Railway Journey: The Industrialization of Time and Space in the Nineteenth Century

Easy read, super fascinating--even for weekend locomotive lovers.

Railway journey's.

Fascinating cultural study.

Schivelbusch connects psychology and history beautifully, though the beginning is a little slow for me.

Recently I've developed a taste for cultural histories that examine the influence of new technologies on the perception of nature, space, time, individuality (etc., etc.) The railroad is a prime example of a technology that, once adopted, profoundly altered how people perceived and interacted with their world. (And, in a very real sense, created a new world.) The railroad 'collapsed' space and time, opened up new lands to settlement (and new resources to exploitation), and inaugurated a new era of technologically-mediated experiences of nature.Wolfgang Schivelbusch's book is not only a good, concise history of the railroad (focusing on England and the United States), but a pioneering study in the cultural impacts of new technologies. It's a bit old, and in places shows its age, but is an excellent place to start for readers who share my interest in the culture/technology interface. What is particularly valuable is the realization that many of the cultural shifts associated with 'postmodernity' today (particularly 'time-space compression') are in fact rooted in such eminently modernist achievements as the railroad and (contemporaneously) the telegraph.Also valuable is Schivelbusch's discussion of resistance to the railroad. While early promoters had the idea of reorganizing transportation (of both goods and people) through a widespread adoption of rail, there were just as many - and just as vocal - dissenters. Opponents of this new technology were concerned that it would further isolate people from nature. The relentless motion of the train displaced the feelings of fatigue and physical exertion that come with long-distance travel; the speed of the train turned landscape into simply passing scenery. (In other words: the same arguments that people had and continue to have about the cultural impacts of the automobile were already taking place nearly 200 years ago!)To continue a thread of discussion in these reviews, I suggest that a book like this (and Schivelbusch's other excellent work on technology: "Disenchanted Night: The Industrialization of Light in the Nineteenth Century") be read alongside broader histories like Stephen Kern's "The Culture of Time and Space", and more focused studies of technology like David Landes' "Revolution in Time." The weakness and strength of Schivelbusch's study, when read along with these other works, is its conciseness. Schivelbusch does not delve very deeply into concurrent technologies; nor does he make broad generalizations or indulge in speculation (however warranted that may be). Instead he culls nuggets of insight from original sources and provides enough interpretation to whet the reader's appetite - perhaps for their own researches.Well written, well argued, and a quick read.

The Railway Journey is a straightforward but deceptively sophisticated work of social/cultural history that chronicles the rise of train travel and the effect this had on perceptions of space, time, travel, commerce, and ultimately 'modernity' (though the author avoids that loaded term). Schivelbusch draws mainly from primary sources and presents arguments about how significantly train travel affect the consciousness of 19th century travelers, and how the effects differed in America and Europe. The strength of the book lies in Schivelbusch's mastery of the details; the reader discovers exactly why British rails were straight while American rails curved around the landscape... the answers are rooted firmly in the economic differences between the two nations. And you learn about how the imprints of class structure differed for British and American train passengers, because British train cars evolved from stagecoaches while American train cars emulated river steamships.The goal of so many histories of science and technology is to show the connections between the physical, technical world of scientists and engineers and the broader cultural world, and how the connections run both ways. Of course it is usually easy to show how science and technology change culture, but much harder to show profound influences of culture on science and technology. But Schivelbusch does just that, and does so with crisp writing and very clear evidence; his conclusions are often profound, yet it is very hard to take issue with the connections he makes.Another reviewer recommends Kern's Culture of Time and Space over this book; while Kern takes a much broader view of the connections between culture and science, his work is so loosely constructed that it is hard to take his overreaching conclusions seriously. In particularly, Kern has a very thin understanding of the history of science (especially regarding the technical details), which frequently undermines his narrative. The Railway Journey is far more satisfying; it is a model of how cultural history of science can be done without ignoring the actual history of actual science.

The book had a lot of interesting information on the original trains, and that was worth the read, but some of this theories just don't make any sense.I get the feeling he's too willing to dislike modernization, it's one thing to say how some people disliked or were afraid of the train (the "railway spine" disease made me chuckle) but it's quite another thing to blame the railroads for everything from loss of culture to ruining cities. That is a very powerful claim but he does not seem to back it up with any real evidence. I want to see pictures of what the cities looked before and after, some statistics on income, something. You cannot make that claim without some sort of evidence.As for the alleged social side effects, I don't know how he would know that. I think that's a sweeping generalization even in its best form, and I can't really see how there could be any sort of means to show, definitively, that EVERY city that has a railroad has lost its culture due only to the railroad being there. I can't even imagine what kind of evidence would back that up.I really like the history part of it, the facts are painstakingly researched and captivating to readIf it were truly a history book I would have given it five stars, easily. But the book is about his theories of time and space and the railroad, so, unfortunately, I can't give him a good rating, because the central purpose of his novel is far too undersupported and weakly argued.

Very interesting perspective going beyond the rails into many contributing factors of change.