was leafing through an old book this afternoon which i have not looked at in a long while. titled the living city, written by frank lloyd wright, published in 1958, it is a very

outspoken bit of criticism, centered on what he saw as the overcentralization, dehumanized values, and waning sovereignty of the individual as wrought by our big cities. to say wright had a low opinion of the grid, the skyscraper, and the cubicle of our urban centers is an understatement.

i am fond of most of the frank lloyd wright buildings i have seen, though i am by no stretch of the imagination well versed in architecture. i am, however, well versed in the romanticism which is part and parcel of any philosophical ruminations about our place as reluctant animals in the un-animal friendly world we’ve created. additionally i am an urbanite through and through. in as much i find wright’s poetical shots across our metropolitan bows bitter sweet. on the one hand we are so far gone there is the temptation to dismiss his ideas as romantic or utopian pap, on the other there is the distinct pitch of something, somehow, ringing true.

what follows is only a short bit from the first chapter of the book.

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nature

earth

the value of earth as man’s heritage, or of man as earth’s great heritage, is gone far from him now in any big city centralization has built (but never designed). centralization- without plan -has overbuilt. urban happiness of the properly citified citizen consists in crowding in confusion- lured by the hypnotic warmth, pressure, and approbation of the crowd? the screech of mechanical uproar of the big city turns the citified head, fills the citified ears- as the song of birds, wind in the trees, animal cries, or as the voices and songs of his loved ones once filled his heart. he is sidewalk-happy.

but where and as he now stands, out of the machine that his big city of the motor age has become, no citizen creates or operates more than mere machinery nor is he going to be much more than a machine himself- if his big city stays.

thus the properly citified citizen becomes a broker of profit-system ideas, a vendor of gadgetry, a salesman dealing for profit in human exaggeration; a speculator in frailties continually dealing in the ideas and inventions of others- or becomes an avid spectator. this puller of levers, pusher of the buttons of vicarious power, has power of his own only by way of mechanical craft. a “graft” is this tide on which he rides.

so a parasite of the spirit is here; dervish in a whirling vortex. yes- from the top down, and enamored of the whirl.

perpetual to-and-fro excited this citified citizen, robs him of deeper sympathy, of the meditation and reflection once his as he lived and walked under clean sky among the fresh greenery to which he was born companion. on solid earth he was neither foolproof nor weatherproof, but he was a whole man.

but he has traded his book of creation for emasculation by way of the convenient substitute; traded his origins and native pastimes with streams, woods, fields, and animals for the ubiquitous, habitual to-and-fro; taint of carbon monoxide rising from him to his rented aggregation of hard cells on upended streets overlooking hard pavements. “paramounts,” “roxies,” nightclubs, bars- such as these are his relaxation, his urban recourse. for all this easy come and easy go he lives in some cubicle among other cubicles under a landlord himself a “hotshot”- one who probably lives up there above him in a penthouse. both landlord an tenant are the living apotheosis of rent. rent! always rent in some form is the city. if not quite yet parasites- parasitic all.

so exists the properly citified urbanite! still a slave to the heard instinct, fatally committed to vicarious power- a slave in any final analysis just as the medieval laborer, not so long before him, was slave to caprice of king or state. a cultural weed now, he grows rank in the urban field.

this weed goes to seed! children keep coming and growing, now herded by the thousands in schools built like factories, run like factories: all systematically turning out herd-struck teenagers like machines turning out shoes. in knowledge-factories.

and when urban men of commerce themselves succeed, they become more than ever vicarious. soon the very successful men sink into the sham luxury their city life so continually produces. but they create nothing! spiritually impotent, a fixation has them where impotence wants them: fixation in a cliche.

but life itself has become intolerably restless; a mere tenant of the big landlord: the “big city.” yes… above the belt, if he is properly citified, the citizen has long lost sight of the true aim of normal human existence. he has accepted not only substitute means but substitute aims and ends… a vicarious life virtually sterilized by machinery, by medicine, by more and more stimulants. his demoralization has only begun.

from part one of the living city by frank lloyd wright.

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pretty over the top huh? sounds almost like a bearded prophet’s biblical screed or a pre-civil war north hatin’ speech. to be fair this very beginning section is taken out of context a bit. the book goes on to explain further and offer ideas for the alternative city of the title. one of these days i’ll share some of his thoughts specific to new york. fairly interesting.

overall i’d have to say this- it strikes me as a very valid complaint, only leveled against the wrong target. these characterizations could easily encompass our entire culture, and i don’t for a second think it’s the urban mind frame that is to blame. i think the urban mind frame is a natural outgrowth of something deeper.

but what do i know? any thoughts?