The First House: Myth, Paradigm, and the Task of Architecture

In the first century BC, Vitruvius Pollio narrated a myth of the origins of dwelling. In a forest clearing, previously isolated and savage people gathered about the embers of a dying fire; from this gathering emerged political institutions, human language, and the construction of permanent shelters. This volume finds in this story the foundation of an extensive theory of architecture still able to offer guideposts for architectural practice. Against any tendency toward theoretical disengagement or self-referentiality, the author argues that architecture must continue to address important political, cultural, and ecological issues. Ultimately, the role of architecture is to provide the structures that enable us to interpret the world and make it habitable. The book engages in a series of explorations of Vitruvius's myth of architectural beginnings. The first chapter develops the elemental geometric patterning of Vitruvius's account (center and periphery, secure inside and untamed outside, the vertical stance of the human subject) as a diagram both for the private house and for the public space of the city. The second chapter examines the power of paradigmatic structures-both architectural and intellectual-to represent order and authority in human affairs. The third explores architecture's capacity to represent the public realm, and through representation to help effect public action. Chapter 4 seeks to reestablish connections between architectural order and the order of the cosmos, working back from myth-making to its significance for architectural and urban practice. The final chapter addresses the task of constructing as a part of public life, while a brief epilogue proposes a revision of the Vitruvian myth in the light of modern ecological thought. Throughout, the author's meditations on Vitruvius are supplemented by extensive notes that establish points of contact with a wide array of modern writers on myth, language, political theory, and the arts.

Arts & Photography

Dripps, R. D.

Architecture

Mit Pr

<p>In the first century B.C., Vitruvius Pollio narrated a myth of the origins of dwelling. In a forest clearing, previously isolated and savage people gathered about the embers of a dying fire; from this gathering emerged political institutions, human language, and the construction of permanent shelters. R. D. Dripps finds in this story the foundation of an extensive theory of architecture still able to offer guideposts for architectural practice. Against any tendency toward theoretical disengagement or self-referentiality, Dripps argues that architecture must continue to address important political, cultural, and ecological issues. Ultimately, the role of architecture is to provide the structures that enable us to interpret the world and make it habitable.<br><br> Throughout, Dripps's intensive meditations on Vitruvius are supplemented by extensive notes that establish points of contact with a wide array of modern writers on myth, language, political theory, and the arts.</p>

Has the neuromuscular junction been over-exposed or is it perhaps already a closed book? I asked myself this at a recent International Congress when an American colleague complained that the Journal of Physiology had articles on nothing but the neuromuscular junction, while another colleague asked why I was editing a volume on a subject about which everything was already known. It is worrying to think that these views may be shared by other people. I hope that this volume will convince my two colleagues and other readers that the neuromuscular junction is very much alive and continues to attract the interest of many workers from a variety of fields; strange as it may seem, the synapse between a motor nerve ending and muscle fibre, with its relatively simple architecture, is one of the most inter esting sites in the body-I do hope we have done it justice. The various chapters of this volume present a cross section of knowledge as viewed by a group of 13 individuals, actively engaged in research. Multi-author volumes such as this are frequently criticised on the grounds that chapters or sec tions overlap. I believe that such criticium is only valid where the overlap is repetitious. Where it results in the reader having available discussions of material from differing stand-points, overlap becomes a valuable feature of this type of publication.

Neuromuscular Junction (Handbook of Experimental Pharmacology, 42)

Medical Books

Smith, S.E.

Duchen, L. W.

Bowden, R.E.M.

Collier, B.

Hale Enderby, G.E.

Ginsborg, B.L.

Head, S.

Hobbiger, F.

Jenkinson, D.H.

MacIntosh, F.C.

Maglagan, J.

Zaimis, E.

Pharmacology

Springer

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