MR. KOJO NNAMDIFrom WAMU 88.5, at American University in Washington, welcome to "The Kojo Nnamdi Show," connecting your neighborhood with the world. Roger Lewis is here. It's the only memorial on the mall that doesn't honor a president or war, and the only one to honor a man of color. After more than 15 years of planning, fundraising and designing, the Martin Luther King Jr. National Memorial opened to the public this week.

MR. KOJO NNAMDIThe District of Columbia is hosting a jubilant celebration, and President Obama will help dedicate the memorial on Sunday, weather notwithstanding or maybe despite the weather or maybe not. With folded arms and a serious expression, the 30-foot tall statue of Dr. King is both a somber tribute to a great man and, this being Washington, a sore subject among some people upset by its design and provenance.

MR. KOJO NNAMDIAs Washington and the world welcome a long awaited tribute to the icon of the civil rights movement, we look at how the new memorial fits the city's landscape and what it says about the way Americans honor their greatest leaders. Joining us in studio is Roger Lewis. He's an architect, an urban planner. He writes the "Shaping the City" column for The Washington Post.

MR. KOJO NNAMDIRoger is also professor emeritus of architecture at the University of Maryland College Park. Hi, Roger. How is it going?

MR. ROGER LEWISVery well. Thank you for, once again, inviting me.

NNAMDIYou are more than welcome. Because you have seen the memorial, would you, in your own words, describe it for us?

LEWISWell, let me begin with a very biggest picture, which is that the memorial is located on about four acres of -- excuse me -- West Potomac Park, essentially embracing what you might consider the northwest quadrant of the Tidal Basin, so on a site that once had a number of cherry trees. It now has new cherry trees.

LEWISThey've created a new landscape, which involves a number of pathways, a pair of curving walls, a pair of stones, which is actually meant to be perceived as a single stone, "a mountain of despair," to quote Dr. King, from which a piece has been removed and advanced toward the Tidal Basin by several dozen feet, which is -- in which is carved his image, this 30-foot-high piece you mentioned, the Stone of Hope.

LEWISAnd that, as, I think, almost everyone has seen, unless they've been hiding in Libya or something, has a carving of Dr. King standing, arms folded, holding a scroll, looking eastward. And one other point I want to make about it, it actually sits at the midpoint between an axis that, I think, would connect the Lincoln Memorial and the Jefferson Memorial.

NNAMDISpeaking of hiding in Libya, one of Dr. King's top aides at the time of his demise...

LEWISRev. Fauntroy.

NNAMDI...Walter Fauntroy, who used to be the delegate for District of Columbia to Congress, was locked up with reporters in Lebanon in the hotel in which they were staying. They were all released yesterday. It's a story that we're looking at and we'll be pursuing at some point in the future. But have you seen the new MLK Memorial? What are your first impressions? You can call us at 800-433-8850. 800-433-8850. Go to our website, kojoshow.org.

NNAMDISend us a tweet, @kojoshow, or email to kojo@wamu.org. This being Washington, Roger, opinions are flying about the new memorial. What are your impressions?

LEWISWell, my -- I'm going to hedge this a little bit only because I haven't really gone up to -- as I always like to do with works of art and look at them from inches away and a few feet away and dozens of feet away and even further eventually from an airplane as we take off or land at National Airport. I think there a lot of things about it that are -- from a design point of view, that are very interesting.

LEWISI think everyone will -- probably understands that this is, like so many commemorative works or memorials, is at once representational, which when you start off making a memorial, you have to make decisions about, is it going to be a symbol and a metaphor? Is it going to be figurative and representational? Is it going to be didactic and teach? Or is it going to be mute when it comes to teaching history?

LEWISBut it's -- it isn't. It's clearly a commemorative to a historical figure of great significance to this country. And I think the -- with the inscriptions, I don't think I mentioned that there are inscriptions on the curved walls, which are essentially, again, as so many other memorials do, quotations of his. So I think that it will inspire. I think -- whatever you think of it from an aesthetic point of view, I think it's a very inspiring design.

LEWISAs to whether it needs to be as large, whether it needed to consume -- I've raised questions about whether we need four or five acres every time we build a memorial.

NNAMDIPeople who have been reading Roger Lewis for years knows that he is not -- know that he is not a big fan of expansive and expensive memorials.

LEWISWell, I think there may be times when that's appropriate, but I think that we have been building, as I've said recently in an article, we've been building very big commemoratives, chewing up a lot of landscape. The Eisenhower Memorial that's being proposed is taking up four acres of urban space near the Air and Space Museum. The Roosevelt Memorial is immense. It's -- it goes on -- it's a very interesting design.

LEWISAll of these, interestingly enough -- and I would include Dr. King in this -- all of these commemoratives to these individuals, if the individual showed up today, they might look at them, even Ronald Reagan with the Ronald Reagan Building and the -- I think all of them might say, you know, maybe this is a little out of scale. You know, it seems to me that maybe we ought to rethink how big and gargantuan and bombastic these things need to be.

NNAMDIWell, art critic Blake Gopnik wrote this week in The Daily Beast that the MLK statue, in his opinion, is too small, that it's dwarfed by most decent-sized trees, and that, from points around the Tidal Basin, Dr. King looks postage stamp-sized. What do you say to that?

LEWISWell, I think that's certainly debatable. I don't think there would have been much support for a colossus, as they had in Rhodes. No. I think the -- perhaps the more fundamental question is, does a figure, a -- this is a representational sculpture. It shows Dr. King.

LEWISAnd the question, in my mind, is, it more significant, more lasting after we build these things for hundreds of years, at 30 feet, is that going to endure and be more meaningful because of its size in 100 years than if it were half that size or even life-size, particularly given the context? Because I think some things -- the beauty is so much about context. The Kennedy Memorial -- the gravesite. I always point to the Arlington gravesite of Kennedy.

LEWISIt's a little flame burning in a surface on the ground. It's as inspiring to me to stand there, probably because of what you see when you turn around and look at the cityscape. It's very, very minimalist.

NNAMDIAn example of a memorial that, in your view, is both powerful and appropriately sized, if you will.

LEWISWell, I think the -- I think, for example, the Jefferson Memorial is -- because of its location, because of the context in which it sits, I think the Jefferson Memorial is about the right size and scale for its site and for what it's doing, anchoring one of the major axes of the -- Washington -- the center of Washington, of the great monumental core. I think the Washington Monument is a masterpiece.

LEWISYou know, it's an unadorned obelisk. Hopefully, it isn't cracking apart from -- after this little tremble -- tremor we had. I think the -- what's interesting is that the juxtaposition of this pure vertical obelisk with no adornment that is a few hundred yards north of the Jefferson Memorial and then several hundred yards beyond that to the north, we have the White House.

LEWISIf you look -- if you get up in an airplane and you look at this ensemble, there's a kind of a compositional harmony of location, size and scale that I think is actually quite appropriate.

NNAMDINevertheless, several of these memorials, including the aforementioned Washington Monument, were controversial...

LEWISOh, yes.

NNAMDI...when they opened. And now, they're national treasures. How does our reaction, the public reaction to memorials change over time?

LEWISWell, my theory is very simple. When they're first designed, there's always controversy because, as we architects say, if you put three architects in a room, you have five opinions, almost by definition. And the same is true, I think, of citizens and others who have to make judgments about these things.

LEWISSo I think that most memorials, as is the case, I think, with a lot of architecture, they begin life with some amount of controversy because there's always -- there are always different views about what's appropriate. They get built. The mixed reviews continue for a while. A few decades pass. We start getting used to them. And we move from, let's say, controversy to acceptance.

LEWISAnd then a few more decades pass, and acceptance advances toward a certain liking. And a few more decades pass, and we begin embracing these things as...

NNAMDIIt becomes love.

LEWISYeah, we start to love them. And I -- you know, the -- think about the Eiffel Tower was hated.

NNAMDII was thinking about the Eiffel Tower.

LEWISIt -- there were people who thought it was the most dreadful thing in the world, wanted it taken down. The old executive office building next to the White House, built in the late 19th century, this sort of Victorian interpretation of classicism, people hated that. They wanted to take that down. We wouldn't even consider taking it down today. No.

LEWISI think that time -- I think the World War II Memorial, which I think has about -- which I raised many questions...

NNAMDIWe'll get to that.

LEWIS...is another one that probably, in 100 years, everybody will think is just dandy.

NNAMDIWe're talking with Roger Lewis, interpreting the MLK Memorial, inviting your calls at 800-433-8850. What do you think a memorial needs to accomplish to be a success? Should it speak to your emotions, teach you something, inspire great thoughts? 800-433-8850. Here is Kiki in Washington, D.C. Kiki, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

KIKIListen, I love the new memorial. And I've got to tell you I saw the pictures of the first one that was submissionned. (sic) And then they rejected them because they thought he looked too militant. And I loved that one 'cause I thought, wow, he looks just so powerful and so fierce. And then they had a second drawing that had him looking all down, and I thought he just looked so sad and nothing like the man I remembered.

KIKIAnd from what I've seen of this one, I like his pose. It looks like I remember, seeing him standing on the mall on television as he talked about the issues. And I think the size of it is right because he wasn't a president, but he was a peacemaker. And, you know, where he's sitting between the Jefferson Memorial and the Lincoln Memorial, it just -- I think the size is right because it doesn't take that area out of balance.

NNAMDIKiki, you just heard Roger describe how it takes decades for some people to go from disliking controversial, to beginning to accept, to beginning to like, to beginning to love. You seem to have covered that space in a matter of days or months, huh?

KIKIBecause once you -- you know, once you, like -- I just got to drive by it, and then I saw the pictures of it. But then when you look at it, the marble -- the choice of the marble, that the open spaces it, being near the water, you see it's intimate. And I say that about the FDR Memorial when you walk through it. It's beautiful. It's intimate. And I think the King Memorial continues this sense of intimacy with the people that will walk through that.

NNAMDIWhat do you say to Kiki, Roger Lewis?

LEWISWell, I think -- I actually think the -- my biggest problem with a number of the memorials has less to do with the scale of the objects themselves than with the amount of acreage, the amount of land that we're consuming for these things because there's a fixed supply of that land. And I -- one wonders about our next few hundred years when there are going to be more things to commemorate.

LEWISWill we have used up all the most precious parts of our landscape, particularly the mall landscape or the areas around the mall? So -- but I actually am not terribly concerned. I mean, I think the size, the 30-foot Stone of Hope, in terms of its scale, is really not the problem.

LEWISI'm not sure we needed -- they needed to take four acres of the public park in order to accomplish what, I think, they're trying to do, which is to create a large enough area for people to move around. I think they could have done that, perhaps, more efficiently. In fact, though, I have to acknowledge what they have done, by recreating the landscape and transforming it a bit, they have, in fact, recreated a park. It's just it's a different feeling.

LEWISI think the notion of intimacy is a very good one. Kojo, you said earlier, you know, is the mission, in part, to stimulate emotional responses? I don't think there's any question that the best memorials do that. And they -- and I think they can do that as well as inform. I, right now, am facing this personally. I'm a trustee of the Peace Corps Commemorative Foundation, which we're trying to create a commemorative to the founding in 1961 of the Peace Corps.

NNAMDICorrect.

LEWISAnd we're in now for congressional authorization in the Senate and the House. But once we have that, we have to -- we haven't yet done the hard work, which is to figure out what is it. What should the content be? What should the nature and character -- what -- how much interpretation, how metaphoric versus how figurative. How far do we go with just being symbolic?

NNAMDIAnd that involves the role of a memorial. If you'd like to join the conversation, go to our website, kojoshow.org. Join the conversation there. Send us a tweet, @kojoshow, or email to kojo@wamu.org. Kiki, thank you for your call. We're going to take a short break. I mentioned earlier that Dr. King's former aid, Walter Fauntroy, our former delegate from D.C., was kept in virtual imprisonment in Lebanon.

NNAMDIOf course, I meant in Libya. It's a story that we will be following. I'm Kojo Nnamdi.

NNAMDIWelcome back to our conversation interpreting the MLK Memorial with Roger Lewis. He writes the "Shaping the City" column for The Washington Post. He's professor emeritus of architecture at the University of Maryland College Park and is an architect and urban planner. Before we took that break, Roger, and before I go to the phones, you were talking about both the process and the content of the Peace Corps memorial that you were a part of creating.

NNAMDILet's talk a bit about the role of a memorial. The website for the MLK Memorial says its vision is to capture the essence of his message, a message in which he so eloquently affirms the commanding tenets of the American dream, freedom, democracy and opportunity for all. That sounds like a tall order.

LEWISIt is. I mean, I think that one of the things that is challenging about any commemorative, particularly with someone like Dr. King, whose work, whose leadership, I think, really brought about such a tremendous change in American history and culture, and to capture that all is -- without writing out, you know, a 5,000-word essay, which you can't do, is a challenge.

LEWISAnd I think that, from what I've heard from people who have been interviewed, who visited this memorial, it succeeded -- or it is succeeding in communicating, again, primarily, symbolically, I would say, and through the representation of Dr. King. People are seeing it in a way that gets that message across.

LEWISNow, the question arises, will our grandchildren -- I mean, we've lived through this. And, I think, probably a lot of our listeners, you know, remember certainly some of what -- are old enough to remember what was going on in the '60s and -- but on the other hand, one wonders, in 2160 or 2260, if people -- and I -- this is something I wanted to bring up.

LEWISOne of the questions, when you design a memorial, is, how do you do it so that that message that you summarize, those values, those ideals are equally well-communicated in 100 or 200 years to people who may or may not have any real feeling for what happened historically? I've seen this already.

LEWISI mean, my -- the students that I was teaching a few years ago at Maryland, they really didn't know much about the Vietnam War, which, of course, was so much a part of our lives.

NNAMDIOf course.

LEWISSo it's a challenge, and it's not an easy one. I'd much easier design a library.

NNAMDIHere's Kevin in Woodbridge, Va. Kevin, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

KEVINKojo, thank you for taking my call. Please allow me to finish my point. As you know, the statue of Dr. King was carved in China by the official stone carver of Mao Zedong. And the pose is reminiscent of the poses that we always see Mr. Mao was carved into statue, Stalin was carved into statue and the president of North Korea.

KEVINEvery time he poses a picture, it's the same pose. Dr. Martin Luther King has been carved into his stone by the official stone carver of Mao. And this is completely contrary to what Dr. Martin Luther King stand for. As an immigrant to this county, I studied him because I wanted to learn about the freedom in this country.

KEVINAnd this is slapping the face of African-Americans in this country (unintelligible) freedom teaches, who he -- who he believed about. Thank you.

NNAMDINow, Kevin, there are two points I'd like to discuss about what you raised, because, Roger, art is obviously in the eye of the beholder. Some people, like Kevin, feels that the MLK statue looks maybe even communist. But there are some feel that it looks confrontational. On the other hand, here's an email we got from Justin King in Reston, Va.

NNAMDI"While, on the one hand, I celebrate the recognition that a national monument to Martin Luther King brings, I am worried that it also signals a continued domestication of the Rev. Dr. King's message. His message is actually quite radical and challenging, both in regards to racism in the U.S. and the world and in regards to militarism of the United States." He makes some other points.

NNAMDIBut this is a debate here because some people argue that, in Kevin's case, it looks too Russian or too, in this case, Chinese and too communist. Other people say, look, Dr. King was a universal figure. You cannot have an image of him that's limited to his domestic impact.

LEWISWell, I think this is a really important thing. First of all, let us remember that all of these people, including the North Korean leader, they are human beings. I mean, these -- Stalin -- I've heard the term Stalinesque. And, by the way, I've spent a lot of time Russia -- in Russia looking at some of the sculpture.

LEWISI mean, I think the reality is that these are men. These are -- and, in fact, it seems to me that because a sculptor has carved Mao and Stalin and whoever else you can think of, I don't think that disqualifies them from being the sculptor, being the artist to create an image of Martin Luther King. I think the more important thing to discuss is whether, in looking at that image of Dr. King, you know, does it talk to you?

LEWISDoes it deliver to you those sensations, those feelings, those thoughts, those emotions that, Kojo, you summarized a little while ago about America? And I would point out also that, while, I think, in the eyes of some people what King was doing was radical, the reality is it was -- it really wasn't radical. He was simply saying, look at our Constitution. Read this document. You know, what does America stand for? What are the ideals?

LEWISWhat are the aspirations? You know, the -- as someone -- it was pointed out yesterday, I think, in the Post, you know, there was an account to be settled. There was a check. There was a -- well, an account to be settled is maybe the best way to put it.

NNAMDICheck to be cashed.

LEWISCheck to be cashed, yeah.

NNAMDIHere is Jean in Springfield, Va. Jean, your turn.

JEANYes. As someone who was growing up during the civil rights period, I am very, very grateful that Dr. King has now been memorialized for all time. I think the discussion of how relevant the statue will be in 200 years is a very interesting question. I am sure that all the flaws will be of no account by then. But I'm very glad his words are included because they are very inspiring.

JEANAnd, you know, even if Dr. King looks a bit angry, he should be. And he should be looking very sternly to make sure that we are still heeding his words.

NNAMDIOkay. Thank you very much for your call, Jeannette -- Jean. I will move on to Jeannette in Fairfax, Va. Jeannette, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

JEANNETTEHi, Kojo. I took my family from California to visit the memorial just yesterday. And while it is moving and it is stirring that there's an honor being made to him, there were some things that were disappointed -- disappointing. We visited the Jefferson Memorial first, and it is so awesome and austere and regal. And then we visited the Dr. King memorial, and there is no shelter there. There's no benches.

JEANNETTEIt just seemed, like, very modern, very differently done, and it was somewhat disappointing, just in terms of what we expected and in comparison to the other memorial on the basin. That doesn't diminish his work. It doesn't diminish the symbolism of, you know, his speeches. We couldn't find any reference to I Have a Dream specifically in the memorial.

JEANNETTEHe was also holding something in his hand that neither the brochure or the website explained, as far as I could find. Maybe you can help clarify that. But we were somewhat let down, still inspired by its presence, but just in terms of the scale and, you know, those other little details, we were somewhat disappointed in that regard.

NNAMDIYou know, Roger, the memorial's executive architect, Ed Jackson, was asked in an interview what he wanted people to take away from their visit at the memorial. He said Dr. King's work isn't finished and he'd like visitors to remember and live by the quotes on the wall. They're our collage, and that's why she couldn't find a specific I Have a Dream quote. But is that what a memorial is all about?

LEWISWell, I certainly think that's -- yes, I mean, I think it's part of what it's about. I think -- I was going to respond to Jeannette by pointing out that that's not the only memorial where you don't find roofs and benches. I mean, the Vietnam Memorial being the most obvious. I mean, one of -- I've always loved the images of the Vietnam Memorial Wall with people standing there with umbrellas. It's raining. You're out in nature.

LEWISYou're -- you know, there are no -- I mean, it would just be -- it would destroy that memorial to start throwing benches and covered pavilions to seek shelter from the weather. I think that -- I think one of the challenges -- if we can be specific about Washington, the core of Washington, the monumental core -- is that it is essentially intended to be a landscape, you know, an exterior realm in which these various monuments and museums and commemoratives are deployed.

LEWISAnd I think that, to really appreciate the King Memorial, you ought to get up to 30,000 feet. And then when you, again, understand this entire landscape as a work in progress but also as a holistic piece of composition to something that has a combination of things, pavilions like the Lincoln Memorial and Jefferson Memorial where you can go inside, where you can be inside, but still, because of the porosity of what surrounds it, you still see the outside versus something like the Vietnam Memorial or the Martin Luther King Memorial where you're really in the landscape.

LEWISYou are outdoors, and you're not -- you're really not invited to sit down and take your shoes off and pull out your cell phone and start looking -- texting or reading your email. I mean, I think these are things that we think about. We designers think about, do we want someone to sit down 30 feet from that statue of -- that sculpture of Dr. Martin Luther King?

LEWISAnd I think they probably thought about it and decided, no, that's not -- there are places to sit, but not right in front of the sculpture.

NNAMDIJeannette, apparently, they didn't want it seen as a place to hang out.

JEANNETTENo, I understand. And there were some elderly people with us who just wanted to -- maybe a place to look at the quotes and reflect. And it is by the water and that sort of thing, and it was difficult for them to do so.

NNAMDIOkay.

JEANNETTEBut, you know, that was made available in other places. So it's just one small thing. And it does state that it's the tallest of all the memorials, although the other ones seemed a bit bigger. And those are just things that we were noticing. It's a modern...

NNAMDIBecause they are in covered spaces. But, Jeanette, thank you very much for sharing that with us. Roger, some people -- some critics of the World War II Memorial said that it didn't have enough narrative content, that visitors who didn't know a lot about World War II wouldn't learn much there. How important is the teaching aspect of a memorial?

LEWISWell, I had direct involvement in the World War II Memorial. I was the advisor to the state of Maryland when it created its World War II Memorial, north of Annapolis. And we had much discussion about that.

LEWISAnd, for example, unlike this -- well, in that memorial, we spent hours and hours during the design phase talking about maps, you know, do -- what, you know, when you bring, again, decades after World War II or, for that matter, a century after World War II, when you bring kids there, what are they going to learn? And there is -- in that memorial, there are inscribed names.

LEWISThey -- the Maryland divisions are noted, that is the military companies and divisions. There are maps of both the Pacific Theater and European Theater. There is some information given. But the fact is you can never really recount the history of these places in any detail. You have to, I think, provoke curiosity and interest. And then people who want to really find out more about it, they have to go to the Internet or the library or whatever.

LEWISSo I think that, in a way, I see commemoratives, memorials as kind of gateways, or you can think of them as built symbolic gateways that can tell you a little bit, that may communicate a little bit of what they stand for. But if you're really going to be a student of history, you've got to do your homework after you've visited and been inspired by the memorial.

NNAMDIHere is Christine in Columbia, Md. Christine, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

CHRISTINEHi. I have question, and I'm not sure if this has been brought up before. I apologize if it has. But was there a reason that they -- I mean, that they did the statue in light marble? I mean, I know that the other statues in the areas are white, but, I mean, Dr. Martin Luther King stood for African-Americans. And it just seems like we're whitewashing his whole history by doing him in white marble.

NNAMDIRoger?

LEWISWell, I've heard that one several times, you know? I mean, we've heard -- there've been a lot of questions raised. Why wasn't an African-American artist commissioned to do this? And I think the answer of the sponsors who control what happens is that they really didn't feel there was an African-American sculptor in the United States who really had the expertise and experience to do this kind of a sculpture.

LEWISAs to the choice of stone, I mean, I just -- I don't have any problem at all with that. I always thought -- as soon as the design was done, I remember thinking, someone's going to look at this and say why isn't this -- why is this ivory? It's really a kind of ivory-colored stone. I -- it's -- to me it's a non-issue. I think the -- at some point, you -- again, you have to accept that, even though it's representational, it's figurative, it's still an abstraction.

LEWISIt's still an image that allows you, the viewer, to draw your own interpretations. And I think the -- I mean, someone else could look at that, for example, and think, well, this is -- it's luminous. At night I can see it. It will be much more -- if it were made out of Zimbabwe granite, which I have in my house, which is very dark, you know, you wouldn't get the shadow, the relief.

LEWISYou wouldn't get -- I mean, I'm talking aesthetic pragmatics, I know. But at night, it would be much more difficult to see. I mean, I think there's some compelling arguments why the stone might be -- make sense. Independent of saying, well, he was a black man. It should be black stone. That's an equation that, to me, doesn't hold up.

CHRISTINEWell, it's not so much...

NNAMDIAnd, Christine, here this email we got from Robert. "Ridiculous. It makes him look like some African kleptocrat." What do say to that? Christine.

CHRISTINEWell, I don't really know what the term means. I'm sorry.

NNAMDII mean, different people see different things is, I guess, what I'm pointing out. He did not see the light skin color. He saw something else. But let me read Robert's entire email to be fair to him. He said, "I hate to be like the little kid in "The Emperor's New Clothes," but the statue does not look like Dr. King. It just doesn't. King had a benign open expression.

NNAMDI"Whereas the Chinese sculptors felt compelled to toughen him up, as mentioned in Courtland Milloy's column yesterday in yesterday's Post. Ridiculous. It makes him look like some African kleptocrat. And I fail to see why an American, or better yet, African-American sculptor could not have been located." That was the whole email, Christine. But you wanted to finish your own comment. Go ahead, please.

CHRISTINEI guess my question wasn't really about why there wasn't an African-American sculptor. I mean, I believe that an artist can try to transcend whatever they happen to be. I mean, a woman can write about -- write as a man's character. A black man can write as a white woman if he would like. I mean, that's not really the question. The question is why whitewash somebody who has such strong cultural -- I mean, (unintelligible)...

NNAMDIWell, actually I was looking -- Christine, I was looking for the rationale that I had read, about why that particular color of stone was used, but I can't find it right now. I'll probably have it before the end of the show because there was an explanation offered for that.

LEWISI don't know a whole lot about it, but I -- 'cause I'm not an expert on stone. But I know they chose a very, very durable, very hard, very tough stone because you want this to last centuries. And it's -- for example, there are many, many stones, particularly marbles, that won't hold up at all over time, and that was -- I think that was probably a big consideration in the choice of the stone.

NNAMDIGot to take a short break. If you've already called, try to stay on the line. We'll come back and try to get back to your calls. If the lines are busy, go to our website, kojoshow.org, and join the conversation there. You can also send us a tweet, @kojoshow, or email to kojo@wamu.org. I'm Kojo Nnamdi.

NNAMDIWelcome back to our conversation with Roger Lewis, interpreting the MLK Memorial. Roger Lewis is an architect and urban planner. He writes the "Shaping the City" column for The Washington Post and is professor emeritus of architecture at the University of Maryland College Park. You can find video interviews and links about the King Memorial at our website, kojoshow.org.

NNAMDIWhen you go there, you'll also find a link to a new interactive map of Washington monuments and memorials created by the National Capital Planning Commission. It gives the background of over 100 commemorative works in the city, and they're looking for your feedback. So you can check it all out at kojoshow.org.

NNAMDIRoger, one of the points you wanted to make was how long it takes for the entire process of these things to get built, something you are now experiencing...

LEWISExactly.

NNAMDI...with the Peace Corps memorial.

LEWISThe people might remember -- some people might remember the story of the Washington Monument, which was started well before the Civil War. It actually was first talked about, I believe, in the 1820s or '30s. They finally got some money together. Raising the money is not easy.

LEWISI hope everybody understands these -- all of these commemoratives are, while built on federal land, are all financed by private donations, including the Martin Luther King Memorial. I believe the $120 million price tag is -- they're within a few million dollars of having the last...

NNAMDICorrect.

LEWIS...bit to pay for that. So it's important to take note that these memorials get built when sponsors, someone who wants to create the memorial, initiates the process. They require, in D.C., a congressional authorization, which grants no money. It simply is a blessing. It says, yes, we think this is a historically significant thing to be commemorated. The -- I believe the Martin Luther King commemorative was first initiated in the 1990s.

LEWISI don't remember exactly when. I think the paper yesterday pointed out it was over a dinner conversation. Some people thought this was -- it was time to do this. And now it's 2011. So you -- you know, 15 years is probably not a bad -- actually, that's not bad. The Roosevelt Memorial was first proposed in the 1960s when I was a student in an architecture school, and it wasn't finished until many decades later. So they take a long time.

LEWISAnd if they're large and grandiose, they take a lot of money, which is another reason why I'm an advocate for considering that all memorials don't have to be large and grandiose and nine-figure constructions.

NNAMDIOn to the telephones again. Here's Marylou in McLean, Va. Marylou, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

MARYLOUMy only question is why they didn't include the I Have a Dream speech. We did -- my son and I went yesterday, and we asked the park ranger. And he said, yes, we have other quotes, and they’re all about I Have a Dream. But, you know, it's one of the greatest speeches in American history, and, of course, he gave it not far from that spot.

MARYLOUAnd I would almost anticipate they'll do the same kind of thing as they did with the Vietnam Memorial, and that is add it, because I think it's a really big miss not to include that (unintelligible) ...

NNAMDIWell, they probably figured that's the one everybody already knows before they even show up there. Right, Roger?

LEWISThere was -- in The Post yesterday, there was -- I believe Philip Kennicott in his essay talks about that. And I don't remember exactly the details, but that certainly was discussed. I mean, I suspect that the sponsors and designers spent, again, not -- if not dozens, maybe hundreds of hours talking about what to do vis-à-vis the speech. And I think they decided to go with quotes that essentially embody the thoughts and ideas and fabulous rhetoric.

LEWISI mean, there was -- Dr. King was an incredible speaker. I suppose that they thought, well, the speech -- rather than pull pieces out of the speech, they would look at his whole body of work, pull out quotations that did the job in terms of conveying what needed to be conveyed. Maybe there will be -- you could probably print the speech. It was about 15 minutes, as I recall, 20 minutes. So you're talking about a fair amount of text.

LEWISSo there well may be, as you suggest, Marylou, a metal plaque or something -- maybe it's -- maybe they're -- that's still to be done, where you could go somewhere and read the whole speech. But I can understand why they might have made the choices they made.

NNAMDIMarylou, thank you for your call. On to Lisa in Washington, D.C. Lisa, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

LISAYes. Thank you for taking my call. I actually feel that the place, the step on the Lincoln Memorial, the I Have a Dream that's engraved halfway up to the Lincoln Memorial is more significant to me, personally, in who Martin Luther King embodies because he actually stood there and made the speech that led to the freedoms we have now.

LISAAnd so going to another part of the mall to honor Martin Luther King, to me, is taking away from that sacred spot on the Lincoln Memorial, although, you know, we don't want these two significant historic figures to necessarily share a memorial spot. But I do think that the place of that step is most significant for me personally.

NNAMDIRoger.

LEWISWell, I think it's a (word?) situation. I'm quite happy to accept the notion that they've done both, that they've marked the spot where he actually gave the speech. And when you're at the Lincoln Memorial, you can see that. And then the -- this other spot, which serves a different purpose, which is to say, no, this is not a spot where a historical event happened, but rather it's a spot where we're going to commemorate what a particular man...

NNAMDIIn addition to it, Lisa and Roger, I think it's important that Dr. King not be remembered as a man who gave a speech, that his life covered a whole lot more than that. And I suspect that's what the memorial tries to also capture.

LEWISI'm sure that's exactly what the sponsors' conclusion they came to.

NNAMDILisa, thank you so much for your call. We move on to Mike in Alexandria, Va. Mike, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

MIKEHi, Kojo. Thanks for taking my call. I haven't been to the memorial yet, but I've seen all these pictures. I quite like it. I really think that, you know, Dr. King was known for being a man of dignity and silence as a form of action when it was necessary. And to stand there with a face of stern dignity and stoicism where he's, you know, sort of holding people to account, saying that this job is not necessarily over and don't screw it up 'cause I'm watching you, I really like that sort of idea.

MIKEAnd I don't think the color of the stone or the guy who carved it, I mean, like people brought up before, transcends. And, you know, he was a universal figure. And it would be anti-King, in my opinion, to say, well, no, you're not an American or you're not an African-American, so you can't participate in this.

NNAMDIGood point.

MIKEHe fought for the freedoms of everyone.

NNAMDIHear this from Mike in Baltimore, Mike in Alexandria. Mike in Baltimore writes, "The greatest memorial to Dr. King would have been to eliminate poverty. But, instead, poverty has grown and continues to grow. The carved stones in the park add little to his work in non-violent cause." But the twist you put on it, Mike, is, I'm watching you.

MIKEYeah, I think, you know, his legacy is to be felt. I mean, we have -- you know, Barack Obama has been elected president, and, you know, things have drastically improved. But there's a long way to go. And especially, you know, as a native to the -- to D.C., and there's a lot of inequality within the city itself, that somebody needs to be standing there saying, this is still a challenge that we need to meet. And there he is.

MIKEHe's going to stand there and keep an eye on the city and make sure that everybody, for the future, who gets elected, who comes here to visit, who leaves here with these pictures, says, Dr. King is watching us. We have a job to do that's not quite done yet.

NNAMDII suspect I'll hear that line quoted a lot in future demonstrations. Mike, thank you very much for your call. Roger, we got this email from Tito in Arlington. "Your guest just alluded to the importance of the scale when it comes to monuments. And it brought to my mind the (word?) description of Washington as a city of magnificent distances, which I've always thought aptly captures the grandness of the vast sweep of space and distance between the Capitol and the buildings and monuments along the mall.

NNAMDI"That grandness includes the Lincoln Memorial and the Tidal Basin and Jefferson Memorial and, even more recently, the Kennedy Center. To me, though, I lament the uninspired and derivative World War II Memorial, which breaks up the grand sweep of space between the Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial, with its magnificent reflecting pool. At least the Vietnam Memorial is tucked discreetly off to the side, as is the FDR.

NNAMDI"I haven't seen it yet, but I hope the King monument fits within this grand sweep and contributes to it." What do you say?

LEWISWell, I think it's an interesting observation. I don't think we have time to go into the -- all the sturm und drang of World War II Memorial debate that took place many years ago. I do think that what, again, you will see when you visit the King Memorial is that it is, as we say in architectural school, it's an object in the landscape. It's not a piazza.

LEWISBasically, what the -- the World War II Memorial is a very large plaza with a tremendous amount of -- number of elements that surround that plaza. And, fortunately, they've designed it so that you -- the visual access, that great vista from Lincoln to Washington Monument, is not really destroyed. There is -- you see a little punctuation along the way, but it's really pretty open still. I think the King Memorial is an object in the landscape.

LEWISIt's a place that I think you experience -- and I think this is one of the wonderful things about it. You can experience it by walking around West Potomac Park. And you can see it -- I suspect that in the spring, cherry blossom time, it might really look quite wonderful to have this composition of stone and the cherry blossoms ringing the Tidal Basin. It might be a quite wonderful juxtaposition. We'll have to see in the spring.

NNAMDIHere's Rachel in Silver Spring, Md. Rachel, your turn.

RACHELYeah, thank you. As a third generation Washingtonian, I'm kind of behind in my memorials. But the one I actually have the most remembrance of seeing my whole life -- and I'm 51 -- in 1968, shortly before Robert Kennedy and Dr. King were shot, our second grade teacher took us down to see John F. Kennedy's Eternal Flame.

RACHELAnd, you know, back then, you didn't have the kind of crowds you have now. And, in fact, we were the only people there, except for a park ranger. And it started to rain, and the fact that we didn't have any place to shelter us was not an issue. It sort of fit in with the circumstances. We had umbrellas, you know, and it was a poignant moment I remember to this day because it was not showy.

RACHELIt was not -- it was just profound. And I think that's the best thing a memorial can do for you, and I look forward to seeing the new one.

NNAMDIRoger seems to have felt the same way or feel the same way about the Kennedy Memorial.

LEWISYes. I mean, I think it's a great -- I think it's just a wonderful place to be. You know, another memorial got some news coverage this week. Some of you may have seen the coverage of the Flight 93 Memorial in Pennsylvania, which is another -- they've taken an immense -- I forget how many acres and how many hundreds of millions of dollars. Actually, what -- the actual spot where the flight -- the plane landed, there's a boulder that's been placed.

LEWISSo they've marked the spot, which, you could argue, might be enough, that, you know, that a -- now, on the other hand, they -- I guess they're expecting millions of people to come. So they have built an infrastructure for this that is -- I think, Kojo, it must be, what, 108? I mean, it's immense. And so it's -- and you have to wonder, you know, is this really appropriate?

NNAMDIWe got an email, as we're running out of time, from Susan. "I recommend everyone talk to the National Park Service rangers who staff all of the memorials from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. daily. They have a strong -- they have strong history backgrounds and are there to fill in the blanks and to help visitors understand the memorials better. They always have great stories, too.

NNAMDI"And there are benches at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial, inside, opposite the inscription walls. They are made of the same stone as the landscape walls. Your previous caller must have overlooked them." So next time you go visit, look for those benches. Roger Lewis, thank you so much for joining us.

LEWISYou're very welcome. Glad to be here.

NNAMDIRoger Lewis is an architect and urban planner. He writes the Shaping the City column for The Washington Post. He is professor emeritus of architecture at the University of Maryland College Park. Thank you all for listening. I'm Kojo Nnamdi.