Recalling the Ghosts of War: Performing Tourism on the Battlefields of the Western Front1

Abstract

The Great War battlefield landscape of the Western Front still exerts an enormous potency for tourists even though much of its geography requires significant decoding to understand its now hidden stories and dramas. Thousands of British visitors travel to the area throughout the year, drawn to empathize with its symbolic commemorative spaces. This essay explores the ways in which tourists embarking on commercial coach tours engage with the battlefield landscape by examining contemporary tourist performance, as well as the role of the tour guide in setting and directing their imaginative and emotional encounter with the area.