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What is Manchester? Moving far from the glitzy shopping districts and architectural showpieces, away from cool city-centre living and modish cultural centres, this book shows us the unheralded, under-appreciated and overlooked parts of Greater Manchester in which the majority of Mancunians live, work and play. It tells the story of the city thematically, using concepts such a ‘material’, ‘atmosphere’, ‘waste’, ‘movement’ and ‘underworld’ to challenge our understanding of the quintessential post-industrial metropolis.
Bringing together contributions from twenty-five poets, academics, writers, novelists, historians, architects and artists from across the region alongside a range of captivating photographs, this book explores the history of Manchester through its chimneys, cobblestones, ginnels and graves. This wide-ranging and inclusive approach reveals a host of idiosyncrasies, hidden spaces and stories that have until now been neglected.
'Dobraszczyk and Butler have gathered together a set of excavations and forgagings which piece together very different visions of the towns and developments and rivers and canals and in-between spaces that make up the disjointed, uneven, ever-changing city of Manchester. Here, in the book’s exploration of undervalued urban spaces, readers will find the traces of other futures, snickets and ginnels, a rumour of salmon, slow-worms appearing in old brickworks, the amazing story of the city’s hibakujumoko trees, and myriad other transplantations and spaces that twenty-first-century time has passed by.'
John McAuliffe, poet and Reader of Creative Writing and Modern Literature, University of Manchester
'Manchester: Something rich and strange epitomises everything that is wonderful about this great city. The book tells the story of Manchester’s past and present in a unique and engaging way, bringing together a variety of contributors from a variety of different backgrounds.'
Michala Hulme, author of A grim almanac of Manchester and Bloody British history: Manchester'
'It is a book like the city; bold, brash, and gobby, moving from morbid self-pity to delirious triumph in mere moments. A guided tour where they pull up the floorboards and let you see what lies beneath.'
Manchester Review of Books
'There’s strong material in this ragbag of themed think-pieces - Rose recalling the attack which prompted her to reclaim the streets from her nightmares; Kalu conjuring the realities of Manchester’s sewer system with unnerving brio; Tim Edensor on the sources of municipal cobble stone; Hanson on the ubiquity of facades in post-modern, post-Factory Records Manchester - plus Simon Buckley’s celebrated ‘iPhone Lowry’ on the cover and a good helping of Dobraszczyk’s magnificently crisp photography.'
Manchester Confidential
Introduction – Manchester: seeing like a city
Atmospheres
Spirit – Morag Rose
Feel – Sean R. Mills
Corridor – Sarah Butler
Chimney – Jonathan Silver
Night – Nick Dunn
Moors – Cassie Britland
Monuments
Statue – Natalie Bradbury
Museum – Jonathan Silver
Shopping centre – Martin Dodge
Stained glass – Clare Hartwell
Sculpture – Natalie Bradbury
Movement
Exchange – Steve Hanson
Stone – Tim Edensor
Ring road – Nick Dunn
Loop – Natalie Bradbury
Bus stop – Peter Kalu
Walk – Morag Rose
Work
Cotton – Martin Dodge
Brick – James Thorp
Co–op – Natalie Bradbury
Newspaper – Natalie Bradbury
Car wash – Peter Kalu
Relics
Medieval – Clare Hartwell
Railway – Brian Rosa
Stadium – Tim Edensor
Hair – Jenna C. Ashton
Baths – Matthew Steele
Underworlds
Sewer – Peter Kalu
Arches – Brian Rosa
Grave – Cassie Britland
Violence – Andrew McMillan
Prison – Cassie Britland
Dregs
Dye – James Thorp
Arsenic – Becky Alexis-Martin
Shadows – Nick Dunn
Rhythm – Joanne Hudson
Ruins – Tim Edensor
Redundant – Matthew Steele
Secrets
Facade – Steve Hanson
Cloister – Clare Archibald
Thread – Jenna C. Ashton
Radium – Becky Alexis-Martin
Passage – Paul Dobraszczyk
Cobble – Tim Edensor
Nature
Wildscape – Joanne Hudson
Edges – Nick Dunn
Ginkgo – Becky Alexis-Martin
Canal – Morag Rose
Gardens – Matthew Steele
Destruction
Flower – Sarah Sayeed
Bee – Paul Dobraszczyk
Riot – Sarah Butler
Atom – Steve Hanson
Tudor – Paul Dobraszczyk
Home
Homeless – Steve Hanson
B&B – Sarah Butler
Synagogue – Jonathan Silver
Mosque – Qaisra Shahraz
Immigrant – Qaisra Shahraz
Laundrette – Peter Kalu
Notes on contributors
Photo acknowledgements
Index