Rome from the Ground Up

Of the several guidebooks I have walked around Rome with on several visits, this is the most insightful. The locations, buildings, objets d'art on which the author chooses to comment are placed in the context of historical forces -- political, social, and economic. I came away with a much better understanding of the significance of what I saw then ever before in Rome.

However, there are several drawbacks. First, it is sometimes difficult to follow the text while walking. The text is keyed to the occasional picture, but not to the maps at the end of the book, so you may frequently not know just where you are and where you are to go next. Second, some of the walks are ordered in a sensible sequence; some make no sense at all, jumping back and forth over kilometer-long gaps. Third, the book tells you nothing about places you pass as you proceed from one location the author chose to the next. Finally, the book is printed on a glossy paper which makes it rather heavy, and somewhat unpleasant to carry.

My recommendation: Read this book in your hotel room, before or after your walk, but walk with a different guidebook. (My favorite for walking in Rome is still the Michelin Green Guide.)

This book will not be for everyone, but it was for me. I walked (and ran) all over Rome for a week a few months ago with the aid of a useful, but necessarily terse, guidebook. So I know the city superficially, but not very well. McGregor's treatise filled many gaps for me nicely. I wanted to know more about the architecture and history of Rome, and this book did the job. McGregor is strong on his architecture and passable on his history. I did find myself skimming some of the finer architectural points, but I put the blame on my impatience more than on the author, who writes well. I think the book is better read after, rather than before or during a trip to Rome. I found myself turning often to the maps in the back which are coordinated with the text.

I felt this was something of a mixed bag. Parts of it were illuminating and fresh (the geological overview; the argument that Rome is not a palimpsest of overlaid cities but a mosaic of successive cities lying mostly side-by-side), other parts less so (the ho-hum chapter on the Roman Forum).

There are, however, some major historical howlers. Two will suffice: McGregor states that the senate was staffed by patricians and was all-powerful, when in fact patricians were a minority in the senate and it had no legal power whatsoever. It was certainly influential, but it was hardly all-powerful. Elsewhere, McGregor states that Vespasian (69-79) succeeded Titus (79-81), when in fact it was the opposite, as the dates in brackets make clear. Silly errors in fact like this undermine my trust in those parts of the book covering areas I am less familiar with.

All in all, this book is worth having, but not a patch on Aicher's *Rome Alive* or Claridge's *Rome; An Archaeological Guide* for the curious traveller.

Writer trying to find a public
When I bought Rome from the ground up I had no idea what to expect, thinking it was perhaps something along the line of Krautheimers Profile of a city (which by the way is mentioned in the bibliograpy of the book), showing the many layers of which Rome exists and the city's long and complicated history. Just to illustrate what I mean: if you are standing in the Forum and looking at the eight surviving columns of the temple of Saturn, it would be just as easy to write ten pages about what you are seeing, as ten pages about what you are not seeing. Doing both would be quite a job. Krautheimer describes the period from 312 till 1308, skipping republic and large part of imperial Rome, and has, in my first edition, 360 very large, double columned and small lettered pages.
But Rome from the ground up is not that sort of book. Thank God, some readers will say. You' ll find that out just by taking it in your hands. The book has 320 small pages with lots of margin, small pictures, and no maps. It is organised in 8 chronological chapters, beginning with Tiber Island and Forum Boarium, than the Forum, next the imperial part of the city and so on, ending in the 19th century really. The idea of the structure is that in this way you get an chronological overview of the city, of which different parts were indeed built in different and succeeding periods. Every chapter could be a walk, or part of it. A small problem is that you would, in each part of the city, be able to point out things which do'nt fit in, and that now and then you would have to cover quite some distance to find everything that does. In his chapter on the Baroque Mc Gregor passes from the Via del Quirinale, by way of the Palazzo Barberini to the Villa Borghese. I admit that there is a lot of Baroque to be seen, but I sincerely hope he took a bus to do so (number 10, if I am not mistaken). Mc Gregor knows Rome a lot better than I do, I presume, while behind the things he writes looms a lot more knowledge which he doesn't use. And of course, it always is a pleasure to read someone who obviously loves Rome very much. And yes, he writes well, and yes, it must have been fun to write the book too. Yet, Rome from the ground up is really nothing more than a travelguide, without the facilities that normally accompany such a book. I find the title a bit of a gimmick and also the only pretentious part of the book. What is meant, is that a chronological presentation of Rome is from the ground up.
I guess the problem with Rome from the ground up is who its reader is supposed to be. Although the author himself suggest that while "the book stands on its own as a portrait of the city, its format and organisation also makes Rome from the ground up a useful guide to travelers", I don 't think I agree, on both points that is. As a guide it is not of much use, and you would be better off buying a Blue Guide (still the best). As a book to read at home it is only of use if you know Rome well. But then, if you know Rome well, this is no longer the sort of book you read. The long descriptions of streets, palazzi, museums etc. which you don't see, can be very fatiguing. As a travel guide it doesn't work. The author seems to have guessed the problems readers could have with his book. "Maps can be had free everywhere in Rome", he says, "and updating guides all the time has become useless in these modern internet-times." I find that rather silly. When you are walking through Rome, internet is not of much use. Having a map and a guide at the same time is in practice laborious. On the other hand I agree that you will always need a good map. But it is nice if text and maps are integrated in a sensible way, as long as you are walking, especially since Rome is not New York. I usually take several guides with me. At the same time Rome from the ground up, although well written, is also somewhat superficial, even while it has some nice personal touches. But if you for instance would really visit the musea which are described in the book, the texts there wouldn't be of much use. You might even have problems finding the entrance of the place you try to visit, or not find it at all. Ostia isn't there, the catacombs aren't, and 20th century EUR, the part of the city started under Mussolini, and finished after the second world war, gets no treatment, which I find a pity. And it wouldn't be fair to complain about that to the author. A guide doesn't have to deliver an ongoing story and can structure its text in an easier way. And still the Blue Guide needs more than 600 pages. In short, while using Rome from the ground up as a guide would not be comfortable, reading it at home is not much use too. Bit of a waste really.

I read many of the comments by the other reviews, and I was surprised by some of the comments, particularly those of the review from Amsterdam. Please do not read his review thinking that the Blue Guide to Rome surpasses this book. It is simply misleading and not true. The Blue Guide to Rome is opinionated and poorly written, whereas McGregor's book is more impartial and fair in its assessment of Rome.

In my edition, there are no errors that were mentioned by another reviewer. What this book lacks are clearer maps that could be consulted as you read. Flipping to the back of the book will only leave the reader confused.

I wouldn't classify this work as a travel guide, although it certainly could be used as one. The author's task here was to communicate to the reader the many facets of Rome. Rome is a conglomeration of different architectures, different pasts that has been influenced by countless people. McGregor attempts to weave it all together into a coherent "story"...a "potrait" if you will. He attempts to build Rome, "from the ground up". Think of Rome like a cake...if you were to cut it and then pull away a slice, you would see those layers. Rome is a city built on itself, and I think that this is what the title conveys.

My fingers and toes are not enough to count the number of times that I have been to Rome, and I have spent many months and years. I know the city well. When I read the book, I had not been there in almost two years. As I turned the pages of McGregor's book, I almost felt myself there. And that, I feel, is the author's greatest triumph -- providing a framework for further reading, study or travel.