Rich in facts and anecdotes, this is the perfect introduction to 18th-century London and a wonderful companion for readers of Johnson and Boswell… . Schwartz starts with the sights, sound, and smells of the metropolis–a city of steeples, chimneys, coal smoke, and intolerable street noise–and surveys in succession Work and Money, Pastimes and Pleasures, Daily Routines and Domestic Life, Travel and Transportation, and Health and Hygiene and concludes with a gallery of street ‘Londoners, ’ an independent and assertive lot, notably insolent to foreigners, especially those in French clothes. –Washington Post Book World
Outstanding… . The author packs a remarkable quantity of detail into a small space, even including a discussion of price and wage figures that will be intelligible to Americans [today]… . His prose is lucid, graceful, lively. Generously illustrated, the book also includes an extensive bibliography. –Choice

An excellent source for English Literature and history students studying this period or Samuel Johnson. –Booklist