Saturday 22 December 2012

Dreams of London: Abandoned




London has been the greatest city in Europe, arguably the greatest in the world, for five hundred years. Here gathered from the net are some dreams of an abandoned London.




14 comments:

  1. Oh no its the end of the world as we know it. Or is it

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  2. I quite like the rainforest-devoured London picture. I would be tempted to stay there for longer than a weekend for a change!

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    1. I suspect it looks better than the reality would be.

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  3. The rainforest devoured London reminds me of James Lovegrove's novel Age of Aztec.

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  4. Interesting that the Gothic Revival architecture of Pugin and Street will have survived all the way to the end of the world.

    Nice Pics though.

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  5. Someone is doing a cool London based scenery on Lead Adventures...been chceking on it every now and then interesting stuff.

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  6. Dear John,
    Oddly enough I'm working my way through the 1894 volume of McClure's Magazine, which contains Robert Barr's The Doom of London with a number of (different) illustrations. I haven't gotten to the story yet.
    You may know Barr from the Eugene Valmont detective stories (or even his Sherlock Holmes parodies).
    I let you know if the Medway Towns escape what appears to be lethal air pollution.
    as always
    Dave

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    Replies
    1. Empires at their peak always seem to be terrified of catastrophe.

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  7. Reminds me of this, the loser to Shelley in a competition between two young bucks, itself almost forgotten now, I've always preferred the sentiment of this to the other ('winning') poem.

    Hugh...

    OZYMANDIAS

    (Later re-titled; "On a Stupendous Leg of Granite, Discovered Standing by Itself in the Deserts of Egypt, with the Inscription Inserted Below")

    In Egypt's sandy silence, all alone,
    Stands a gigantic Leg, which far off throws
    The only shadow that the Desert knows:
    "I am great OZYMANDIAS," saith the stone,
    "The King of Kings; this mighty City shows
    "The wonders of my hand." The City's gone,
    Nought but the Leg remaining to disclose
    The site of this forgotten Babylon.
    We wonder, and some Hunter may express
    Wonder like ours, when thro' the wilderness
    Where London stood, holding the Wolf in chace,
    He meets some fragments huge, and stops to guess
    What powerful but unrecorded race
    Once dwelt in that annihilated place.

    Horace Smith

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