The Conscience of the Eye: The Design and Social Life of Cities [Paperback]

Richard Sennett (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 17, 1992

"Visionary, often brilliant." —Los Angeles Times

From the assembly halls of Athens to the Turkish baths of New York's Lower East Side, from eighteenth-century English gardens to the housing projects of Harlem—a study of the physical fabric of the city as a mirror of Western society and culture.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Sennett's study of urban culture began with a discourse on public and private life, The Fall of Public Man ( LJ 12/15/76), and continued with the historical novel, Palais Royal ( LJ 12/86). This, the final installment of his loose "trilogy," seeks to relate architecture, urban planning, and sculpture to the cultural life of cities, from the time of ancient Athens to late 20th-century New York. The author achieves a great deal more, for he offers a broad humanistic reflection on many of the elements that constitute modern culture: literature, spiritual rootlessness, philosophy, music, poetry, ballet, bars, and public baths. The central thesis, that modern humans suffer because of the dichotomy between their subjective private experience and their outside public life, is thoroughly persuasive. Almost every page of this elegantly written work of cultural history contains food for thought, e.g., "The essence of developing as a human being is developing the capacity for ever more complex experience." For general collections.
- Bennett D. Hill, Georgetown Univ., Washington, D.C.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Review

“Over the past 20 years, Richard Sennett has been at the forefront of those generalists endeavoring to synthesize the urban insights of history, architecture, the arts and social sciences into a coherent cultural vision. . . . A wonderful, stimulating, richly thoughtful work that should add much to our debate about cities in the coming years.” (Philip Lopate - Newsday )

“A radical, original rethinking of our relationship to the built environment.” (Publishers Weekly )

“Sennett brings an immensely civilized perspective to the forms and patterns—the visual experiences—of cities, primarily New York City, interpreting how they shape, reflect, or, sadly, fail to reflect, the human beings who built and use them. . . . Provocative and learned.” (Kirkus Reviews )

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Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company (August 17, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393308782
• ISBN-13: 978-0393308785
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #290,002 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Looking beyond the walls, May 3, 2000

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Taeho Paik (Rome, Italy) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Conscience of the Eye: The Design and Social Life of Cities (Paperback)

Richard Sennett is an articulate writer whose style reveals a fascinating mind and above all, a keen pair of eyes. In relating our visual organ to the conscience, he implores us to start seeing our lives as wholly related to and organically integrated with, the cities that we live in. In this thoroughly original and important book, Sennett successfully avoids the tendency of many writers on urbanism to proffer 'well meaning' solutions, but instead takes us on a historical and psychological journey. He convinces his readers to focus on impulses and 'spriritual' reasons behind the creation of cities, ranging from the Greek ideals of 'grace' and 'balance' that produced the 'Agora' to the dilemmas of the modern soul that creates walls made of sheer glass. In chapter after chapter of engrossing reading anyone deeply interested in the well-being of urban life will begin to share his insights on urban forms. He articulates his views using descriptions of ordianry people's lives through history. His well researched narrative succeeds in relating their living conditions with their daily activities as being outward expressions of their inner being. Psychological and emotional states which then find direct expressions in the physical forms of the places in which their lives are enacted. For anyone working in architecture or urban planning, this book is a must-read. In the modern age we are conditioned to believing that a city is a product of functional processes. It is this commonly held apathy which is the very root cause of our modern urban alienation. To me, the message of Richard Sennett's book is a revelation. It is a matter of conscience to use our eyes to see the spirit of our own lives embedded in the walls and the streets that our fathers and mothers have made.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Space; Human Geogrpahy, February 8, 2011

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Coffe-N-Books - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Conscience of the Eye: The Design and Social Life of Cities (Paperback)

This is an interesting and easy read book. It is written by a major contributor in human geogrphy and addresses the role of space in society. This is a great book!!!

2 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Meandering, though I suppose that's the point, September 22, 2007

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Meme Mutation - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Conscience of the Eye: The Design and Social Life of Cities (Paperback)

If you want to read Sennett's opinions on various artworks and art-forms and how he applies these to his social philosophy this is the book you (and apparently two others) have been waiting for.