FALLEN IDOLS. History is not erased when statues are pulled down. It is made.

364pp., b/w & colour illus., paperback, Reprint, London, (2021) 2022

Includes a chapter on the statue of Cecil John Rhodes erected at the University of Cape Town in 1934 and pulled down in 2015.

“A lively, engaging and often witty exploration of why statues are put up, why they are taken down and what this teaches us about history and memory. It’s extremely well researched ... In this fascinating book [von Tunzelmann] asks us to look ‘beyond the binaries of pride and shame, good and bad, heroes and villains’ and think more deeply about how history is made.”  Sunday Times (London)

"Alex von Tunzelmann deftly captures ... [that] ... statues are always works in progress: toppled, moved, reworked, re-erected and reinterpreted. There has never been a time when they were not contested." Mary Beard, Guardian 

Alex von Tunzelmann is the author of Blood and Sand, Indian Summer, and Red Heat. She lives in London.