Waterloo Sunrise: London from the Sixties to Thatcher

Waterloo Sunrise is a panoramic and multifaceted account of modern London during the transformative years of the sixties and seventies, covering topics such as the rise and fall of boutique fashion, Soho and the sex trade, eating out in London, cabbies and tourists, gentrification, conservation, suburbia, and the welfare state. It traces how 'swinging London' captured the world's attention in the mid-sixties, discarded postwar austerity, and grappled with problems of deindustrialisation, inner-city blight, and racial friction.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 600 pages
Publication date: 26 March 2024
Publisher: Princeton University Press

Waterloo Sunrise is a captivating and comprehensive portrayal of modern London during the transformative sixties and seventies, when a city still grappling with the aftermath of war transformed into a vibrant yet divided metropolis. John Davis offers a vivid and colorful depiction of life in the British capital, exploring a wide range of topics such as the rise and fall of boutique fashion, Soho and the sex trade, dining out in London, cabbies and tourists, gentrification, conservation, suburbia, and the welfare state. Through vivid and immersive scene-setting, Davis traces how "swinging London" captured the world's attention in the mid-sixties, abandoning postwar austerity as it built a global reputation for youthful confidence and innovative music and fashion. He also charts the gradual erosion of the optimism of the mid-sixties, illustrating how a newly prosperous city grappled with issues of deindustrialization, inner-city blight, and racial tensions.

Davis reveals how London underwent a complex evolution that reflected an underlying tension between majority affluence and minority deprivation. He argues that the London that emerged by the time of Margaret Thatcher's election as prime minister in 1979 already exhibited many of the characteristics that would later be associated with "Thatcher's Britain of the eighties."

Waterloo Sunrise is a monumental work of history, drawing on a wealth of archival evidence to provide an evocative and engrossing account of Britain's ever-evolving capital city.

Weight: 492g
Dimension: 205 x 130 x 41 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780691223797