Customer Reviews

Venice: Pure City

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Yes, this is magisterial, beautifully written - but, typically of Ackroyd, too many questionable sweeping assertions sometimes impede the flow of what should be a rollicking good read. For every "wow!" there is a corresponding "huh?" It can be argued this is what makes Ackroyd unique.

If you know and love Venice, you'll enjoy this. If you don't, it will pique your curiosity. And you might agree with Shakespeare's Holofernes: "Venetia, Venetia, chi non ti vede, non ti pretia!" (Venice - whoever doesn't see you, doesn't esteem you.)

Let's start with the "wow!" Wide-ranging, learned and instructive. As with his London: The Biography, Ackroyd dives headfirst into the water surrounding Venice's 117 islands, fishing for primal origins and finding it an elemental metaphor for the city. Chapter 2, "City of St Mark," deals with the refugees who settled there. Then comes the golden age of state power, commerce and trade. This also embraces the merchants of the Rialto and the Jews in the Ghetto.

By Chapter 6, Ackroyd is back in rhapsodic mode, with "Timeless City," including ruminations on the bells. The next section, "Living City," humanises the city, with fascinating subsections on Body and Buildings; Learning and Language; Colour and Light (fabulous work with the artists including Bellini, Tintoretto and Titan); and Pilgrims and Tourists. Then Ackroyd moves on to carnival and carnal aspects, including the "Eternal Feminine" (virgin and whore). Similarly, Sacred City considers heavenly and hellish aspects - which seem to win out in "Shadows of History" with its Death in Venice theme.

And now for the "huh?" factor. There's a lingering suspicion about some of the connections: is the mirror-like surface of the Lagoon like glass, which, conveniently made in Murano, stands as a metaphor for the City? Does Venetian satin, conveniently called watered silk, like the watery and "undulating" floor of St Mark's, echo the water surrounding the whole city? Are the pinky green stones of the buildings the colours of flesh and bone, thus personifying the entire urban building fabric? And is watery Venice a place of "liminal fantasies of death and rebirth?"

Some will be inspired, others irritated. But there's no denying Ackroyd's learning, creativity, gusto and grace.

This was a very pleasant read. He gets right down into the dialect and persona of the Venetian citizen and makes a pretty convincing argument that their City and its history molded their character and world-view. There is a good overview of how the city was built over time. Their amazingly successful political structure is explained. He comes pretty close to capturing and expressing the mystique of Venice. When I go there, it is always a chameleon. Sometimes as old, filthy and smelly as a destitute subway platform. Sometimes, as charming, and ageless as a dreamscape that unfolds before your eyes. It's a unique city. If you've been there yourself, this book will add to your understanding of what you've experienced; and if you haven't been there, the book will introduce you to a fascinating people and place.

The variations in response to this book VENICE: PURE CITY by Peter Ackroyd are puzzling at best. Perhaps the history of the writer's output has polarized the readers. Perhaps the integration of emotional and intellectual responses in the history of the rise and present sate of Venice makes the book uncomfortable for some. This reader became immersed in the mysteries that surround the history, the socialization of a swamp, the creation of a city on water, the ingredients that create the flavor of Venice visually, aurally, the particular types of influences of art (painting and music and architecture et al) and the interaction of this city with the great minds of our time such as Wagner, Proust, Henry James, Freud, Thomas Mann, Benjamin Britten, John Singer Sargent and on and on and on -it is simply a feast for the mind in Ackroyd's brilliant prose and in the many drawings and photographs and reproductions of the art and the city that grace this book.

Yes, there are likely more focused and accurate history books that take the reader on a chronological voyage through the rise and development of Venice, and if that is what the reader desires there are many books available that do just that. But what Ackroyd does that is so fascinating is to relate the history thematically, bouncing back and forth with contemporary knowledge of the Venice we know as played against the Venice of the past - all smoke and mirrors and delectable commentary. There is more to discover about the blend of society and the church and the wars and the peculiar aspects of a part of Italy that is actually not joined physically to that country. Ackroyd gives fine insights to the immigrant status of the sectors of Venice that few others have the courage to define.

But perhaps the true appeal of this book is that it feels to be written for the same passionate reason that many of us, past and present, feel about La Serenissima. It is a difficult response to define much less to put into written book form. It is a feeling, a magnetic draw that once instilled in the mind and heart is very difficult to sever. As a critic in the LA Times comments '"Ackroyd -- the marvelously erudite and staggeringly industrious English writer -- [has compiled] an encyclopedic amount of general and arcane factual information and then [arranged] it less chronologically than thematically -- much as one might encounter it in the course of a long walk over fascinating terrain in the company of a knowledgeable but never pedantic companion. It's an experience rendered all the more agreeable by the independent turn of Ackroyd's critical imagination and lapidary quality of his prose." Perhaps then this book is for Romantics who love history - but who love Venice even more. Grady Harp, August 11

I was really looking forward to reading this book, received it as a gift, and have been hugely disappointed in it. Contrary to what some published reviews have claimed, I think it's generally a very poorly written book: a hodegpodge of assertions without a hint of support, banal generalities, and inaccuracies.

Its scatter-shot style, along with the outdated nature of many of its observations, lead me to believe it was written over a long period of time: a piece of work the writer returned to in his spare time, rather than one coherent effort. Though published in 2009, Ackroyd's book is no more up-to-date than Mary McCarthy's classic VENICE PRESERVED (publ. 1963) and infinitely less informative and historically accurate.

For example, Ackroyd writes about the sacred place of the pigeon in Venice and the way in which a number of families still earn their living from selling pigeon feed in Piazza San Marco. You don't have to live in Venice, as I do, to know this is completely wrong. Simply read John Behrendt's CITY OF FALLING ANGELS (published a few years before Ackroyd's) to learn how the city actually rounds up pigeons for extermination and feeding pigeons--much less selling pigeon feed in San Marco--has been illegal for years.

Ackroyd also writes of Venice's huge population of cats. This was true in McCarthy's time, it was even true when I was here for a time in the early '90s, but I can tell you from firsthand observation that the vast--or even small--tribes of cats that Ackroyd evokes as a contemporary reality of Venice simply do not exist. You will generally be lucky to see 1 or 2 lolling on window ledges of some apartments.

I honestly have a hard time imagining who this book is intended for. If you know Venice well--or even just fairly well--you can't help but be annoyed by its many historical and contemporary inaccuracies. If you are new to the city, it will do little to provide a coherent or reliable historical background and its presentation of the contemporary life of the city is simply absurd. (I love Ackroyd's typically vague and purely anecdotal suggestion that the city drives its inhabitants mad--he refers to "insane cries" from a house in Castello. I live in Castello, my son attends school in Castello, and while there are plenty of oddities in the city (both in terms of local beliefs and inhabitants), you can take my word for it that Ackroyd has no actual clue what or who they are.)

There are many many fine books on Venice. My strong suggestion is to avoid this one.

Peter Ackroyd has a knack for crafting biographies of "place" quite as compelling as any biography of a living, breathing human being, and in this latest book he does an impressive job of making Venice -- often described as a dying city -- live and breathe for the reader.

True, it's not up to the standard of his books on London and the Thames, and a knowledgeable reader may find that much of its contents are familiar. But it's still an excellent thematic look at this unique city through the eyes of its residents and visitors over the centuries. It's not a straightforward history -- he explores themes and ideas, jumping back and forth in time to address the issue of light, of food, of justice and the family, as they evolved in the unique environment of Venice, which remained a medieval state until Napoleon walked in and took it over in 1797, but which also was a city-state one of whose occupants could declare as early as the 16th century that he saw himself as a free man in a free country.

Ackroyd draws on a lot of other well-known Venice observers -- Jan Morris, Ruskin, Mary McCarthy, to name only a few -- as well as the obvious literary commentators, from Byron to Henry James and some lesser known figures of the early Renaissance. For me, the tiny details that abound here made this book fascinating to read, rather than the scope itself -- to those who know a lot about Venice, there's probably very little tremendously new beyond Ackroyd's rather unexpected view of the city as both literally and metaphorically "insular" and one that has always relied on being able to command the attention of outsiders (through trade, or today through tourism). One flaw, admittedly, is Ackroyd's far too repetitive and occasionally excessively florid use of watery metaphors of every possible stripe.

My only other quibbles are minor ones: Ackroyd's passion for staccato sentences became annoying after a while, and he has a propensity for repeating himself (I assume it's done deliberately) that became downright maddening. Ultimately, I felt like screaming that I KNOW that Venetians are private and don't like inviting people into their homes, I understood that the last five times it was mentioned!

This would make a great gift to someone traveling to Venice, to accompany the standard guidebooks and provide a context. It's less dense than John Julius Norwich's massive tome, and while not quite as scholarly, is immensely readable.

I bought this book after having read Ackroyd's impressive "Life of Thomas More" (published 1991), and have now been left wondering what happened to Ackroyd in the meantime. His book on More is tight and compelling, whereas this one is as sloppy as they come. The most infuriating thing about "Pure City" is that in this book, at least, Ackroyd enjoys a good over-generalization just as much as the Marquis de Sade enjoyed a good spanking.

Let me give you one of the most egregious examples. The last chapter of "Pure City" is supposedly about Venetian music, its character, and its part in the life of the city. But the chapter is essentially about one particular composer, Vivaldi, and mentions - in passing - but one other Venetian composer (Galuppi). Vivaldi may indeed be the best-known Venetian composer, but can we generalize from him to ALL of Venetian music? Ackroyd does exactly that, and claims not only that Vivaldi was the "acme" of Venetian music, but that Venetian music is marked by a "ferocious gaiety", and "provokes astonishment and admiration, rather than contemplation. Yet it could also be unruly and abrupt, with sudden and unexpected turns both in melody and harmony. It is often eccentric or extravagant. It sometimes relishes strangeness, or what were known as bizzarria. It has an eastern flavour." Now anyone with a deeper knowledge of Venetian music than that which comes from owning a recording of the Four Seasons will see the problem here. To give just the easiest of counter-examples: Giovanni Gabrieli was surely more "Venetian" in his musical education, and had more influence on later musicians both in Venice and in the rest of Europe, than Vivaldi. And yet if, when listening to Gabrieli, you are struck by anything resembling "ferocious gaiety" or "bizzarria", then you will need to get your head checked. Why did Ackroyd insist on including this chapter in the book, when it appears that he has never bothered to listen to music by more than one Venetian composer?

At least Ackroyd's over-generalizations about music can be disputed. Other statements in "Pure City" are so general as to lose all possible meaning. Try this paragraph: "From the 14th to the 18th centuries Venice became the city of luxury goods. Luxury may be defined as a form of erotic display, a deep response to the refinements of sensation. It suggests delicacy and rarefied pleasure. One need hardly add that it encourages further and further consumption. We need many things as the staples of life, but we desire even more. Desire lies in the open mouth of the consumer. Venice has always been known as a sensual city, whether in the ubiquity of its courtesans or in the lush canvases of its painters" etc. Perhaps the wine I drink is not as airy-fairy good as Ackroyd's, because for me, the only information contained in this paragraph is in its first sentence. Can YOU see what Ackroyd means when he writes that "desire lies in the open mouth of the consumer?" Or how about these two gems, from captions for the book's illustrations: "Glass is material sea." "In Venice oil paint can be liquid music."

Even when Ackroyd's thinking in "Pure City" is not as sloppy as the above examples, he often compensates with sloppy prose. Describing Venetians' devotion to the Virgin, he writes that "There were artists who did nothing else but execute cheap images of the Madonna known disparagingly as madonnieri." Ackroyd's placement of "madonnieri" in this sentence would lead you to believe that the images were called by this name, while in reality the word - with its "iere" ending - refers to the artists who created them. A simple change in word order would eliminate the ambiguity, and I bet Ackroyd is old enough to remember the days when a sentence as slipshod as this one would never have made it past a Year 10 English teacher.

Or for just one final example, look at this passage about collecting: "Private collecting was a Venetian phenomenon of the 16th and 17th centuries. It created new forms of demand, and new methods of accumulation; it made the act of possession intrinsically worthwhile. The consumer could pose as the connoisseur. The sybarite could become a humanist saint. He was called a virtuoso. The first known collections were Venetian, dating from the 14th century. But the obsession with studioli or curiosity shops just grew and grew." What could Ackroyd possibly be trying to achieve by putting the 14th century after the 17th century here? Did this book even have an editor?

In short, if you are in prison and your keeper offers you nothing to read but "Venice: Pure City," then by all means open it up. Otherwise save your money for books whose authors take their work seriously.

* Venetian proverb-It is always collapsing but it never falls down- such is the fate of latter day Venice a city struggling to survive in a modern world. But what is the secret to this metropolitan area that has captivated writers & visitors alike for hundreds of years. Readers used to Ackroyd's style from his books on London & the Thames will find this equally engaging. Not an overwhelming history, but Ackroyd manages to cover the many facets of the Most Serene Republic through the ages. Covering commerce, art, politics & yes as ultimate tourist destination this book will be equally enjoyed by the first time reader as well as one who has studied Venice in other works.

I liked Peter Ackroyd's "Venice: Pure City." The book is big, about 6 1/2 by 9 1/2, with just over 400 pages, so getting through it in detail, which is worth it, can take a while.

One thing immediately noticeable is the jacket, or half-jacket, that covers only the bottom 6 inches of the cover.

The half-jacket bears the name of the book and a standard view of St. Mark's Square with the Doge's Palace, and in front of it, several gondolas in the Grand Canal.

The upper part of the cover and the half-jacket reveal what almost all travelers have noted, that Venice is very beautiful.

What is hiding behind Peter Ackroyd's half-jacket is the lower part of the cover, which I daresay cannot be called beautiful. Grotesque is a better word. I won't tell you what is depicted, which for all I know may come only with the hardcopy (the hardcopy would be my recommendation). But the pretty jacket concealing something that is not pretty, fits in with Ackroyd's overall revelations about Venice throughout the book.

Ackroyd stresses that Venice has always rested uneasy on the sea and is predominately surface and show. The façades of houses are covered with attractive sheets of varied colors of marble. Hence the beauty. Behind the façades, the construction material is brick, not blocks of marble. The houses rest on 10 or 12-foot wooden poles sunk down into the mud to reach a firm foundation of harder clay and dense sand. These pilings can last a thousand years if they remain submerged. Returned to air they would crumble.

The sea continuously seeks to reclaim Venice's 35-mile by 6-mile stretch of 117 islands. The city has always been in danger of disappearing into the sea. Yet the sea and the city's industry have been their life of far-flung trade. Ackroyd traces its history from early beginnings to a once great warring empire to its present position of attracting and depending upon worldwide tourism.

Ackroyd's enormous research is greatly evident. His writing is masterly. He is an excellent guide through Venice's life, religion, government, trade, industry, history, and myth. Venice is thoroughly fascinating.

Ackroyd's "Venice, Pure City" is not history or geography. Rather, it is a series of beautifully-written essays on his impressions of various aspects of the city. Naturally, the history and geography cannot help turning up, but the focus is more intimate, more personal, more literate. It is subjective. So the text tends to repeat itself and contradict itself.

Consider the illustrations. There are dozens of beautiful and relevent pictures, many in brilliant quality color, showing the art and architecture of the city; but there is only one very inadequate map which shows a small area of the city in the sixteenth century but nothing of the rest of the Adriatic area where Venice's history played itself out. Ackroyd's focus is almost entirely on culture, customs, feelings - sense and sensibility.

I got "Venice" from the library because I expected the history, and soon found my mistake; but I read almost the whole book anyway, carried away by Ackroyd's insight and style (a little distracted by his tendency to comma-spot) because I was finding a fresh, intact view of a whole society.

History buffs are cautioned: this is not a coherent history. But lovers of the personal essay will probably be delighted. I was.

All the magic and mystery of Venice is sucked out and left for a dying corpse by this endless and pointless book. Ackroyd merely lists and lists and lists subjects, dates, events; and exclusively by quoting other writers and authorities. Has he ever stepped foot in Venice himself? Reminiscent of a poorly documented and disorganized term paper. Back and forth through the centuries; skipping from subject to locale, with no central theme or subject to hold the pages together.

Altogether a huge bore, and a serious disappointment for anyone who has visited Venice and was looking for some historical interest or story to contain the perspective of this amazing place. If you're thinking of reading/listening to this as a preparation to visiting Venice-- don't.... it will only be an endless annoyance.