ABSTRACT
This chapter enquires into the nature of memory, the rituals of remembrance, and memorials to the British dead of the First World War. It has often struck me that while memorials are supposed to serve as tangible weighty structures denoting consensus, their design and style of figurative sculpture can just as easily divide as unite a community of involved/actively engaged or committed spectators. By the latter I mean those with particular emotional investments in the memorial such as ex-servicemen, parents, wives, children, brothers and sisters, and lovers of those who are being mourned. As to the issue of memory, it is also clear from the many texts generated by the processes of commissioning and unveiling memorials that how the spectator remembers assumed critical importance. It is essential for those present at a memorial unveiling and at an Armistice Day ceremony to be seen to behave in a way that has been stipulated and sanctioned by the wider community. However, building on important research by Alex King, Adrian Gregory and Serguisz Michalski, it would seem the often sharply contrasted agendas for a memorial held by ex-servicemen and those who for one reason or another did not fight in the war have been all too frequently glossed over or treated superficially ( Gregory 1994: 5–6; King 1998: 2, 13–14; Michalski 1998: 45–6; see also Winter 1995: 6, 36).
