Reviews for Wall Street in History

The average rating for Wall Street in History based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2014-12-23 00:00:00 E.h. Koch In 'Reminiscences of Literary London' - dealing geographically with the metropolis - the coverage of periodicals, plenty long since disappeared, authors, many now little known, publishers, many now long gone, and auctioneers, some such as Christie's still in existence, is exhaustive. And Thomas Rees' account of 1853 has been augmented by extensive additions to the period under review by John Britton for this 1896 edition. There are one or two well-known authors mentioned such as Mary Russell Mitford, Leigh Hunt, Thomas Hood and William Cobbett while one such as William Combe is almost forgotten, despite his venture into the world of Doctor Syntax - but I do have a couple of Dr Syntax prints n the wall near my desk. Combe was an interesting character in that Rees reports, '[He] would sit down in the publisher's back room and extemporise a letter from Sterne at Coxwold, a forgery so well executed that it never excited suspicion.' So if you possess a copy of 'Tristram Shandy' with a Sterne letter in it, beware of its authenticity! Another long forgotten author is George Saville Carey whose 'The Balnea, or Sketches of Watering Places' was the first work to give an account of famed fashionable resorts - a first edition can now be bought for £60. Carey claimed, apparently falsely, that his father wrote 'God Save the King'. The Reverend Richard Clark of Westminster Abbey refutes this by stating that John Bull (a good old English name if ever there was one) wrote it for a performance that took place at the Merchant Taylor's School in London on 16 July 1607. There is so much important material in the book it is difficult to give it all a mention. For instance, John Major was a bookseller who was much respected by followers of Isaac Walton for he specialised in fishing books and his shop was always well stocked with the choicest items; £10 to £20 was paid by publishers for three-volume novels, that was until Colborne and Bentley 'drove this trash out of the market' [I wish I had some of that 'trash' now!]; Peter Coxe, a minor poet, once bought three pictures from the Bowood sale and they were by Sir Joshua Reynolds, George Romney and Joseph Wright of Derby - what a threesome -, the last named one of my all-time favourite painters whose use of light and shade was fantastic; Joseph Johnson was reputed to have paid £10,000 for William Hayley's 'Life of Cowper' - a three-volume 1803/4 first edition could now be purchased for as little as £260 or £1320 if 'a handsome copy' is required - and Thomas Longman, the firm still extant today, began as a publisher in 1724 at the sign of 'the Ship and Black Swan' - and the ship is still used as their logo - while John Christie, auctioneer, had premises at Pall Mall and then King Street, St James's. As for the periodicals, there were so many that sprang up including 'The London Magazine', the 'British Almanac', the 'Edinburgh Review' and the 'Quarterly Review' and 'Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopedia' that ran to 133 volumes between 1830 and 1851 and included many distinguished writers that meant 'heavy expenses were incurred' in its production. These periodicals were superseded by, or at least augmented by, a new species "The Annual", including 'Forget-me-Not', which Frederic Shoberl edited from its inception to its demise, 1823 to 1834, and many similar which covered topography, history, travels and literature. This delightful book running through Paternoster Row, St Paul's Churchyard, Fleet Street and The Strand covers a cornucopia of literary facts about writers, artists and makers and publishers of books plus the personal peculiarities of literary and business men along with many curious anecdotes and prices. And it all makes for a fascinating read.

Review # 2 was written on 2020-03-18 00:00:00 Frans van Eil My rating is for the first half of this book. I got the 1988 version from the library and the second half is about sending cassette tapes to record companies because it was written two decades before YouTube. I found the first half of the book to be full of practical, eye-opening insight. For instance, songs on the radio have to be simple and universal, unlike songs on an album which a buyer will pore over. I tend to write obscure lyrics and needed to be told that lyrics are not poetry. I've also had more experience with classical composition, which I didn't realize was so different than pop songwriting (pop has no development, just hit them over the head with the idea and get out). I liked the section that explained how to use specific, dynamic images to capture and hold the listener's imagination. The chapter on collaboration was helpful for me to understand the mindset of collaboration ("I'm working with this person to make a better song"). I tend to want to do everything myself but as my projects become more ambitious I am realizing that solo endeavors are inherently limited. Sadly, I didn't recognize the vast majority of the songs he cites as examples. That's probably because I was a toddler when the book was written ... My goal for my songs is simply to entertain mostly myself, and family and friends second, so I'm not worried about copyright or monetization. But I might try to hunt down a more up-to-date edition of this book just to learn about the process. In conclusion, I know my songs are going to be better as a result of reading this book. [One fun fact I learned is that songs in musicals always use exact rhymes, while other songs often use close rhyme. I've been listening closely to musical songs now, and they do indeed use exact rhymes. I'd never noticed.]