He maps on the contours of Los Angeles what embracing-or rejecting-an Angeleno identity has come to mean.īecoming Los Angeles draws on a decade of Waldie’s writing about the intersection of the city’s history and its aspirations. He measures the place of nature in the city and the different ways that nature has been defined.
He encounters the immigrants and exiles, the dreamers and con artists, the celebrated and forgotten who became Los Angeles. In his exploration of sprawling Los Angeles, he considers how the city’s image was constructed and how that image fostered willful amnesia about the city’s conflicted past. Waldie’s particular concern is commonplace Los Angeles, whose rhythms of daily life are set against the gaudy backdrop of historical myth and Hollywood illusion.īecoming Los Angeles is a further account of how Waldie gained a sense of place, which James Mustich, author of 1,000 Books to Read Before You Die, described as “an almost sacramental act of attention.” Becoming Los Angeles is ultimately a book about learning how to fall in love with wherever it is you are. … Because Waldie’s breadth of knowledge is so vast, his opinions so sharp and his loyalty so deep, he is especially articulate about what we have lost.īecoming Los Angeles, a new collection by the author of the acclaimed memoir Holy Land: A Suburban Memoir, blends history, memory, and critical analysis to illuminate how Angelenos have seen themselves and their city. Becoming Los Angeles nails the city in ways big and small, as only D.
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