This paper considers the ruin in the context of three emblematic modern German sites, the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtniskirche in Berlin, the Frauenkirche in Dresden and the Reichstag, also in Berlin. Different sites, the author shows, format and present the relationship between past and present in different ways. The paper develops its argument using the views of German philosopher Günther Anders (Hannah Arendt's first husband), and extracts from his diaries and travels in Germany after the Second World War. Anders' views on the ruin are contrasted with those of Georg Simmel and others. The author considers the relationship between, on the one hand, the idea of the picturesque and, on the other, the ruin as a memorial to violent conflict and injustice, in which different modalities of memory can play their part. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]