Oral testimony is one of the most valuable but challenging sources for the study of modern history, providing access to knowledge and experience unavailable to historians of earlier periods. In this groundbreaking collection, oral testimonies are used to explore themes relating to the construction of urban memories in European cities during the twentieth century. From the daily experiences of city life, to personal and communal responses to urban change and regeneration, to migration and the construction of ethnic identities, oral history is employed to enrich our understanding of urban history. It offers insights and perspectives that both enhance existing approaches and forces us to re-examine official histories based on more traditional sources of documentation. Moreover, it enables the historian to understand something of the nature of memory itself, and how people construct their own versions of the urban experience to try to make sense of the past. By using the full range of opportunities offered by oral history, as well as fully considering the related methodological issues of interpretation, this volume provides a fascinating insight into one of the least explored areas of urban history. As well as adding to our understanding of the European urban experience, it highlights the potential of this intersection of oral and urban history.

“Ruiz Zafón’s visionary storytelling prowess is a genre unto itself.”—USA Today Return to the mythical Barcelona library known as the Cemetery of Forgotten Books in this posthumous collection of stories from the New York Times bestselling author of The Shadow of the Wind and The Labyrinth of the Spirits. Bestselling author Carlos Ruiz Zafón conceived of this collection of stories as an appreciation to the countless readers who joined him on the extraordinary journey that began with The Shadow of the Wind. Comprising eleven stories, most of them never before published in English, The City of Mist offers the reader compelling characters, unique situations, and a gothic atmosphere reminiscent of his beloved Cemetery of Forgotten Books quartet. The stories are mysterious, imbued with a sense of menace, and told with the warmth, wit, and humor of Zafón's inimitable voice. A boy decides to become a writer when he discovers that his creative gifts capture the attentions of an aloof young beauty who has stolen his heart. A labyrinth maker flees Constantinople to a plague-ridden Barcelona, with plans for building a library impervious to the destruction of time. A strange gentleman tempts Cervantes to write a book like no other, each page of which could prolong the life of the woman he loves. And a brilliant Catalan architect named Antoni Gaudí reluctantly agrees to cross the ocean to New York, a voyage that will determine the fate of an unfinished masterpiece. Imaginative and beguiling, these and other stories in The City of Mist summon up the mesmerizing magic of their brilliant creator and invite us to come dream along with him.

This is the story of the young women of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, who unwittingly played a crucial role in one of the most significant moments in U.S. history. The Tennessee town of Oak Ridge was created from scratch in 1942. One of the Manhattan Project's secret cities. All knew something big was happening at Oak Ridge, but few could piece together the true nature of their work until the bomb "Little Boy" was dropped over Hiroshima, Japan, and the secret was out. The reverberations from their work there, work they did not fully understand at the time, are still being felt today.

Jakarta is a fascinating city. It's attraction lies in the incredibly wide variety of people - Indonesians, Chinese, Indians, Arabs and Europeans - who have arrived over the centuries, bringing with them their own habits, folklore and culture. Their descendants have resulted in a vibrant mix of people, most of them making a living along the thousands of small lanes and alleys that criss-cross the kampungs of this enormous city. Artefacts indicate that this area was inhabited from the fifth century. Hundreds of years later, a small trading post on the coast named Kelapa was founded and eventually grew into the mega-city of Jakarta with over twenty million people. This book provides a unique look at the history of Jakarta through the eyes of individuals who have walked its streets through the ages, revealing how some of the challenges confronting the city today - congestion, poverty, floods and land subsidence - mirror the struggles the city has had to face in the past.

Oral testimony is one of the most valuable but challenging sources for the study of modern history, providing access to knowledge and experience unavailable to historians of earlier periods. In this groundbreaking collection, oral testimonies are used to explore themes relating to the construction of urban memories in European cities during the twentieth century. By using the full range of opportunities offered by oral history, as well as fully considering the related methodological issues of interpretation, this volume provides a fascinating insight into one of the least explored areas of urban history. As well as adding to our understanding of the European urban experience, it highlights the potential of this intersection of oral and urban history.

Nationalists and nativists often blame the figure of the immigrant 'other' for society's ills, contrasting this with the 'local' or 'native' whose livelihood and way of life are seen as under threat from immigration. Being at ease with difference is seen as the worldview of a cosmopolitan elite.Stories from a migrant city argues for an urgent transformation of how such terms are understood and deployed. Drawing on eight years of research in an English provincial city and a biographical approach to oral history, this book challenges the ways in which people have come to be seen as 'migrants' or 'locals' and understood to have opposing interests. Non-elite cosmopolitanism is shown to be alive and well, in spite of racism, the legacies of empire and the devastating effects of four decades of neoliberalism.

Nestled along the Massachusetts coast, the small town of Arkham has existed for centuries. It is the source of countless rumors and legends. Tales of Arkham are whispered by those who have visited it, each telling a different and remarkable account. Reports of impossible occurrences, peculiar happenings and bizarre events, tales that test the sanity of the reader are to be found here. Magic, mysteries, monsters, mayhem, and ancient malignancies form the foundation of this unforgettable Eastern town. Collected in this volume are the strange and terrifying stories of the legend-haunted city.