Treasures of Westminster Abbey
By Tony Trowles
Scala Art, 176pp, £16.99/$25
Walking into once Catholic churches appropriated by other religious bodies tends to produce the sense that “we were robbed”, but there are not many that I would be more interested in seeing restored to Catholic ownership than Westminster Abbey.
This is a point on which I do not pretend to objectivity. My inability (as an American) to be influenced by patriotic prejudices is more than compensated for by the combination of my affection for the Benedictine order, which once inhabited the abbey, and the fact that the Gothic in which it was built is one of my favourite architectural styles. But I do think, or at least I hope, that this new book can show those unable to visit the former monastery that it ought to be numbered among the greater architectural losses from which the Catholic Church has suffered.
