Pevsner on Art and Architecture: The Radio Talks. . - Reviews - book review

Contemporary Review, March, 2003

Pevsner on Art and Architecture: The Radio Talks. Stephen Games, editor. Methuen. [pounds sterling]20.00. 357 pages. ISBN 0-413-77243-8. Towards the end of his life Sir Nikolaus Pevsner was revered as something approaching a demigod when it came to England's architectural heritage. Sir Nikolaus was that somewhat frightening phenomenon, a German polymath, but his influence was tremendous, in large part because of the talks he gave on BBC Radio's Third Programme (now Radio Three).

For the first time, the editor (who is also writing a life of Pevsner) has collected these talks of which some two-thirds were on architecture and one third on art. The majority deal with historical subjects and with England whilst the minority dealt with contemporary issues and foreign countries. Of a total of 80 the editor has included fifty which he deemed worthy of publication and the bulk of these are historical. The editor also provides an Introduction in which he puts Pevsner's works into an historical context. Whereas Pevsner portrayed himself as a refugee from Nazism, Mr Games shows that he had been a supporter of Hitler even though he was a Jew, albeit a convert to Christianity. The edition is well done and the Introduction whets the appetite for the full biography. (M.H.L.)