Underground London - Stephen Smith

I like London, in an I-live-there-and-it’s-a-nightmare-but-ki​nd-of-cool way. I also like a good book about the place. Which is why I picked this up in a three for two offer at one of the big bookshops in the West End a while ago. It looked like it might be quite interesting, and there were an impressive array of favourable quotes on the back. Having read it, I rather wish I’d gone for something else instead. The book is sub-titled ‘Travels Beneath the City Streets’, and it describes various subterranean bits of London that the majority of people remain blissfully unaware of – as well as some ... more

It is somewhat hard to see London as the 'flower of cities all' from dozens of feet beneath the surface. However, some of the most intriguing bits of London fall well below the surface on which most people live. London is in many ways like a Middle Eastern tell - hills that contain the ruins of cities, built up in multiple layers over time, such that the stratification can be seen and identified in ever-increasing age the deeper one goes. London isn't quite so evenly distributed, but the idea is still much the same - there are layers of the city from Roman times to the present, and the more ... more

A book promising to reveal all the secrets of what lies under the streets of London? Yes please! Such were my thoughts when I first became aware of the existence of "Underground London" - subtitles "Travels Beneath the City Streets - by journalist Stephen Smith. The book is structured according to different aspects of London underground. Thus there are chapters on London's lost rivers - a very interesting subject, on sewers, on burial grounds. At the same time other chapters are grouped by eras; thus we have "Roman London" "Anglo-Saxon London" etc. London Underground and especially its closed ... more

I picked up this booked whilst working in London for a few weeks thinking i would learn more about the city and that was the understatement of the century. As i greedily absorbed everything Smith told me in the calm yet highly detailed and referenced manner that he writes i started to become facinated with all things underground. I now cant go on The Tube without gluing my face to the window to try and glimse long closed stations. This book was truely inspiring giving an amazing insight into places that i was walking over everyday and not knowing existed. I found myself looking all around me ... more