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cjeanne99's review
informative
slow-paced
3.0
A look at Chicago from the early 30’s through the early 70’s - how the city influenced the rest of the country - through engineering, architecture, literature, music, politics, comedy, education and advertising. This unabridged edition contains a LOT of information about Mies van der Rohe and Nelson Algren - far more than I needed to know. With all the detail given to those two - I was surprised at how little mention was given to the socio-economic changes brought about by building the expressways. I guess that is for a different book.
This one focuses on the influence Chicago had on the rest of the world - and how the world left Chicago behind. The author almost talks about how the city turned on itself - and became it’s own worst enemy through segregated neighborhoods and reliance on dying industries - but doesn’t quite get there.
Interesting, long, and falls short of the mark in a few spots.
This one focuses on the influence Chicago had on the rest of the world - and how the world left Chicago behind. The author almost talks about how the city turned on itself - and became it’s own worst enemy through segregated neighborhoods and reliance on dying industries - but doesn’t quite get there.
Interesting, long, and falls short of the mark in a few spots.
donzhivago's review
5.0
An excellent investigation of how current-day Chicago, a city I openly loathe, came to be. Despite the racists, corrupt pols, blatant self-promoters and other assorted human detritus which populate the book (there are some good folk too, around), Dyja places them all together to create a realistically sad portrayal of the city. He does not trash Chicago the way other reviews seem to believe, but instead seems to see Chicago as a place of lost possibility, whose attempts at greatness soured into nothing more but the offal trickling from the city's slaughterhouses.
Needed more discussion on Chicago's #1 feature: Deep Dish.
Needed more discussion on Chicago's #1 feature: Deep Dish.
smoreface's review
5.0
A brilliant sociocultural history of key decades in Chicago history, I want to read a second installment and other versions about different cities. A lively and politically aware story.
ejdecoster's review
3.0
Just like Chicago never became the city Dyja thinks it could have been, this book doesn't quite hold together the way it ought. I picked this up and didn't make much progress in November 2013; I revisited it recently because I saw this was selected as the 2016 Chicago Public Library "One Book, One Chicago". Dyja's strengths are his focus on specific elements of Chicago during a specific time period, his willingness to address racist systems head-on, and a clearly vast pool of research. His weakness, largely, is failing to articulate what he thinks Chicago "could have"/"should have" been, the standard to which he holds the city throughout the book. A sense of disappointment haunts the book, but the reader isn't sure why.
Dyja discusses several factors that may have inhibited Chicago's late-20th/early-21st century ambitions, including government corruption, de-industrialization, racism, and a certain overzealousness about perceived blight that damaged historical architecture (otherwise a Chicago strength). But he fails to distinguish these elements of Chicago from similar elements in other cities - Chicago may be corrupt, but is it so much more corrupt than comparable Midwestern cities that it hindered growth? For sure it's possible - but he doesn't make that case or that comparison. Another example: he suggests Los Angeles' population skyrocketed past Chicago's because ... the DC-8 enabled people to fly non-stop from New York? As opposed to, say, climate, the growth of LA as an entertainment hub, or changing migration/immigration patterns?
In the end, the strength of the book is also its weakness. In writing solely about Chicago, Dyja is able to focus his argument - but he removes the argument from context. ALSO! I don't know that making regular comparisons to New York (X Chicago neighborhood is the equivalent of Z New York neighborhood) is really useful for the reader. If you're some sort of lunatic who's lived in Chicago and not New York the comparisons are meaningless and then sort of obnoxious if looked into. Most readers of Dyja's book are going to be people with Opinions About Chicago (good or bad) and most of the people in that group didn't sign up for a course in the cultural geography of Manhattan as a pre-requisite.
Dyja discusses several factors that may have inhibited Chicago's late-20th/early-21st century ambitions, including government corruption, de-industrialization, racism, and a certain overzealousness about perceived blight that damaged historical architecture (otherwise a Chicago strength). But he fails to distinguish these elements of Chicago from similar elements in other cities - Chicago may be corrupt, but is it so much more corrupt than comparable Midwestern cities that it hindered growth? For sure it's possible - but he doesn't make that case or that comparison. Another example: he suggests Los Angeles' population skyrocketed past Chicago's because ... the DC-8 enabled people to fly non-stop from New York? As opposed to, say, climate, the growth of LA as an entertainment hub, or changing migration/immigration patterns?
In the end, the strength of the book is also its weakness. In writing solely about Chicago, Dyja is able to focus his argument - but he removes the argument from context. ALSO! I don't know that making regular comparisons to New York (X Chicago neighborhood is the equivalent of Z New York neighborhood) is really useful for the reader. If you're some sort of lunatic who's lived in Chicago and not New York the comparisons are meaningless and then sort of obnoxious if looked into. Most readers of Dyja's book are going to be people with Opinions About Chicago (good or bad) and most of the people in that group didn't sign up for a course in the cultural geography of Manhattan as a pre-requisite.
yangyvonne's review
1.0
This historical look in to Chicago from the time of the Great Depression to the 1960's posits the notion that many ground-breaking things originated here. It meticulously examines architecture, music, politics, population trends, pop culture, and national phenomena and demonstrates the value of things inherently "Chicago". Glaringly absent is any mention of the 1933 Fair. Much of the book is focused on Mies, Aldren, Daley, Stevenson, Kroc, various blues musicians, and especially, the "white flight" to the birds and the (often violent) attempts at integration of various neighborhoods. In the end, the author laments how the City never lived-up to its potential because of its occupants' racism, etc.
The author clearly holds Chicago is low esteem. He has a HUGE problem with The University of Chicago and never misses an opportunity to slam it and its greatest leaders. The long chapters on IIT and architecture as well as those about the Blues and independent record labels are so boring, I struggled to stay awake. His obsession with Nelson Algren (who from age 8 on was in Albany Park, so how he "knew" the "seedy side" of Chicago is curious) borders on ridiculous. The only interesting parts of the book were the limited ones on Ray Kroc, Hugh Hefner and (offensive as it was to me) Robert Maynard Hutchins. Most of his obsessions were kitschy crap (Kukla, Fran & Ollie) or unknowns (Sun Ra, Mahalia, etc.) What a waste of time....
The author clearly holds Chicago is low esteem. He has a HUGE problem with The University of Chicago and never misses an opportunity to slam it and its greatest leaders. The long chapters on IIT and architecture as well as those about the Blues and independent record labels are so boring, I struggled to stay awake. His obsession with Nelson Algren (who from age 8 on was in Albany Park, so how he "knew" the "seedy side" of Chicago is curious) borders on ridiculous. The only interesting parts of the book were the limited ones on Ray Kroc, Hugh Hefner and (offensive as it was to me) Robert Maynard Hutchins. Most of his obsessions were kitschy crap (Kukla, Fran & Ollie) or unknowns (Sun Ra, Mahalia, etc.) What a waste of time....
mr_robot_man's review
2.0
This book had such promise that it's frustrating to give it 2 stars. The actual information given was excellent but that isn't what makes a book good. It reads like it was written by 2 or 3 authors with completely different styles. People are introduced with the implication that the reader should know who it is, e.g. book critics and others are re-introduced multiple times. There was an unexpected amount of f*@ks written that weren't direct quotes which was surprising for this type of book. Lastly, often sentences were structured in a way that forced me to re-read sentences multiple times just to figure out what was being said.
xanderlaser's review
5.0
Great book! Chicago is the land of unfulfilled promises. However, it's dreams became the realities of modern America culture. Chicago can be thanked for sky scrapers, fast food, improv theater, rock and roll and pornography, to name just a few contribution. With its midwestern penchant for the "ordinary" (or "sanitary") and a businessman's ken for the "bottom line" it made all of these trends palatable and mass-marketable for American consumers. Though many of the fashions started in the second city found their fullest expression elsewhere, there's no denial Chicago's flat prairie soil was a fecund source of inspiration for the American dream.
What I liked about the book is that it never attempts to apologize for Chicago. It never tries to argue that Chicago is more deserving of credit than New York or LA. Dyja is keenly aware of Chicago's flaws. It lacks the aggressive chic of New York culture. It lacks the nonconformist laissez faire of LA. However, Chicago by its very realness, its flaws, its grimy ugliness pierced by rays of brilliance and beauty is in fact the truest American city.
What I liked about the book is that it never attempts to apologize for Chicago. It never tries to argue that Chicago is more deserving of credit than New York or LA. Dyja is keenly aware of Chicago's flaws. It lacks the aggressive chic of New York culture. It lacks the nonconformist laissez faire of LA. However, Chicago by its very realness, its flaws, its grimy ugliness pierced by rays of brilliance and beauty is in fact the truest American city.
abeanbg's review against another edition
5.0
A magnificent cultural history of Chicago in the middle of the 20th Century. Unfortunately, Goodreads deleted my longer review. So I'll just say this is very highly recommended.
suchkristenwow's review
1.0
I wouldn’t have finished this if it weren’t for my stubbornness. Although it contains some interesting anecdotes, there is no plot to hold it together so when I’d pick the book up again I would forget what I had read previously. It attempts to be about everything in 1950s-1960s Chicago (politics, architecture, music, theatre…) and somehow it ends up reading more like a comedy of errors. The thesis statement at the end comes out of nowhere. It’s a terrible book about a terrible place.
pearseanderson's review
2.0
I tried this book out for size, all FIVE hours of architectural education and politics, and then I realized I have 12 more hours to go. No. No thank you, Dyja. This is a series of biographies, not what I signed up for. Bye bye! 4/10.