- Expansion & Support
- My FPL
- Events
- Browse
- Research & Learn
- For You
- FPL Info
Patron Login
Item request has been placed!
×
Item request cannot be made.
×

Dear Los Angeles : the city in diaries and letters 1542 to 2018 / edited by David Kipen.
Item request has been placed!
×
Item request cannot be made.
×

Reviews
Booklist Reviews 2018 November #2
Los Angeles native and book critic Kipen performed a seven-year feat of zealous, far-ranging research ("Everything good in the world comes from either librarians or their patrons.") and editing to create what he describes as "a collective self-portrait of Los Angeles." This irresistible compendium of letter and diary excerpts from an array of voices reaching back to the Spanish missionaries follows the calendar year, but each month contains entries that span decades. March 25 delivers a 1774 note by Juan Bautista de Anza, which the guide to diarists identifies as a Basque explorer and the governor of Spanish-ruled New Mexico, followed by a 1942 entry by Bertolt Brecht about having to register as an enemy alien, and a vivid 1946 dispatch by Eleanor Roosevelt. November 12 stretches from 1854 to 2016. Rapport grows with the diarists who appear throughout the book in which regular folks mix with the likes of Lillian Gish, Dalton Trumbo, Thomas Mann, Raymond Chandler, Octavia E. Butler, Christopher Isherwood, M. F. K. Fisher, and dozens more. This West Coast match to New York Diaries (2012) is lushly rewarding. Copyright 2018 Booklist Reviews.
PW Reviews 2018 September #2
The love-hate relationship between L.A. and its inhabitants comes alive in this scintillating collection of letters and diary entries. Literary critic Kipen (
No Comments.