Why read The Memorial to the Missing of the Somme?

Book cover of The Memorial to the Missing of the Somme

Book description

Edwin Lutyens' Memorial to the Missing of the Somme at Thiepval in Northern France, visited annually by tens of thousands of tourists, is arguably the finest structure erected by any British architect in the twentieth century. It is the principal, tangible expression of the defining event in Britain's experience and…

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Why read it?

1 author picked The Memorial to the Missing of the Somme as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Rosemary Hill

Author

This is my most personal choice. The architectural historian and critic Gavin Stamp, who died in 2017, was my husband. This was one of his best and most deeply felt books. It tells the story of the memorial arch at Thiepval in Belgium designed by Edwin Lutyens, which bears the names of 73,000 men whose bodies were never found after the catastrophic Battle of the Somme in July 1916. It shows how architecture can bestow dignity on loss, how it can both embody grief and to some extent relieve it. Gavin’s book looks beyond the monument itself to meditate on…

From Rosemary's list on The best books about the way that architecture reflects British history and society.