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Museum Without Walls
'We are surrounded by the greatest of free shows. Places" Jonathan Meades has an obsessive preoccupation with places. He has spent thirty years constructing sixty films, two novels and hundreds of pieces of journalism that explore an extraordinary range of them, from natural landscapes to man-made buildings and 'the gaps between them', drawing attention to what he calls 'the rich oddness of what we take for granted'. This book collects 54 pieces and six film scripts that dissolve the barriers between high and low culture, good and bad taste, deep seriousness and black comedy. Meades delivers 'heavy entertainment' - strong opinions backed up by an astonishing depth of knowledge. To read Meades on places, buildings, politics, or cultural history is an exhilarating workout for the mind. He leaves you better informed, more alert, less gullible. "Everything is fantastical if you stare at it for long enough. Everything is interesting."
446 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2012
34 people are currently reading
334 people want to read
About the author
Jonathan Meades
25 books51 followersJonathan Turner Meades (born 21 January 1947) is a writer, food journalist, essayist and film-maker. Meades has written and performed in more than 50 television shows on predominantly topographical subjects. His books include three works of fiction and several anthologies.
Meades is an Honorary Associate of the National Secular Society and a Patron of the British Humanist Association.
Meades was born in Salisbury, Wiltshire, and educated at King's College, Taunton, which he described as "a dim, muscular Christian boot camp". He studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) in 1968.
Meades wrote reviews and articles for The Times for many years, and was specifically its restaurant critic from 1986 to 2001. He was voted Best Food Journalist in the 1999 Glenfiddich Awards. Having given up writing about English cuisine in 2001 after being The Times' restaurant critic for fifteen years, Meades estimated, in an interview with Restaurant magazine, that he had put on 5 lb a year during his reviewing period, which works out around an ounce per restaurant. By his own statement in the series Meades Eats, after being pronounced 'morbidly obese' he subsequently managed to lose a third of his body weight over the course of a year.
His first collection of stories Filthy English was followed by Pompey (1993), which was widely praised and compared to Sterne, Scarfe, Steadman, Dickens and Joyce amongst other great stylists.
Meades' An Encyclopaedia of Myself was published in May 2014 by Fourth Estate. It was long-listed for that year's Samuel Johnson Prize and won Best Memoir in the Spear's Book Awards 2014. Roger Lewis of the Financial Times said of the work that "If this book is thought of less as a memoir than as a symphonic poem about post-war England and Englishness – well, then it is a masterpiece."
Meades's book Museum Without Walls was published on the Unbound crowd-funding site, in both print and e-book editions.
Meades is an Honorary Associate of the National Secular Society and a Patron of the British Humanist Association.
Meades was born in Salisbury, Wiltshire, and educated at King's College, Taunton, which he described as "a dim, muscular Christian boot camp". He studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) in 1968.
Meades wrote reviews and articles for The Times for many years, and was specifically its restaurant critic from 1986 to 2001. He was voted Best Food Journalist in the 1999 Glenfiddich Awards. Having given up writing about English cuisine in 2001 after being The Times' restaurant critic for fifteen years, Meades estimated, in an interview with Restaurant magazine, that he had put on 5 lb a year during his reviewing period, which works out around an ounce per restaurant. By his own statement in the series Meades Eats, after being pronounced 'morbidly obese' he subsequently managed to lose a third of his body weight over the course of a year.
His first collection of stories Filthy English was followed by Pompey (1993), which was widely praised and compared to Sterne, Scarfe, Steadman, Dickens and Joyce amongst other great stylists.
Meades' An Encyclopaedia of Myself was published in May 2014 by Fourth Estate. It was long-listed for that year's Samuel Johnson Prize and won Best Memoir in the Spear's Book Awards 2014. Roger Lewis of the Financial Times said of the work that "If this book is thought of less as a memoir than as a symphonic poem about post-war England and Englishness – well, then it is a masterpiece."
Meades's book Museum Without Walls was published on the Unbound crowd-funding site, in both print and e-book editions.
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Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews
April 2, 2019
The best bellowing contrarian in the land. This is mostly just TV scripts I've already seen, and though this means that we can at last catch up with his rapid-fire aesthetic barbs, they still suffer without their inspired, bizarre visual production.
A sense of loneliness comes through on paper (anger and historical command is the dominant note in the programmes). You can see almost all his work at this Youtube channel. It is a fine use of a week.
A sense of loneliness comes through on paper (anger and historical command is the dominant note in the programmes). You can see almost all his work at this Youtube channel. It is a fine use of a week.
November 25, 2014
For me about the best read of 2012. I admire his work and his writing maybe not least because I find it impossible to disagree with him. Some of the essays in the book covers parts of the country which I know well; others simply provide a reason to go and see. One particular favourite note is that at Harvington by Kidderminster is a graveyard for reliant robins which are cannibalised to form the motorised trikes for the hells angels. Taken with the cds from his TV work, most recently on Essex, Jonathan Meades is a profund and cnetral commentator on the aesthetics and mores of our times.
December 9, 2019
“We are all of us prey to itineraries of what is already mediated by prose and photographs and television, the prepared scapes, the ready made vistas, the off-the peg sublimity, the store-bought sites of emetic picturesqueness. It was always thus: hence the majority of Grand Tourists of a quarter of a millennium ago took in the same places and were forever running into each other. We see what we have been taught to see.”
Meades is clearly a learned man and this is one of those books where I stumbled upon all sorts of treasures and titbits to chase up later on. There were times when his vast knowledge seemed to get in the way of his writing, as a result it can really break the flow and impact of some of his essays, but this is a price worth paying for the greater pay-off of the whole book.
“The internet has been a great boon to fans of pornography and amateur genealogists. One pursuit will make you go blind…the other will merely boost sales of Superstrength Kleenex Mansize New Labour Expenses Wipes.”
Of the six scripts included in here, I would say at least half of them are excellent and really give us a feel for his distinctive style of presenting and tackling subjects. He makes so many vital points on so many compelling topics. He is clearly not a fan of the suburbs of Brussels, garden cities, Tony Blair or Michael Heseltine, but his love and passion of so many other things is apparent and enjoyable to digest.
His approach seems to flit between snobby and pretentious to totally absorbing and many things in between, ensuring that this is a varied, deep, challenging and rewarding experience that pulls you in all sorts of directions. Put simply Meades is one of those writers who makes you look at familiar subjects in a new light and teaches you a lot about subjects you scarcely knew anything about.
This collection put me in mind of so many other fine and contemporary essayists and men of the world, the likes of Iain Sinclair, Ian Nairn, Geoff Dyer and A.A. Gill and like those guys he seems perennially inquisitive about the world around him, eager to find what lies beyond the next horizon. His childlike enthusiasm brings all sorts of weird and wonderful obscurities to life and this was a really enjoyable read.
March 6, 2021
Cannot stress how much I love Jonathan Meades
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October 21, 2024Like many/most readers, I’m guessing, I first became aware of Jonathan Meades through his delightfully idiosyncratic BBC-however-many series. And if anyone wants to narrate my life, I would want it to be him.
In every essay here, I could hear his voice, his unique intonations (hardly surprising for a RADA-trained actor). But this is also the weakness of the text if you’re already a fan of TV Meades. In addition to the fact that much of the text is just scripts for those series (making me realize how much I’d remembered verbatim, certainly a sign that these are lines worthy of theatrical memorization), much else consists of draft versions that would later become full-length documentaries (e.g. “On the Brandwagon,” which was an OK essay and an insanely fun doc). So for an already-fan, the text is of limited use. And yet each page is brilliant. If you don’t know Meades, read this! As for me, I’m really looking forward to the rest of his literary oeuvre.
In every essay here, I could hear his voice, his unique intonations (hardly surprising for a RADA-trained actor). But this is also the weakness of the text if you’re already a fan of TV Meades. In addition to the fact that much of the text is just scripts for those series (making me realize how much I’d remembered verbatim, certainly a sign that these are lines worthy of theatrical memorization), much else consists of draft versions that would later become full-length documentaries (e.g. “On the Brandwagon,” which was an OK essay and an insanely fun doc). So for an already-fan, the text is of limited use. And yet each page is brilliant. If you don’t know Meades, read this! As for me, I’m really looking forward to the rest of his literary oeuvre.
June 5, 2013
I'm biased but this is a magnificent collection of a masterful writer who doesn't get anything like th recognition he deserves.
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July 7, 2024On the front, the only amusing or insightful thing AA Gill ever said reminds us that "Jonathan Meades is the Jonathan Meades of our generation", which seems about as good a summary as you'll get. 'Writer, film-maker and architecture critic' won't really suffice, will it? Doesn't come close to capturing the scale or the strangeness of him, the essential Meades-ness. Equivalent to describing the Pyramids in terms which could equally apply to the local crem. Equally, another blurb's comparison to Cobbett's Rural Rides is fascinating, in that it captures some of the magisterial spleen on offer, the sweeping prescriptions and proscriptions – but at the same time, Cobbett is one of the recurring betes noires here, a key player in the history of anti-urbanism which Meades sees as having damaged both Britain's cities and its countryside, draining the former and concreting the latter in its desperate denial, building suburbs that aren't even sub-urbs anymore, just burbs, endless and dead nowheres in particular. And of course that was before the Event further fucked the cities, though more than once you sense that Meades, far-seeing as ever, suspected something along the lines of the last decade's many reversals was coming: "We are very likely living in an era when the world has achieved maximum shrinkage, is smaller than it will be for a long time to come. [...] We are not going to be getaway people forever. Escape may not be an option." That in 2006, ten years before the walls really started going up.
Equally, watching one of his films, my millennial spouse compared his juxtapositions of voice and image, his sudden visual gags, to a YouTuber, and there's something else he anticipated. Scripts for several of the films are included here, and realising that I can read them in half or a third of the time the films take helped me clarify for myself why I can't really be doing with actual YouTubers much, even the few who aren't chortling/droning/somehow both chortling and droning halfwits; unless you've got an eye for film to match Meades and his collaborators, which almost nobody does, just stop wasting my time and give me the transcript. In Meades' case, where they are worth watching, the script is still useful in the way scripts are, for checking details, not least the locations; this was especially handy in the case of Victoria Died In 1901 And Is Still Alive Today, where a fair few of them are not far from my gaff. That one is also especially good on what Meades sees as an endemic disease of British architecture, where there must always be an appeal to some virtue or other behind British buildings, rather than just saying it looks good – the result, of course, is buildings as hypocritically pitched as they are visually uninspiring. Which leads in nicely to illustrations of the same problem as more recently expressed in the chapter on bullshit urban regeneration projects – although this is more afflicted than most of the book by the repetitiveness of which journalism collections can become victims, even if the point all the pieces are making is solid, and each iteration has some great lines not shared with the others. Still, as much as Meades tearing strips off all and sundry is always fun, it's good for the soul to see that balanced with his enthusiasms, whether for buildings a mere contrarian might feel obliged to slag off (of course he has the sense to love St Paul's – though he does point out it really isn't very cathedral, which is true, and one of the best things about it), or the more surprising likes of amateur shacks and Norman Foster. The collection concludes perfectly with a paean to five architects overlooked because they don't fit prevailing narratives, comrades in Meades' crosstime, interdisciplinary awkward squad; I was delighted to see our splendidly named local oddity Sextus Dyball, "to whom all devotees of inspired ugliness and sinister gracelessness will be forever indebted", made the team. Turns out my dream local house (we all have one, surely?) is one of his, and even more so now I know living there would also constitute an excuse to offer Jonathan Meades a viewing.
Equally, watching one of his films, my millennial spouse compared his juxtapositions of voice and image, his sudden visual gags, to a YouTuber, and there's something else he anticipated. Scripts for several of the films are included here, and realising that I can read them in half or a third of the time the films take helped me clarify for myself why I can't really be doing with actual YouTubers much, even the few who aren't chortling/droning/somehow both chortling and droning halfwits; unless you've got an eye for film to match Meades and his collaborators, which almost nobody does, just stop wasting my time and give me the transcript. In Meades' case, where they are worth watching, the script is still useful in the way scripts are, for checking details, not least the locations; this was especially handy in the case of Victoria Died In 1901 And Is Still Alive Today, where a fair few of them are not far from my gaff. That one is also especially good on what Meades sees as an endemic disease of British architecture, where there must always be an appeal to some virtue or other behind British buildings, rather than just saying it looks good – the result, of course, is buildings as hypocritically pitched as they are visually uninspiring. Which leads in nicely to illustrations of the same problem as more recently expressed in the chapter on bullshit urban regeneration projects – although this is more afflicted than most of the book by the repetitiveness of which journalism collections can become victims, even if the point all the pieces are making is solid, and each iteration has some great lines not shared with the others. Still, as much as Meades tearing strips off all and sundry is always fun, it's good for the soul to see that balanced with his enthusiasms, whether for buildings a mere contrarian might feel obliged to slag off (of course he has the sense to love St Paul's – though he does point out it really isn't very cathedral, which is true, and one of the best things about it), or the more surprising likes of amateur shacks and Norman Foster. The collection concludes perfectly with a paean to five architects overlooked because they don't fit prevailing narratives, comrades in Meades' crosstime, interdisciplinary awkward squad; I was delighted to see our splendidly named local oddity Sextus Dyball, "to whom all devotees of inspired ugliness and sinister gracelessness will be forever indebted", made the team. Turns out my dream local house (we all have one, surely?) is one of his, and even more so now I know living there would also constitute an excuse to offer Jonathan Meades a viewing.
October 15, 2018
Easily one of the best reads in recent memory. I revisit the book time and time again to enjoy Meades' dynamic, fluid writing, describing the beauty of everyday places and environments. I don't feel Meades has ever gained the widespread notoriety and respect that his exceptional prose and body of work deserves. One of the greatest influences on my writing, by far.
June 6, 2017
Whether you are familiar with his TV work or not, these essays are an excellent introduction to Meades' style and composition. He is a writer that is interested in everything, and he makes this clear will a wonderfully playful use of language and imagery.
September 22, 2017
As irascible and demanding as his films, these collected writings of Jonathan Meades are at times challenging, witty, infuriating and contradictory. They are all, however, true to his own views on art, architecture, and society.
February 28, 2021
Plenty of architectural entertain and information. The WW Nazi building film is worth tracking down. Frequent access to a dictionary may be required depending on reader smart arsiness.
June 19, 2013
Museum Without Walls collects essays, articles and TV scripts by Jonathan Meades. And it is an immensely enjoyable read. Meades' obsession is with Place and how it shapes and influences us.
Meades is a brilliant writer, skewering his targets with deadpan, razor wit. His special ire is reserved for Architects and the insipid buildings they inflict upon us. A great architect can inspire and transform the people who live in their buildings. A poor one can inflict bland mediocrity upon us.
The writing here ranges from examinations of the buildings of Hitler and Stalin to the strange charm of shacks in the Severn Valley; from suburban Britain to our fascination with all things Victorian.
Meades is opinionated to be sure, but its hard to disagree with him when he makes his arguments with such persuasive prose. And it is always backed up by the wealth of knowledge he has gathered over the years.
The only part of the book that didn't work for me is the inclusion of some of his TV scripts. Meades is brilliant in front of the camera, subverting the conventions of the usual TV talking heads with his deadpan delivery. You really need to see the TV programmes to see these scripts come to life. A judicious search on YouTube show you what I mean. All his TV programmes are there.
Otherwise, a brilliant, informative, funny, opinionated (in the best sense) book. Go read.
Meades is a brilliant writer, skewering his targets with deadpan, razor wit. His special ire is reserved for Architects and the insipid buildings they inflict upon us. A great architect can inspire and transform the people who live in their buildings. A poor one can inflict bland mediocrity upon us.
The writing here ranges from examinations of the buildings of Hitler and Stalin to the strange charm of shacks in the Severn Valley; from suburban Britain to our fascination with all things Victorian.
Meades is opinionated to be sure, but its hard to disagree with him when he makes his arguments with such persuasive prose. And it is always backed up by the wealth of knowledge he has gathered over the years.
The only part of the book that didn't work for me is the inclusion of some of his TV scripts. Meades is brilliant in front of the camera, subverting the conventions of the usual TV talking heads with his deadpan delivery. You really need to see the TV programmes to see these scripts come to life. A judicious search on YouTube show you what I mean. All his TV programmes are there.
Otherwise, a brilliant, informative, funny, opinionated (in the best sense) book. Go read.
October 27, 2014
Meades has the uncanny ability to make the preposterous sound commonplace and the commonplace preposterous. It is less of a book or collection of essays as typescripts from his television work and as such it does lose a bit of context without the accompanying visuals. Hence I found myself on frequent occasions reaching for the internet in order to look up a referenced building/figure/architect.
Nevertheless this is pure Meades and his voice is prominent throughout: explaining, mocking, cajoling. Always fascinating. Always erudite.
However given these pieces are from different times they can begin to meld into each other if read sequentially. (Note to editor: please ask Mr Meades to refrain, if possible, from the use of the word "quoditian". After the fortieth instance it does grate heavily on the nerves.)
Nevertheless this is pure Meades and his voice is prominent throughout: explaining, mocking, cajoling. Always fascinating. Always erudite.
However given these pieces are from different times they can begin to meld into each other if read sequentially. (Note to editor: please ask Mr Meades to refrain, if possible, from the use of the word "quoditian". After the fortieth instance it does grate heavily on the nerves.)
June 2, 2015
I do like Jonathan Meades - it's so great to have someone who is unapologetically intellectual when there is so little that can even be called intelligent on television. This book is a collection of his writings arranged around a vague theme of place, with a few of his tv scripts put in as well. His prose fizzes with energy and erudition, and generally takes no prisoners. I don't always agree with him but he is always entertaining & thought-provoking. The nature of a collection of essays like this from various sources inevitably means that there are repetitions but by the end some of them were becoming a little annoying: it would have benefitted from a bit of judicious editing; or being sightly shorter. I did read it in one go & it might have been better read a bit at a time but it was still hugely enjoyable.
September 29, 2016
Great value. Infuriating, exasperating, but always entertaining. Meades never uses one analogy when he can come up with five, and preferably scurrilous ones at that. I don't agree with him about everything by any means, but he makes you think and certainly makes you firm up your own views and why you disagree with him. He makes up words all the time, but he's pretty good at it and you know what he means.
There is inevitably repetition in these essays as they weren't written at the same time or for the same publication, but that's fine. I usually find any sort of script impossible to read, but even the spoken words to his documentaries make interesting reading. His range of references is show-off wide. He certainly doesn't have any time for Blair, faith or the Guggenheim in Bilbao, but is kind to Hadid and Nairn.
A great read.
There is inevitably repetition in these essays as they weren't written at the same time or for the same publication, but that's fine. I usually find any sort of script impossible to read, but even the spoken words to his documentaries make interesting reading. His range of references is show-off wide. He certainly doesn't have any time for Blair, faith or the Guggenheim in Bilbao, but is kind to Hadid and Nairn.
A great read.
April 6, 2016
Well, it's basically more Meades. If you've seen his shows or read any other books or articles, you'll have gotten most of the gist of this book. It also contains six scripts for his shows, which was a nice look behind the scenes, so to speak.
February 10, 2013
Magnificent aplomb. Love it.
May 3, 2013
Utterly brilliant, a book that will expand your world, your mind and your vocabulary!
March 20, 2013
loved it. thought provoking and brilliant on every page
December 27, 2013
Wonderfully rude and contrarian. Excellent at skewering the absurdities of architecture, planning, urban policy, taste etc. Enjoy reading him even when I disagree.
January 11, 2014
A fantastic selection of essays!
January 20, 2014
A hefty slice of Meades. Erudite, didactic, opinionated, confrontational, argumentative. Would have had 5 stars if he hadn't overused the word "douce". I look forward to the next volume.
July 31, 2019
Jonathan Meades combines high and low culture with dark humour while discussing the most erudite of cultural issues. A joy to read.
October 30, 2014
Part of a continuum of architectural criticism that runs, more or less: Betjeman, Nairn, Meades, Hatherley.
August 4, 2015
Nonstop brilliance.
Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews