Kicking off the new year with the 109th Salon discussing dreams and dooms in visions of the future city with Matt Brown and Niall Kishtainy.
doors: 7pm
London is a city of dreams.
A city of possibility and courageous aspirations. Author Niall Kishtainy draws us into the imaginative worlds of dreamers like Thomas More, the Diggers, William Morris, and Extinction Rebellion protestors. He introduces us to thinkers like Thomas Spence the fiery radical bookseller and coin dealer who built a utopian movement in the alleys and taverns of Holborn and Soho and the squatter community of Claremont Road in Leyton in the 1990s, which began as an anti roads protest and turned into a situationist-inspired countercultural utopia and why he thinks utopian dreams remain as relevant as ever.
London is a city of nightmares.
A city whose clock is ticking and whose end is just around the corner. Author Matt Brown draws us into the darkness of those who have had visions of the city's utter destruction and introduces some of those who have prophesized its coming doom
long before Hollywood. We'll meet Richard Jefferies, who foresaw the city relapsing into barbarism before being reclaimed by nature, as well as more famous novelists, illustrators and even architects who pictured London in ruins.
At the end, Matt will reveal his Top 3 most-implausible doomsday scenarios."
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Matt Brown is Editor-at-Large of Londonist and probably the most London-obsessed person in the world, reaching parts of the capital others can’t reach. He has waded along the buried River Fleet, spent the night in a haunted plague pit, caught a lung infection by climbing Soho’s tallest steeple and walked along the tracks beneath Leicester Square at 2am.
Matt is author of 12 books, including London Night and Day, Everything You Know About London Is Wrong and the bestselling/award-winning Atlas of Imagined Places
Niall Kishtainy writes about visionary social thinkers and the history of ideas. His first book, A Little History of Economics, has been translated into over twenty languages. Before becoming a writer he worked in government, international development, journalism and academia.
His book The Infinite City: Utopian Dreams on the Streets of London shows how London’s spirit has been one of visionary imagination amid relentless change and innovation.
