RISE, FALL AND REINVENTION: THE ARCHITECT'S SHIFTING IDENTITY

摘要

Between 1929 and 1943, the image of the architect underwent a dramatic and amusing change, at least insofar as the literature of the novel was concerned.Professor Otto Silenus made his first appearance in this country in 1928, on the pages of Evelyn Waugh's Decline and Fall. To Waugh, he was a ridiculous figure of fun: a dementedly serious and humourless German architect - almost certainly modelled on Walter Gropius - commissioned by Margot Beste-Chetwynde to design 'something clean and square'. Silenus has attracted his client's attention with his designs for a chewing-gum factory in Hungary, recently published in the architectural press.