by Nikolaus Pevsner
7-The Genius of the Place
In this, the last of the lectures. Dr. Pevsner suggests that the English qualities he has defined equip this country better than any other to solve the most urgent of twentieth-century visual problems; the problem of town planning.
Pope instructed the eighteenth-century gentleman always to consult the genius of the place. If his advice can be boldly applied to the larger problem of the town, it could restore to it the variety, the surprise, and the beauty which it has lost during the last century or so. This lecture will be printed in ' The Listener '