Delirious New York. A Retroactive Manifesto for Manhattan

Authors’ Comment

The book is an polemic discourse centered on modern architecture and the city it generates. Delirious New York introduces some of Koolhaas’ favourite theoretical topics: the interpretation of “programme”, the role of density and urban overcrowding, the stances of the contemporary metropolis, the grid, etc. The author introduces the concept of Manhattanism to describe a kind of urbanity that thrives on congestion, hyper-density, mixing and superposition. This book asserts Rem Koolhaas as (probably) the most visible and incisive writer among the “starchitects” of our age.