It is difficult to speak adequately or justly of London. It is not a pleasant place; it is not agreeable, or cheerful, or easy, or exempt from reproach. It is only magnificent.

Henry James (1843-1916), The Notebooks of Henry James

London is like a dream come true. As I ramble through it I am haunted by the curious feeling of something half-forgotten, but still dimly remembered, like a reminiscence of some previous state of existence. It is at once familiar and strange.

Joseph Fort Newton (1876-1950), Preaching in London: A Diary of Anglo-American Friendship

London is a labyrinth, half of stone and half of flesh.

Peter Ackroyd (b.1949), London: The Biography

London is a hell, where the Moloch of globalization is worshipped through the nightshifts.

Yosefa Loshitzky (b.1952), Screening Strangers: Migration and Diaspora in European Cinema

But hail thou giant City of the world, / Thou that dost scorn a canopy of clouds, / And in the dimness of eternal smoke, / For ever rising like an ocean-stream, / Dost mantle thine immensity – how vast / And wide thy wonderful array of domes, / In dusky masses staring at the skies!

Robert Montgomery (1807–1855), London, Religion and Poetry: Being Selections Spiritual and Moral