This is the story of the women, men, boys, and girls who hawked oysters, cherries, cabbages, and pies on London's streets, feeding the capital throughout its transformation from medieval city to global metropolis. Street Food reconstructs the working lives of these poor traders, following them from the back alleys and cramped rooms they called home, to the taverns, bridges, and corners where they set up shop. It describes fast-moving food chains, heaving markets, rumbling wheelbarrows, scruffy donkeys, rushing traffic, and advertising cries that echoed through the city. The first long-term, comprehensive history of street selling in London, the book explores the intricacies of hawkers' work and their profound social, economic, and cultural importance to metropolitan life between the late sixteenth and early twentieth centuries. Based on the largest collection of archival and published evidence to date, it not only highlights the crucial roles street sellers played in fuelling the capital's expansion, but argues that their endurance over three centuries raises challenging questions about major narratives and processes of urban history, like modernization, the rise of retail, and the improvement of the streets. And it examines why the street food of the past-like the continuing vitality of street vendors around the world - is so different to the fashionable street food ubiquitous across London today.
By:
Charlie Taverner
Imprint: Oxford University Press
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions:
Height: 241mm,
Width: 160mm,
Spine: 19mm
Weight: 1g
ISBN: 9780192846945
ISBN 10: 0192846949
Pages: 256
Publication Date: 06 April 2023
Audience:
Professional and scholarly
,
Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active
Acknowledgements List of illustrations Note to the reader Introduction: Hawkers and the history of London Part 1: People Fishwives and costermongers All sorts of Londoners The status of street sellers Hawkers at home Part 2: Workers Gutter merchants Aristocracy of the kerb The costermonger class Part 3: Street food Garden city Perishing commodities As regular as the weather permits Moveable feasts The metropolitan diet Part 4: Markets Liberty of the markets In defence of hawkers Friends of the poor Part 5: Retailers About the streets Keeping score Carnivals of shopping Part 6: Tools Shops on their heads Barrow wheelers The coster's companion Part 7: Traffic Broken pavements Around the clock Crossing the road Part 8: Nuisances The costermongers' charter Infamous wretches Preventing free passage Part 9: Voices Tortures of the ear The crying art Declaring the seasons The end of the cries? Epilogue: The return of street food Curating street food Hawkers past and present Notes Appendix: Identifying street sellers, 1600-1825 Index
Charlie Taverner is a social historian of food and cities. After receiving a PhD from Birkbeck, University of London, he held an Economic History Society postdoctoral fellowship at the Institute of Historical Research. He is currently a research fellow on the ERC-funded FoodCult project, based at Trinity College Dublin. His research has appeared in journals such as History Workshop and Urban History. Previously, Charlie worked as a business and agricultural journalist, starting out on the staff of the magazine Farmers Weekly.
Reviews for Street Food: Hawkers and the History of London
a tasty tour of how we used to eat... richly researched * Bee Wilson, The Sunday Times * an immensely vivid portrayal of a forgotten London, and a tribute to the hard lives and admirable independence and resilience of Londoners past. * Christopher Hart, Daily Mail * Accessible and enjoyable... makes for vibrant, engaging reading. It is a world reconstructed with real humanity and warmth For anyone interested in the economics of food or the capitals history, this is a fascinating book. * Olivia Potts, The Spectator * Highly enjoyable, well researched and full of details, Street Food is a must read for anyone with a hunger for Londons culinary history. * CM, All About History * engaging...a comprehensive narrative, debunking stereotypes and detailing everything from the tools of the hawkers' trade... to the famous cries of the street. * Charles Wright, OnLondon * a lively and engrossing book, full of fascinating historical facts and illustrations. * , Shiny New Books * Street Food: Hawkers and the History of London places street trading and markets in the context of a changing city with a diverse population that adapted frequently...it will be enjoyed by anyone who wants to learn more about London's history, its neighbourhoods and the role that markets and street food played both in the past and present. * Diane Cunningham, London Society *
