Heart of Empire? Landscape, Space and Performance in Imperial London

Abstract

In this paper we address the ways in which global processes of imperialism helped to constitute the cultural geography of the capital cities of Europe. London is our focus, not least because its representation as an imperial city during the modern period was particularly fraught with difficulty. In the first section of the paper we consider the value and limitations of a ‘post-colonial’ perspective, and specifically the extent to which the discourse of imperial cities was European rather than national in character. In the second section we turn to London, widening the conventional focus on the ceremonial core at Westminster to consider a number of alternative ‘hearts of empire’, sites which were also claimed as central places in the landscape of the imperial city. Here we question the assumption that London ‘became’ imperial in a circumscribed area and only for a brief moment in the late-Victorian and Edwardian era. In order to develop the argument that the ‘imperial’ was not merely the preserve of policymakers in Whitehall, we then consider the role of imperial culture in shaping a variety of other urban landscapes, especially the swelling London suburbs. Last, we address the contradictions and tensions in the idea of ‘imperial London’ as it developed around the turn of the 19th century.