Before skyscrapers forever transformed the landscape of the modern metropolis, the conveyance that made them possible had to be created. Invented in New York in the 1850s, the elevator became an urban fact of life on both sides of the Atlantic by the early twentieth century. While it may at first glance seem a modest innovation, it had wide-ranging effects, from fundamentally restructuring building design to reinforcing social class hierarchies by moving luxury apartments to upper levels, previously the domain of the lower classes. The cramped elevator cabin itself served as a reflection of life in modern growing cities, as a space of simultaneous intimacy and anonymity, constantly in motion. In this elegant and fascinating book, Andreas Bernard explores how the appearance of this new element changed notions of verticality and urban space. Transforming such landmarks as the Waldorf-Astoria and Ritz Tower in New York, he traces how the elevator quickly took hold in large American cities while gaining much slower acceptance in European cities like Paris and Berlin. Combining technological and architectural history with the literary and cinematic, Bernard opens up new ways of looking at the elevator--as a secular confessional when stalled between floors or as a recurring space in which couples fall in love. Rising upwards through modernity, Lifted takes the reader on a compelling ride through the history of the elevator. "Theres a great deal to admire in Bernards integration of evidence of various sorts, from building regulations and operator manuals to high literature, into a shrewd and versatile account of the transformative effect of the elevators irresistible rise on the social psychology of life in the modern metropolis from the 1870's to the 1930's. . . . For Bernard, the elevator is a Benjaminian street brought indoors and rotated on its axis: during the few seconds of ascent or descent, the perpetual & anaesthetising of attention allegedly required of the city-dweller becomes an acute anxiety." ― London Review of Books "For most of us, the innocuous topic of the elevator is hardly the stuff of cutting-edge historical theory. But in this translation by Dollenmayer (German language & literature, Worcester Polytechnic Inst.), Bernard's groundbreaking 2011 German treatise on the revolutionary transformation of a mundane engineering marvel compels readers to reimagine what they think they know about the modern urban landscape. From Elisha Graves Otis's 1854 demonstration at the Exhibition of the Industry of All Nations in New York City to the modern day, Bernard (editor,Süddeutsche Zeitung) scans the literature, philosophy, and history related to the technological innovation and presents a lucid, engaging analysis of just how Otis's elevator has gone from its original 'luster of strangeness' to the 'dull and inconspicuous.' In the process, Bernard reminds us of Georges Canguilhem's dictum that the 'history of science is not a retrospective history of progress nor the depiction of outmoded stages leading to today's truth.' VERDICT Bernard's fascinating work on technological innovation, while at times a bit esoteric, will find a ready audience among readers with a passion for innovative philosophical and cultural histories. Fans of Wolfgang Schivelbusch'sThe Railway Journeymay especially find it appealing." ― Library Journal,Brian Odom, Birmingham, AL Library "[M]any readers will indeed get a lift fromLifted. It is a very special book thoroughly researched and clearly written, and about a subject of great historical interest to a diverse group of academic scholars as well as lay readers." ― Journal of American Culture "Those seeking an intellectually entertaining series of discourses will be delighted." ― Historian "The elevator, which today seems so boring, was once a vehicle of change of compelling power. Whoever reads this book will view the worlds elevators with different eyes." ― Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung "Bernards passion for research is as impressive as the ease with which heelevator-likemoves between the disciplines of literature, art history, sociology, and psychology." ― Der Spiegel "A well-informed and engaging cultural history. . . . Whats more, Bernard manages to dissect processes that have shaped the transition from the 19th century to the 20th, illustrating the elusive phenomenon of 'modernity. After reading this study, it becomes at least temporarily impossible to use a lift without a brief contemplation of what it may particularly signify in the here and now." -- Ulrike Zitzlsperger ― Times Higher Education "In a new book, 'Lifted,' German journalist and cultural studies professor Andreas Bernard zeroes in on this experience, tracing mankinds relationship to the elevator back to its origins and finding that it has never been a totally comfortable one. 'After 150 years, we are still not used to it,' Bernard said. 'We still have not exactly learned to cope with this