The space of Lefebvre

The translation of The Production of Space into English is a major event for those, like myself, otherwise lacking access to so much of Lefebvre's work. Of the sixty-six volumes he published before his death last year, only six have previously appeared in this language. The availability of The Production of Space will now help advance for Lefebvre, in the English-speaking countries, the kind of influence he has long had in Europe. Some of the book's contents have filtered into English-only circles through the writings of others (Castells, Harvey, and, most explicitly, Gottdiener);2 some insights have come our way through more or less simultaneous invention. But almost two decades after being first published, the content is rich enough to reward sustained attention. This work makes an important contribution not only to urban theory but, if appropriately understood, to theory more generally.