The “New World” is Old: Journeying Through Deep Time’

Abstract

The following essay is a revised excerpt from Samuel Alexander and Brendan Gleeson's new book, Urban Awakenings: Disturbance and Enchantment in the Industrial City (Palgrave, 2021). In this, the authors' practise a method they call 'urban tramping', as they walk their home city of Melbourne in search of disturbance and enchantment. They set out, in other words, to sojourn through urban landscapes with the same sense of wonder and critical observation that a nature-walker embodies as they saunter through a rainforest. The book reports on their various perambulations, with 22 short chapters and more than 70 colour images, to document and enrich their urban tramps.