London on His MindFor travelers with limited time in London, a three-day itinerary that gets to the essence of the city would by necessity have to inc

Peter Ackroyd is a man obsessed by London. Of the 17 works of fiction and nonfiction he's produced over the past two decades, the principal subject has been this most diverse of European cities, its past, present, and future, its characters and politics, and, above all, its mysterious allure.

In recent years the London-based author has turned the heat up on his passion, turning out biographies on London luminaries Charles Dickens, William Blake, and Thomas More in addition to The Plato Papers, a futuristic novel set in 38th-century London. Last year, Ackroyd published what may be his magnum opus, London: The Biography, a 750-page trek through the history of his favorite city, from prehistory to the present.

Ackroyd's "biography" is hardly a conventional chronicle of people, places, and events. Rather, the book attempts to capture the experience of London by exploring specific themes in its history. The result is an engaging portrait of a city with its own laws of growth and change.

Recently chatted with Ackroyd about the book. The discussion ranged from little-known London neighborhoods to Celtic mythology to the "echoic" nature of the city.



Peter Ackroyd: Visitors should go to the City of London, and then cross London Bridge to Southwark. While in that neighborhood they should visit Southwark Cathedral and the Old Operating Theatre of St. Thomas's Hospital. They should also walk around Clerkenwell and Smithfield. They should see Spitalfields and perhaps go farther east to Limehouse.

What are some of the more interesting neighborhoods in and around London we don't ordinarily hear about?

There are many interesting neighborhoods, but I would recommend Clerkenwell, which has been the home of radical activity since the early 14th century.

What sort of radical activities?

For example, Wat Tyler, leader of the Peasants Revolt in 1381, encamped upon the Clerkenwell Green, and ever since that time it has been used by Chartists, Fenians, and trade unions to represent their causes. Visitors will find the Marx Memorial Library here. Also beside the Green is Sessions House, which was used for some of the most important trials of radicals in English history. To the south of the Green, down the famous Jerusalem Passage, lies the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, whose crypt holds medieval tombs, and just beside it is St. John's Gate, an ancient gateway. There is a "history trail" here for the casual visitor.

London's fires have become a part of city lore. They are referred to in books, songs, and have even been depicted in paintings. Where should visitors go to see the physical evidence of this legacy of "conflagration"?

London has burned to the ground many times but has always been resurrected, or, rather, has resurrected itself. There is very little physical evidence of the 1666 Great Fire of London, but anyone interested in that event should visit the Monument to it in the City of London, by Fish Hill, north of London Bridge. Those who wish to understand something of the appearance of London before the fire should visit Staple Inn along Holborn.

The griffin, a symbol from Celtic mythology, is a conspicuous image in London. What is the significance of this four-legged, winged beast?

The griffin is to be found upon the coinage of the Iceni tribe, which inhabited part of the area now known as Greater London. It has survived as the emblem of the city itself and is posted on all the boundaries of the City of London. It is an appropriate emblem, since the griffin was a legendary monster which guarded gold mines and buried treasure.

London appreciates popular culture -- James Bond, the Beatles, Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, punk rock. Is it fair to say that this has always been so?

From its inception, London has always manifested the signs of a native egalitarianism. In terms of popular culture, half the art and spectacle of London is derived from the life and art of the people. Handel caught an air from a whistling tradesman, Turner borrowed pictorial effects from pantomime scenery, and Blake borrowed scenes from theaters of the period.

London functioned for a thousand years under "its own laws of growth and change." Are these "laws" still governing the city today? Or has London been changed by globalization and the move toward a more united Europe?

London has not really been changed by globalization, since its financial pre-eminence has existed since it was first constructed as a trading port. It has been built by the twin imperatives of commerce and power. That is why it is in certain respects such a dark city. It retains its identity through centuries of change. So when architectural historians lament the building of new financial centers, they are repeating the criticisms of a thousands years. London has always been vandalized. It has always grown out of monetary speculation and greed.

In 1994, the Channel Tunnel opened, linking Britain and Europe. Does this connection to the continent signal the emergence of a new spirit in London?

London has always been a European city, and the building of the Channel tunnel will not necessarily change the city's identity. It has always been open to immigration, for example, and in part was created by immigrants. It has thrived by means of assimilation and adaptation. It can only survive by attracting new inhabitants, as if it were some living creature which needs to engorge fresh supplies.

Your book is not a chronology of people, places and events. Rather, it is a tour of images, sounds, smells, and lore. What did you hope to achieve with this unusual approach to writing about a city?

I did not want to write a conventional history of the city, since so many volumes have already been devoted to that theme. Instead I wanted to evoke and to capture the living experience of the metropolis, so pressing and multifarious, by concentrating upon various themes and metaphors. Also, I believed that I would be able to suggest that the city itself was a living organism with its own laws of growth and change. That is why it is a biography rather than a history.

What motivated you to write a "biography" of London?

I spent my childhood and most of my adult life in London. It has become in that sense the landscape of my imagination. My novels and biographies of Dickens, Blake, and Thomas More have been concerned with a line of London writers whom I call Cockney visionaries. In the novels themselves London seems to have become as much a character as any of the human agents, so in that sense all my previous books have directed me towards the writing of London: The Biography.

Many cities have seen their share of "flame and ruin," as you put it, Rome, St. Petersburg, Berlin, Dresden, Constantinople. What makes London special?

Of all capital cities, London is by common consent the most echoic. It has been continually inhabited for many thousands of years, and has relics of Druidic worship as well as of Roman and Saxon occupation. But it is not merely its longevity that is important. In my investigations of London I have been struck many times by what I call the territorial imperative at work in its streets and alleys, by which I mean that a certain area seems actively to guide or to determine the lives of those who live within its bounds. In that sense all its previous existences exist simultaneously, engendering a power that links the present with the past.

Resource: London Destination Guide