Book Review: Ghostly Ruins

Ghostly Ruins: America's Forgotten Architecture by Harry Skrdla, published by Princeton Architectural Press, 2006. (Amazon)



What at first glance appears to be a collection of exquisite photographs documenting the ruins of America's past -- or an inadvertent guidebook to exploring those ruins -- is actually much more than that. It is a document of a time when Americans put much thought and effort into the appearance of public and private architecture, it is a call-to-arms for preservation of these places, but mainly it is a critique of the American way of life.

This last comes across not so directly in the photographs as it does in the text that introduces the book and each chapter and that accompanies each ruin. For example, in the introduction to the chapter on industry -- with places like the Bethlehem Steel Mill and Packard Plant included -- the author explains that, "money-hungry capitalists began to move their factories overseas ... [so] we've convinced ourselves that we are somehow above the mere manufacture of goods and that only backward countries still 'make' things." This sort of commentary is prevalent throughout the book, though fortunately it is balanced by the author's reverence for these places, lest his view take on an overly retroactive stance in a yearning for a return to those days which is, obviously, impossible. He is also critical of our abandonment of those glorious structures of yesterday, something circumstantial in the 20th century (suburban flight) but not necessarily excusable.

One need not share Skrdla's opinions to enjoy his book. His photographs embody the widespread appeal of ruins, what Rose Macauley in The Pleasure of Ruins calls, "the ruin-drama staged perpetually in the human imagination, half of whose desire is to build up, while the other half smashes and levels to earth." The tension between creation and destruction peppers our experience of ruins, as does the imagination filling in the blanks left over time. Ultimately ruins influence the way we do things now, as they give us a glimpse into the future of our present creations. Perhaps it's the cheap, disposable building's of today's America that frustrates Skrdla the most, as their ruined state is not too distant, and neither pleasing nor lasting either.

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