Hubbub Filth, noise, & stench in England, 1600-1770

This powerful, convincing antidote to any inclination to wax romantic about life in early modern England, whether private or public, looks at London, Manchester, Bath and other cities, and discusses how and why so much of life was ugly, smelly, dirty, flea infested, and garbage strewn. Cockayne (Open Univ.) relies on journals, diaries, pamphlets and treatises for reform, town and court records, and such familiar commentators as Pepys, Bernard Mandeville, and the Duchess of Newcastle, though many others have a say too. Her basic argument is that few had access to soap and water or a frequent change of clothing, and that when they ventured out, they were apt to be confronted by poorly paved, dark streets soiled by human and animal waste, offal from in-town slaughterhouses, and unruly crowds. Towns were noisy and smelly; the air was foul from wood and coal smoke; drains and sewers were of limited efficacy. Cockayne touches on (if she does not extensively draw out) the class bias underlying many of these conditions, and assesses whether they improved or deteriorated over the years. The book includes many powerful anecdotes. The 62 pictures, some by William Hogarth, show contemporary awareness of the problems, if only to ridicule them. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries. J. T. Rosenthal emeritus, SUNY at Stony Brook

In her monographic debut, Cockayne (Open Univ., UK) removes the facade of the beautiful 17th century to restore to readers the breadth-and depth-of the awful during the Renaissance and Age of Reason in England, almost two centuries extending from the heyday of Shakespeare to Wren, from the imported talents of Rubens and Handel and straight through the homegrown deveBlopment of the novel. Life for most, she reminds us, was nasty and brutish, and even aristocrats were a putrid bunch. Cockayne rediscovers an all too organic food supply; excreta-wallowing pigs kept in conditions living down to their reputations; and such routine perils negotiated by pedestrians as falling into unmarked pits, down unrailed cellar steps, and into waste piles or being run down by horses or carriages. Mixing her prodigious research into a multisensory textual dish that is addictively disgusting in all its particulars, Cockayne has produced a lively, witty, and provocatively illustrated history that is only slightly flawed in that what results perhaps inevitably reads more as a comprehensive sampler of ills than a thoroughly integrated narrative of horror. Recommended for all humanities collections.-Scott H. Silverman, Bryn Mawr Coll., PA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.