The Life of the City is a bold and innovative reassessment of the early urban avant-garde movements that sought to re-imagine and reinvent the experiential life of the city. Constructing a ground-breaking theoretical analysis of the relationships between biological life, urban culture, and modern forms of biopolitical 'experiential authority'.
'Never has the relationship between power and authority been so complex. With the idealism of fin-de-siècle Montmartre as a touchstone, Julian Brigstocke offers an inspiring account of new forms of experiential authority in the modern city. This book radically reassesses the political relationship between art and life in ways that are urgent, immediate and contemporary.' Helen Nicholson, Royal Holloway, University of London, UK 'Julian Brigstocke's The Life of the City is a path-breaking work that brings to our attention the important counter-culture of Montmartre's fin-de-siècle cabaret scene. In the years after the Commune this pre-eminent contested space of anarchist politics and cultural innovation brought to life a new expression of authority that emphasised the importance of embodiment, vitality and affect against established bourgeois norms. Weaving together important historical research with the latest geographical thinking around non-representational approaches and the importance of affect, Brigstocke's book is an important event in cultural understanding. Through this study we learn a great deal about the character of urban modernity and the challenges to forms of modern capitalist spectacle that have been there from the outset. This book will prove essential reading for all those interested in the city.' Kevin Hetherington, The Open University, UK 'Brigstocke provocatively analyses the contradictory dynamics of the Montmartre avant-garde community and shows how humor was used to contest traditional and scientific forms of authority and work against prevailing modes of subjectivation.' H-France 'Using humour, laughter, and violence as his focus, Brigstocke provides an insightful and compelling account of how the transformation that Paris experienced during the second half of the nineteenth century was seen and perceived from the heights of Montmartre. ...' Journal of Historical Geography
