Reviews

Jacobs's The Death and Life of Great American Cities forever transformed the discipline of urban planning by concentrating on what actually helped cities work. Unencumbered by generations of fatuous theorizing, Jacobs proposed a model of action that has left a positive mark in neighborhoods all over the world. Her latest salvo, Dark Age Ahead, is, despite the pessimism of many of its conclusions, also positive, less a jeremiad than a firm but helpful reminder of just how much is at stake. Jacobs sees "ominous signs of decay" in five "pillars" of our culture: family, community, higher education, science and "self policing by the learned professions." Each is given a detailed treatment, with sympathetic but hard-headed real-world assessments that are often surprising and always provocative and well-expressed. Her chapter on the decline of the nuclear family completely avoids the moral hand-wringing of the kindergarten Cassandras to place the blame on an economy that has made the affordable home either an unattainable dream or a crippling debt. Her discussion of the havoc wrought by the lack of accountability seems ripped from any number of headlines, but her analysis of the larger effects sets it apart. A lifetime of unwasted experience in a number of fields has gone into this short but pungent book, and to ignore its sober warnings would be foolish indeed. (May) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

"She once again has proven herself to be one of the most trenchant observers and challenging critics of American culture and character." -"The Christian Science Monitor"
"There's no writer more lucid than Jane Jacobs, nobody better at using wide-open eyes and clean courtly prose to decipher the changing world around us. . . . It's a tribute to Jacobs that her observations still resonate, succinct yet dead on. That's why Dark Age Ahead""is a treat to read for the way it snaps our perceptions into focus." -"San Francisco Chronicle"
"A short, dense, terse and often lyrical book that sets the wistful against the hopeful. . . . Wonderful and essential." --"Milwaukee Journal Sentinel"
"Dark Age Ahead is witty and damning. . . . It's hard to disagree with Jane Jacobs.... Worth reading and thinking about." -"The Washington Post Book World"
"Jane Jacobs has been right about so much for so long that when she writes gloomily of a 'Dark Age Ahead, ' we all better listen...Prescient." --"Austin-American Statesman"
"[Jacobs is] the matchless analyst of all things urban." --"The""New Yorker"
"A short, terse and often lyrical book that sets the wistful against the hopeful... This book is a warning, artfully and profoundly dressed as a reminder.... Thanks to Jacobs for pointing the way." --"St. Petersburg Times"
"Scholarly yet accessible...certain to spark debate...[a] unique addition to the genre of social forecasting." --"Library Journal"
"Compact and compelling...A spellbinding account of the forgetting and misplacing of shared values, assets and skills that ...may lead the contemporary Western world into widespread social, economic and physical disaster." --"Toronto Globe and Mail"
"Still right and still cranky after all these years." --"Cincinnati Enquirer"
"Jacobs has always championed neighborhoods. Now she has extended her ideas about community to include the culture at large...We should stick around and liste

Jacobs (The Death and Life of Great American Cities) defines a dark age as a period of cultural amnesia, when a society forgets its beliefs, customs, knowledge, language, practices, etc. A dark age can be caused by outside forces or by a culture itself, and she fears that North America is creating its own version of the latter. An introductory chapter identifies five threatened pillars of North American culture: family and community, higher education, science and science-based technology, taxation powers and policies, and professional self-policing. Subsequent chapters define these pillars and the dangers to them and consider the consequences of their collapse. Jacobs places arguments in historical context, contending, for example, that the transformation of North American colleges and universities from institutions of higher learning to credential factories has its roots in the Great Depression and the resulting obsession with joblessness. Jacobs does not believe a North American dark age inevitable, leavening her ominous predictions with practical solutions and mordant humor. Scholarly yet accessible, and certain to spark debate, this unique addition to the genre of social forecasting is highly recommended for public and academic libraries.-M.C. Duhig, Carnegie Lib. of Pittsburgh Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.