The Barbary Coast by Herbert Asbury6/20/2023 ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Duis, “our greatest compendium of information about American urban lowlife” 2. Asbury, however, gave different and specific titles to each book, and only gathered them together around a shared goal – the description of the underworld – and a same generic title: an informal history of. The great success of Martin Scorcese’s 2002 movie Gangs of New York, based on Asbury’s first informal history, has led publishers to rename all the books of the series “the Gangs of…”. If these books are not “urban mysteries” strictly speaking, they offer long and detailed descriptions of a city underworld and aspire to form a series, clearly identified with a common subtitle: “an informal history of the XX underworld”. Beginning with New York in 1928, he also devoted studies to San Francisco (1933), New Orleans (1936), and Chicago (1940) 1. Herbert Asbury appears as an exception: his literary hunger pushed him to describe no less than four cities. Apparently, these metropolises, with all their vices, their crimes, and their low life, gave them enough to deal with. ![]() Sue did not try to extend his vision of the Parisian underworld to other cities, Reynolds was happy with London, and Ned Buntline with New York. Most of the authors who wrote urban mysteries content themselves with a unique city. ![]()
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