European Cities

Viennese ideas saturate the modern world. From California architecture to Hollywood Westerns, modern advertising to shopping malls, orgasms to gender confirmation surgery, nuclear fission to fitted kitchens—every aspect of our history, science, and culture is in some way shaped by Vienna. Richard Cockett gives us the entirety of an extraordinary story of how one city made the modern world—and how we all remain inescapably Viennese.

Editor Eleanor Brown presents a collection of personal essays from 18 different authors about their experiences in the City of Light.

Do you want to relax at the end of the day? Want to tap into your inner imagination and explore the world without ever needing to leave your bed? Then it’s time to try sleep meditation.

In summer 2006, 20-year-old Gerald Yeung and his childhood friends from Hong Kong travel to South America and Africa on their parents' dime. Confronted by challenges foreign to their privileged upbringing, the "Wannabe Backpackers" persevere in their Christian Dior clothes. They make plans to do it again when they turn 30. The decade that follows doesn’t go exactly to plan.

London E17, 2019, a yellow kitchen stands as a metaphor for the lifelong friendship between three women: Claude, the earnest baker, fragile and goal-orientated Sophie and stubborn and political Giulia. They have the best kind of friendship, chasing life and careers; dating, dreaming and consuming but always returning to be reunited in the yellow kitchen. That is, until a trip to Lisbon unravels unexplored desires and the friendship between Claude and Sophie becomes intimate. Having sex is one thing, waking up the day after is the beginning of something new.

Immune to the consequences of immorality, five privileged young men in Bogotá bond over a shared code: worship drugs and drink, exploit women, and scorn the underclass. As males, they declare the right to freedom of pleasure. As friends, only disloyalty to each other is forbidden. When a little girl from the slums disappears, the limits of a perverse and sacred bond will be tested in ways none of them could have imagined.

In this staple of classic literature, Charles Dickens tells the tale of fueding classes set at the inception and escalation of the French Revolution. Amidst the upheaval, righteous former aristocrat Charles Darnay becomes wrongly tangled in unfortunate events, endangering his freedom and family. Sidney Carton, a cynical lawyer who squandered his life away, seeks to redress his unhappiness through Darnay's beautiful wife, Lucie.

Орхан Памук — известный турецкий писатель, обладатель многочисленных национальных и международных премий, в числе которых Нобелевская премия по литературе за «поиск души своего меланхолического города». Новый роман Памука «Мои странные мысли», над которым он работал последние шесть лет, возможно, самый стамбульский из всех. Его действие охватывает более сорока лет — с 1969 по 2012 год. Главный герой Мевлют работает на улицах Стамбула, наблюдая, как улицы наполняются новыми людьми, город обретает и теряет новые и старые здания, из Анатолии приезжают на заработки бедняки.

Scritto in risposta alla frase pronunciata dal ministro Depretis "bisogna sventrare Napoli!", il romanzo, scritto nel 1884, è molto più di un'inchiesta giornalistica. "Il ventre di Napoli" è un grido accorato di denuncia che conduce il lettore negli splendori e nelle miserie di Napoli, con le sue usanze e le sue tradizioni, laddove il degrado, la miseria e lo scempio non possono che generare rabbia e pietà.

Una de las novelas más conocidas de Dickens, un clásico de la literatura inglesa del siglo XIX. La historia transcurre entre dos ciudades, Londres y París, durante la época de la Revolución Francesa. La indiferencia de Dickens por la política y su desprecio por los políticos alejan la novela de cualquier debate político o filosófico sobre la revolución.