“The Black Death of 1348 was only the most notorious epidemic of bubonic or pneumonic plague that descended on London every decade or so throughout the 14th century. It killed half the population. Plague was of the essence of London; it was its nature. It was an emanation of the city, seen in the shape of a miasma or mist uncurling above the rooftops. That is why the Great Plague of 1665 has been largely understood as a London phenomenon. The sites of old plague pits are now poin-ted out with understandable pride. Richard Barnett reveals that the escalator at Camden Town Underground station passes through a vast grave for plague victims, and that a “massive plague pit” is responsible for the low ceiling of the basement of Harvey Nichols. It would be fair to say that he takes a certain, rather morbid, pleasure in compiling this Baedeker of disease and suffering. But why not? This is London’s real heritage. Together with this volume are a glossary and six maps, so that the reader can make his or her way down the various roads to oblivion. If you wish to follow the course of tropical disease as it ate its way to the heart of the metropolis, you can do so; you can follow the route of the plague, or the life of an 18th-century medical student. All human life, and human death, is here.”
Peter Ackroyd
Tumbleroll
Colophon
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