The Tunnel Through Time, A New Route for an Old London Journey

Tindall, Gillian

ISBN 10: 0701188650 / ISBN 13: 9780701188658

Published by Chatto and Windus / Random House, London, 2016

About this Item

First edition, first impression with full number line. Some very slight edge wear to top of jacket and spine, not price clipped (£20.00), no inscriptions, internally clean tight and square, overall a vg+ copy. 306pp, illustrated. Crossrail, the 'Elizabeth' line, with its spacious, light filled stations, is simply the latest way of traversing a very old east west route through what was once countryside to the old City core and out again. Visiting Stepney, Liverpool Street, Farringdon, Tottenham Court Road (alias St Giles in the Fields) and the route along Oxford Street (alias the Way to Oxford and also Tyburn) this richly descriptive book traces the course of many of these historical journeys across time as well as space. Archaeology disinters layers of actual matter, one may also disinter the lives that walked where many of our streets, however altered in appearance, still run today. These people spoke the names of ancient farms, manors and slums that now belong to our squares and tube stations. They endured the cycle of the seasons as we do, they ate, drank, laughed, worked, prayed, despaired and hoped in what are essentially the same spaces we occupy today. As 'The Tunnel Through Time' expertly shows, destruction and renewal are a constant rhythm in London's story.

Seller Inventory # 005136

Bibliographic Details

• Title: The Tunnel Through Time, A New Route for an Old London Journey
• Publisher: Chatto and Windus / Random House, London
• Publication Date: 2016
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0701188650
• ISBN 13: 9780701188658
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Printing: 1st Printing
• Condition: Near Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Near Fine

About this title

Synopsis

It is the largest building project in Europe today, buried deep beneath the city of London. The great scheme for Crossrail, offering high speed links across the capital, has been a dream on planners’ desks for decades, but construction is now well under way, with tunnelling and earth-shifting machines moving slowly but inexorably, like underground monsters, from separate directions to their final meeting point. As evidence of the line surfaces behind screens in the heart of London, spectators get to gaze down into immense holes where thousands of engineers are at work.

Focussing in on key Crossrail stations – Stepney, Whitechapel, Liverpool Street, Farringdon, Tottenham Court Road (alias St Giles in the Fields), and the route along Oxford Street (alias the Way to Oxford and also Tyburn) Gillian Tindall traces the route of the new line, including the thrilling archaeological obstacles it encounters, to reveal the city’s history through the events, buildings and lives of the Londoners who have witnessed change across the centuries. Crossrail is just the latest audacious scheme to have visited the ancient sites of London over hundreds of years – and Gillian Tindall is the perfect writer to describe this major transformation.

About the Author

Gillian Tindall is a master of miniaturist history, making a handful of people, a few places or a dramatic event stand for the much larger picture. Well-known for the quality of her writing and the meticulous nature of her research, she has written highly praised regional histories of Kentish Town (The Fields Beneath), London's Southbank (The House by the Thames), the Latin Quarter of Paris (Footprints in Paris) and the Cotswolds, Surrey and inner London (Three Houses, Many Lives), as well as prize-winning novels and history. She lives in London.