ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book analyses the impact water has on categories such as identity, language, media of expression, and communication and divide, exemplified most notably by such cities floating on water as Venice and Amsterdam. It examines how Ferrara was architecturally and urbanistically planned along its river, the Po – indeed Italy’s biggest, longest and, consequently, ‘most rivery’ of rivers – when its entire riverfront was the focus of numerous interventions by the Estes aimed at creating a magnificent backdrop for those who reached the city by water. The book also analyses the cryptic monument to France’s Second World War deportees, carved out from the banks of the Seine in the early 1960s. It focuses on the work of Nadav Kander’s photographic series Yangtze: The Long River.
