"Less a Word Than a Metaphoric Idea"

"The idyllic Hollywoodland concept—Mediterranean home with ocean and canyon views! Double lot! Freshly paved roads!—would prove far less enduring than the sign itself, despite the fact that regular maintenance of the letters (made of wood with hammered-on tin) ended in 1939, leaving the sign basically to rot in plain view."

Paul Brownfield in the Los Angeles Times reviews Leo Braudy's The Hollywood Sign: Fantasy and Reality of an American Icon.