wendy house

How can I visit Alexandria and not know that there is a pillar called Bombay Pompey’s pillar there? 

There is some serious tut-tut-tutting going on

I was drawn to Alexandria Library 

More wonderful than anticipated.  It was highly anticipated. I spent much of the time there sitting, listening to the building, watching the students.  The library website has a collection of photographs of the museum, its settings and collections.

The library has a ‘Nobel section’ that is furnished with a replica of the furniture and lighting designed specially for the Nobel Institute in Stockholm and contains the book collections of Nobel Prize Laureates in Literature from 1901-2006. I don’t think that fits strictly with the Dewey Decimal system. It is a socially meaningful way to highlight books ‘I’d like something from the Nobel room please…  ‘

There are several museums, a planetarium and a caligraphy centre within the Library.  This makes sense to me,  being more than a repository of books,  being a place to explore the world beyond the here and now.  Most libraries are more than a repository of books,  this one has so many enticing advantages through imagination, United Nations funding and gifts from many countries.

I had less than an hour at the Library

The library warranted staying in Alexandria for at least a year….  …seeking sponsorship for specialist research….   ….something more than a tourist walkthrough….

SIGH

The imaginarium of Dr Parnassus  is a wonderful modern faerie tale.  It mixes classic structures and characters (Old Nick) with modern settings, language, and characters. 

review ratings explained

Plot:  Very good.  A classic style of storytelling,  a new story.  A bet with the devil.  Souls to be won or lost.  The classic framework provides the structure that makes the plot easy to follow.  Easy to follow but not overly predictable.  Cunning plans and twists.  There is uncertainty about the virtue and honesty of some characters.  Who is working with, for, Nick?  The film holds a cheeky mirror to modern values as it portrays our dreams.   

Gilliam does not write his female characterisations in as much depth as his male characters. There is only one noteable female character in the film.  Her contribution is central to the plot while the role is hardly touched and seems superficial.  Lets call her a token women.  A pretty girl that needs rescuing. Sigh. A blot on an otherwise wonderful film. 

A related disappointment was the pedestrian ending to the main storyline.  The final scenes felt a bit anemic.  The scenes tied-up the damsel’s storyline quickly and neatly.  This felt forced and out-of-keeping with the plucky playing in the other, mainly male, storylines.  There are many wonderful ways that Terry could have ended the film.  I suspect Gilliam’s creative freedom was somehow compromised. 

Cast: Excellent.  Performances that had the kind of depth that comes from allowing talented actors to develop, improvise and extend their characters.  Apparently Heath Ledger’s last line before he died was ‘Don’t shoot the Messenger’ and Jonny Depp improvised the same line when playing Ledger’s character in the imaginarium. 

Sets. Excellent.  Physical locations included some of my favourite places, such as Ledenhall market in London and the Public Library in Vancouver BC.  The contrast between the architecture in these two locations was used well as a visual clue to different tones, temperaments, stages of the plot.

The animated sets were breath taking.  Apparantly breathtaking animated sets are the norm for widely distributed films by famous directors with excellent casts.  Jolly good. Thoroughly enjoyable.  Lots of ooOOOooooze and aaAAARRRRSSSssse.

Within the imaginarium these fantasy sets had the beauty, unpredictability and the ominousness of real dreams.  

Audience:  one thing that interferred with my total immersion in this fabulous film was the audience.  Specifically,  the lady sat next to me.  She insisted on sniffing loudly at 1spm (1 sniff per minute).  Every few minutes there was a cough, sneeze, or other substantial air movement in her facial regions.  She did have some props for this activity, tissues, but the noise and potential infection kept drawing me out of the film into an unpleasant reality.  Ick. 

I will be watching this film again.

Several pubs I’ve visited recently have bookshelves labeled ‘book exchange’.  Unlike a library, you do not get a wide range of choice, helpful advice, and an occassional dose of ’shushing’. This can be a bonus for noisey, decisionally-challenged, me.

Until now I’d treated the bookshelves of friends and family as book exchanges, now my net has widened to include pubs….  …some people are releasing their books into the wild then remotely tracking their progress via websites like bookcrossing.

HIF: Did you enjoy your holiday in Italy?

Wendy:  yes

HIF: are you all fresco’d out?

Wendy:  yes

The Piccolomini library in Siena was outstanding, fabulous books, floor tiles, wall frescos, ceiling frescos, quiet ambience, excellent lighting and virtually no other visitors.

The Victora and Albert Library is a living piece of history.  A free piblic library where the resources themselves are artefacts of beauty. 

The internet provides information,  sometimes that information is beautifully packaged in ‘media experiences’.  The internet has not yet managed to add to its experience the package offered by old libraries of:

book scent

aging parchment texture

 atmosphere of being surrounded by ancient books

the sound of librarian moderated silences

Woke late this morning because my warm cosey sleep was not interrupted by:

• a CD radio-alarm
• the roar of the morning commute traffic nearby at some unearthy hour

When dailight fought it’s way into my room I rolled out of bed, discovered that there was no hot water and washed sparingly in the cold.  Wrapped up warm.  Put on my head-torch,  manually opened the garage drove the car out,  manually closed then locked it.  I skipped breakfast and tea thinking that I coulkd get that at the works canteen.

Drove to work.  Driving when the power is completely out for a city is fascinating.  It works extremely well with the US 4-way stop system everyone knows what to do,  it may be slow,  but its systematic,  rule-based fairness.  The UK would probably rely on politeness and individual based sense of fairness,  which in th UK would probably work and be a bit faster than a 4-way stop.  When I got to work,  it too was powerless.  Just some emergency generators and bewildered employees.  I sorted a few ‘what to do’ type things and looked at some colleagues impressive photographs of their Journey into work,  over and around fallen trees in 4-wheel-drive monsters. 

Cold,  hungry and completely TEA-LESS,  I followed a rumour that there was power in the nearby city of Bellevue.  I spent nearly 2 hours travelling to Bellevue main library.  That’s where I am now.  Warm,  cosey,  laptop powered-up and online.  Still tea-less.  I left my wallet in the Wendy House.  

When normality is resumed I will

• buy a non-mains-powered way of boiling water to ensure I have Tea during subsequent storms.
• a non-mains-powered radio so that I can listen to the news. 

I’m forcing myself to release the books I’ve been holding hostage in my home for years.  Todays escapees: 

Fabulous public librarys and internet access remove the ’need’ to own many books.   Despite this lack of ‘need’ it is very painful to let books leave.  I haven’t managed to release my 16th Birthday present from my brother – The Concise Oxford English Dictionary.    

What books would you have difficulty releasing?