Twelve Cities

"In this evocation of twelve world cities which have either been intertwined with his life, or have otherwise aroused his particular interest, Roy Jenkins follows up Churchill with a book of a very different shape; short and semi-autobiographical, but also full of the wit, erudition and carefully chosen illustrations which made Churchill such a success. The cities are each described with a mixture of architectural interest, topographical insight and personal anecdote." "Jenkins has three British cities: Cardiff, which was the metropolis of his Monmouthshire childhood; Birmingham, which he represented in Parliament for twenty-seven years; and Glasgow, which he did not know well until he won a famous bye-election there in 1982, but which then aroused in him an enthusiasm far transcending politics." "There are four North European cities: Paris, of which his memories go back to 1931; Brussels, where he lived for four years as President of the European Commission; Bonn, not exactly a metropolis but the modest capital of the very successful West German polity for forty years; and Berlin, surveyed from its Wilhelmine splendour, through its 1945 degradation to its reunification and architectural resurgence in the 1990s. Then there are two essays on South European cities which both have a special and strong flavour - Naples and Barcelona." "From over a hundred visits to North America there emerge highly personal recollections of New York and a more objective view of the architectural sparkle of Chicago. Dublin, so near to home and yet so distant, concludes this delightful collection."--BOOK JACKET.

Beyond its central premise, the book can be read through the connected lenses of Nonfiction. Those themes offer useful points of attention as the characters, ideas, or world develop, especially where the book complicates the expectations of its primary category.