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Title: Dark Age Ahead by JANE JACOBS ISBN: 1-4000-6232-2 Publisher: Random House Pub. Date: 04 May, 2004 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $23.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.33 (3 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: Skeletal
Comment: Jane Jacobs claims that an argument can be made that we reside on the precipice of a new dark age. She provides a very useful outline upon which such an argument could be structured. But she does not make the argument herself. It seems like Ms. Jacobs is using this book to plant the seeds of an idea that she hopes others will step up to germinate and grow. If you are at all skeptical about its premise, this book probably won't do anything for you. The arguments will seem scattered, and the examples will seem superficial at best and irrelevant at worst. But if you are at all open to the dark age notion, or think it is feasible (as I have for a number of years),then the book may be a nice aid in helping you to organize your reading and thinking to better build a case for this haunting premise. Hopefully, some of the rest of us will pick up Jacobs' notion and give it the full treatment it deserves...
Rating: 2
Summary: The Title and Book Jacket Do Not Match the Text Inside
Comment: This book is not about the "Dark Age Ahead" or any parallel with Rome or the history of China or the loss of native culture, or the "fertile crescent" or similar diverse topics covered in the title and the book cover and the first chapter or so. Quite surprisingly and maybe a bit humorously the true title should be "Why I am Annoyed With Traffic Engineers and Similar People". As I read the book it suddenly hit me around page 70 that the actual contents of this book and the title are greatly mismatched.
Okay why did I buy this book? I read the title and the jacket. I skimmed the first chapter. I thought it would give some insight on the pressing social and political problems of our time - all in a sophisticated and meaningful way cross-referenced to the history of Rome and China and tell me where civilization is headed, loss of culture, etc. Our local book store displayed it as a hot new book. Boy are they wrong. It is a real dud.
This books starts slowly with grand history comments going back thousands of years, comments on shipping in China before western explorers, etc., but then suddenly she changes the topic. The author gets excited as we proceed through the 200 pages, but not about anything related to the title of the book or what the book is advertised to be about. Her real personal issues and her angst are really about traffic congestion, General Motors "suppressing" public transportation, and problems with cities and too many cars - her specialty - not the end of the world as advertised. That title was just a literary and sales hook to sell books.
Forgetting for the moment that this subject of traffic congestion is not really related to the book title, I can understand part of her frustration with cars and traffic because I also live in Toronto. I have a car but never drive in the city if I have an alternative. I take the subway and buses or I simply walk or bicycle - since it is safe to do so and simply less of a hassle.
But hold the presses. After lecturing us endlessly about all the evils of society first in a social/historical context, then gradually shifting gears (if I can use that pun) to cars and highways - and why society should use public transport - it turns out that the author herself never uses public transportation. Okay if she has a disability she has my apology, but my God, she lives in Toronto a city with good public transportation, writes these critical books, but takes a taxi everywhere then complains in the book how her taxi is always stuck in the traffic - for pages and pages with many comments sprinkled through the book. A TAXI IS A CAR!!! Dear author: you are part of the problem that you are writing about. Try the subway, or the electric streetcar that GM is "suppresing" that she promotes in the book, or a bus.
Maybe she is in a GM (her conspiracy company) built Chevrolet Impala taxi, the most popular taxi in her hometown of Toronto. Sadly it is more of the same, page after page, with many more references to traffic congestion, lack of government subsidized housing, taxes, and urban sprawl, along with the usual complaints made by urban snobs about the suburbs. What happened to the end of civilization remains a mystery after chapter 1 or 2. That subject dies along with the book. Maybe she is saying that suburbs are the end of our civilization and do not really count as affordable housing?
Give me my money back. One star or two.
Jack in Toronto
Rating: 4
Summary: What this books is really about
Comment: Jane Jacobs wrote "The Death and Life of Great American Cities" in 1961 stating that neighborhoods would be the pulse and soul of city life. City planners and engineers tried their best to laugh her out of town but lo and behold her wisodm of almost everything she had to say came true.
This book now focuses on the five crucial weak spots in the foundation of contemporary life in the West: taxes; community & family; higher education; science and technology; and the lack of self-policing by learned professions. She then argues that these problems lie behind more conventional trouble spots: the environment, crime, and the discrepancy between rich and poor.
My only problem with this book is that she's rather brusque in regards to shoring up her arguments with examples. The book does offer some nice insights for one to ponder on but as far as looking for examples, try turning to your own life experience.
She isn't a historian nor is this book intended to be a historical review of what one may assume as the Dark Ages of the past.
If you're concerned with America's changing culture and changing climate and can keep an open mind, this book could serve as a stepping stone.
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Title: The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs ISBN: 067974195X Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 01 December, 1992 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Who Are We : The Challenges to America's National Identity by Samuel P. Huntington ISBN: 0684870533 Publisher: Simon & Schuster Pub. Date: May, 2004 List Price(USD): $27.00 |
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Title: The Economy of Cities by Jane Jacobs ISBN: 039470584X Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 12 February, 1970 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: Cities and the Wealth of Nations by JANE JACOBS ISBN: 0394729110 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 12 March, 1985 List Price(USD): $12.50 |
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Title: Systems of Survival : A Dialogue on the Moral Foundations of Commerce and Politics by Jane Jacobs ISBN: 0679748164 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 13 January, 1994 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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