Permanent Londoners: An Illustrated Guide to the Cemeteries of London

by Judi Culbertson, Tom Randall

Provides a guide to the burial places of England's royalty, heroes, villians, poets, scientists, musicians, and statesmen

Genres: Nonfiction, Travel, British Literature, History, Death, Biography, London

327 pages, Paperback

First published March 5, 1991

Reviews

[Loren · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love the Culbertson and Randall "Permanent" series books because they don't strive to be comprehensive. Other cemetery guides become tedious lists of all the famous people jammed into a cemetery, but these books go for depth instead, collecting up biographies of a few choice permanent residents. It's arguable you take more away from this series than the others, where either you recognize the famous names or you don't.

While Permanent Londoners spends a fair amount of time on the Magnificent Seven cemeteries (Brompton, Highgate, Kensal Green, etc.), it really shines for poking around inside landmarks that make up in history what they lack in acreage. Four chapters explore Westminster Abbey; one covers the Poets' Corner alone. Other chapters look into the Tower of London and St. Paul's crypt. That's worth the price of the book right there, as far as I'm concerned.

I also like that the book wanders as far as Windsor Castle, discussing the monarchs who chose to be buried at home, rather than in town.

My copy was published in 1996, but I see a more recent version came out in 2000. I hope someone allows them to update it for the current decade.

[jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a thick guide to the cemeteries of the city, with a focus on the burial places of the rich and famous. In London, that means royals, poets and writers, and historical figures. It starts off at Westminster Abbey, proceeds to The Tower of London, covers St. Paul's, Highgate, Hampstead and Golder's Green, then into South London and Windsor. Along with directions and descriptions of burial spots, biographies or historical information about the person or grave marker is included. There are black and white photos of many of the tombs.

[Allison · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a book that I kept in my car to flip through whenever I was waiting and in need of a book. It was great for that because I could pick it up and read a bit about some London cemeteries and people buried in them and easily put it down again. So, now I'm going to have to come up with another book like this for the car.

[hh · Rating 3 out of 5]

this book is essentially a travel guide involving things i like a lot: london, dead people, old churches, and historical and cultural biographies.

the author is a little quirky, which is nice, but some people whom he chose to mention in passing are ones i would have liked to have known about.

this book was fun. recommended if you're someone who's interested in epitaphs and memorials in a historical context.

[Ronn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even though it's much more of a tour guidebook than anything else, it still made for very interesting reading. The bios are clear and concise. I havent been to most of the places included, but for those that I have, I found the directions to be quite accurate. Recommended for Anglophiles and cemetery buffs.

[Lisa James · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty awesome tour of the inhabitants of note at the various cemeteries in London. Some of these places are now on my bucket list :)

[Amanda Witt]

A very detailed read about all the royals and other famous people over the centuries buried or at least memorialised in large places like Westminster Abbey to smaller cemeteries.