London Steele Self-Discovery and City

London Steele Self-Discovery and City Life According to Steele At the time of its composition, Richard Steele's 24 Hours In London echoed a sentiment common to metropolitan visitors in 17th century Europe and U.K. Namely, there is expressed a certain wonderment at the urban lives that persist so seamlessly in concert and interdependency with one another. The primary theme of Steele's short story is the diversity, color and patterning of city life.

The analogy that the author draws between the hours of the day and the individuals living in any given century underscores the breadth of personalities, responsibilities and needs that comprise the city. As Steele says, "the Hours of the Day and Night are taken up in the Cities of London and Westminster by Peoples as different from each other as those who are Born in different Centuries.

Men of Six-a-Clock give way to those of Nine, they of Nine to the Generation of Twelve, and they of Twelve disappear, and make Room for the fashionable World, who have made Two-a-Clock the Noon of the Day." (p. 129) To Steele's observation, one of the finest pleasures of visiting, traversing or residing in the city is the opportunity to observe the endless parade of humanity.

The growing importance of the city as a hub of human activity, of social gathering, of commercial expansion had created a theretofore unseen venue for diversity in interaction. Steele treasures this, describing it as perhaps the only way to observe the integration of such a variant spectrum of activities as to compare to differing periods in human history.

Indeed, Steele seems to make the case that in the friendly interactions he has with the motley array of strangers he encounters across a twenty-four hour period that city life is rife with chance engagements, unexpected delights, unpredictable changes and unending stimulation. It is so much the case that Steele describes his jaunt through London as an experience from which he expects ultimately to awake with a newfound perspective and appreciation for life. To Steele, this idle and pleasurable time is a part of personal and emotional growth.

To be sure, the text in question is driven by the era's emphasis on Literary Romanticism, where self-discovery is considered among the highest pursuits. As Steele proceeds through the busy squares and thoroughfares of London, by the docks and through quiet alleys, he offers a sweeping and concise keyhole view into urban subsistence in his time. And he does so with no small air of affection for the bustling sense of purpose bred by this place.

The author observes that "chimney-sweepers passed by us as we made up to the Market, and some Raillery happened between one of the Fruit-Wenches and those black Men, about the Devil and Eve, with Allusion to the several Professions. I could not believe any Place more entertaining than Covent-Garden; where I strolled from one Fruit Shop or another, with Crowds of agreeable youn Women around me." (p. 130) So stimulating is this experience that it produces a resolution for Steele which recommends to the reader a particular approach to the world.

In his.