Westminster is Walter Besant’s affectionate history and topographical survey of the London district, part of his ambitious series on the city and its quarters. Besant traces the area from its monastic origins around the Abbey through its growth into the seat of royal and parliamentary power, weaving together architecture, anecdote, and social history.
The book pays particular attention to Westminster Abbey, the Palace of Westminster, and the streets and buildings that grew up around them, animating the stones with stories of the people who lived and worked there. Besant writes as a popular historian with a novelist’s eye for color. It remains an engaging guide to one of London’s most storied districts and the architecture at its heart.