About Boston: Sight, Sound, Flavor & Inflection

by David T.W. McCord

Book Overview

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Hardcover
• ISBN: B000K1SI0I
• Release Date: January 1964
• Publisher: Boston, Toronto: Little, Brown, & Co. 1964
• Weight: 0.35 lbs.

Customer Reviews

A walker in Boston ("A pedestrian is a man in danger of his life; a walker is a man in possession of

I do not know Boston well. I have no special interest in it. But sometimes one reads a book which simply goes to another place , and takes one to and through a world one largely doesn't know. This book did that for me. McCord is a wonderful observer of the city, particularly sensitive to the way it is perceived from various streets, neighborhoods, and times. He is a cultured observer and a walker in the city. He tells us how it developed and gives historical accounts of its great institutions and landmarks. He walks us through the Boston Common, including details of some horrifying moments of its past, when public hangings were done there. He observes how it is transformed through time, and through the eyes of some of the famous citizens of the city. McCord seems to have a particular affection for someone who lived outside the city, Thoreau and quotes him frequently. He does not however make the tour of the North Side, or the Holmes Garden or Harvard Yard, or Charles Street Number 148, in a very formal way but does it lightly and impressionistically. He gives the sense of worlds within worlds filled with city life. In one wonderful chapter he talks about the particular challenges of walking in the narrow winding streets of Boston,'from Atlantic Avenue to the Commons , from Charles Street to the Fenway, from Dover Street to Castle Island ....He details tens of different ways of walking through the city, and experiencing what to him was clearly a source of daily delight.