . A sure-footed and unrivalled guide."---Jerry White, Times Literary Supplement

"Like the Kinks classic to which the title playfully alludes, Waterloo Sunrise is infectious, full of human detail, and generous in its narrative sweep."---Matthew d'Ancona, Tortoise Media

"There is a wealth of information and cogent analysis in this book. It is well-researched with a very full scholarly apparatus. . . . [A] highly entertaining work."---Alan Clarke, Open History Journal

"This is a book I will be using as a research source for many years to come."---Geoff Nicholson, Los Angeles Review of Books

"This is an engrossing, scholarly account of a time when London was in transformation . . . and one that will interest Londoners and non-Londoners alike."---Martin Chilton, The Independent

About the Author

John Davis is emeritus fellow in modern history and politics at The Queen's College, University of Oxford, and the author of Reforming London: The London Government Problem, 1855-1900 and A History of Britain, 1885-1939.