[lbo-talk] Graeber's latest...

Dennis Claxton ddclaxton at earthlink.net
Fri May 11 22:50:48 PDT 2012



> Speaking of which, someone told me that pre-artificial light people would frequently get up during the night and visit with friends and/or screw and then go back to sleep. With artificial light, and no doubt the temporal discipline of the pig system, this all changed. Has anyone else heard this?
>
> Doug

Try this: http://www.ucpress.edu/book.php?isbn=9780520203549

> The story of the development of artificial light in the 19th century is not only a history of its technology but a revelation of how that technology helped forge modern consciousness. The range of subjects includes the political symbolism of streetlamps, the rise of nightlife and the shop window, and the importance of the salon in the bourgeois culture. Very Highly Recommended.


> Entertaining... provides ground for much speculation -- about the deregulation of utilities, the role of lighting in crime control, the growing attraction of self-sufficient rural life and the social functions of the theater. That is no mean feat for 227 pages. -- New York Times Book Review

btw, it's a Byfield fave:


> Ted Byfield recommends: "Wolfgang Schivelbusch's Disenchanted Night: the Industrialization of Light in the Nineteenth Century is pretty short (definitely a Viridian virtue) and excellent."
>
> (((Bruce Sterling remarks: "Disenchanted Night" has some very interesting material on the European history of energy and lighting practices. Another Schivelbusch book, The Railway Journey is even better. I'm stuck in the middle of the most recent Schivelbusch book, on the history of drugs and spices .)))



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