The Figure of the Crowd in Early Modern London

Download or read book The Figure of the Crowd in Early Modern London written by I. Munro and published by Springer. This book was released on 2005-04-15 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Figure of the Crowd in Early Modern London examines the cultural phenomenon of the urban crowd in the context of early modern London's population crisis. The book explores the crowd's double function as a symbol of the city's growth and as the necessary context for the public performance of urban culture. Its central argument is that the figure of the crowd acts as a supplement to the symbolic space of the city, at once providing a tangible referent for urban meaning and threatening the legibility of that meaning through its motive force and uncontrollable energy.