Unsafe but excellent
Sir: As much as I appreciated Mr Stamp's argument for a more open approach towards `totalitarian architecture' (Arts, 11 November), I don't think that creating new legends will further his cause.
Not all acts of philistine barbarism are committed by Americans. The destruction of the colonnades of the Zeppelinfeld at Nuremberg was not ordered by the 'occu- piers' (who, in 1967, would no longer have been in a position to order any demolitions on German soil). This act — heavily criti- cised not only by Nazi-nostalgists — was a decision by Nuremberg's city council, backed by an enquiry which had conve- niently declared the colonnades as 'unsafe'. In the Fifties and Sixties the city council would have liked to erase all those embarrassing memories from Speer's draw- ing- board anyway. Only the prohibitive costs of such an action saved the Reichsparteitagsgelande. Fortunately, atti- tudes have changed and the mutilated building today houses an excellent exhibi- tion about Fascination and Violence in the Third Reich.
Franz Metzger
Editor, G-Geschichte mit Pfiff, Aul3erer Laufer Platz 22, 90327 Nuremberg
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