![]() ![]() I make my most important selections, enough for two days full of work-or two months, really-and then sit back in my seat. So for the next fifteen minutes I furiously scratch out requests on green slips of paper, which are then written in an ancient log, which are then sent for and brought by a van. Lewis catalogue?Įxpert: If you could order your first ten materials in the next 15-20 minutes we can get them for you this afternoon. I’ve never rented a Salt Mine in Cheshire.Įxpert: Right, of course sir. Me: Are the books still in the Salt Mines of Cheshire? ![]() All of the buildings in Oxford were full, so they were storing old books and original manuscripts in a Salt Mine in Cheshire! You fill out a little green card, and a bus delivers materials in the mid afternoon or the next morning. It has just opened this morning and I am one of the very first patrons! Yay! Instead of closing the library for several months, they simply closed for a week-this past week, a deadly week if I had timed things differently. The Old Bodleian is very full, so they have been working on the New Bodleian for some time. He smiles, and explains what I already knew, but it’s a cool, potentially devastating, story. This expert comes in and we shake hands and I explain that I have engaged in a very embarrassing academic breech of etiquette but I am traveling from Canada and would like to view C.S. Lewis expert, whose name I have forgotten but who I recognized. I explain that I have engaged in a very embarrassing academic breech of etiquette but I am traveling from Canada and would like to view C.S. I take a breath and walk into the Rare Books and Manuscripts Reading Room. She smiles wanly at me and suggests I speak to a gentleman in the Rare Books and Manuscripts Reading Room. “They aren’t supposed to say that.”įinally I enter the Reading Room, where I explain to a young librarian who looks as nervous as I do that I have engaged in a very embarrassing academic breech of etiquette but I am traveling from Canada and would like to view C.S. “Just press whatever you like,” a man with a rolling chair said. I enter the lift, and all the buttons say “staff only.” I stare at the buttons then look at the strangers in the elevator. Me: Oh, just that 18 th century neoclassical tower in the Bodleian that houses one of the greatest science libraries in the world? Porter: But I did work at the Radcliffe Camera all my life. Porter: Oh no, just a volunteer pulled out of retirement. Me: You’re not really the master of the library or something? We are chatting away, and then I speak awkwardly, as I often do: I am given a welcome packet, three different people check my ID, and one porter finally directs me to the lift (British for “elevator”). A kind porter sees my pale face and directs me to a locker room where I leave my bag-after getting change, believe it or not, from Blackwell’s historic bookstore!-check my bag, put my laptop and journal in a large Ziploc bag, and move forward. If the sheer confusion of my arrival, and scholars in robes darting between ancient buildings with spires to the sky were not enough, I open the glass doors and am met by twenty people in suits and hardhats, clearly celebrating. With great fear I walk up the dusty ramp to the New Bodleian. I have held my breath now for twenty minutes, so I breathe in the early Oxford air. Then she directs me to the New Bodleian Library, a medieval building being updated to house the rare books and manuscripts. I swear an oath not to write in books, or burn the library down, or smoke in the library-C.S. I have all the paperwork properly in hand, though I put “Brenton” for surname and “Dickieson” for given name like a dufus (Canadian for “idiot”). I convince her to give me the reader’s card, which at least my son will think is interesting. We are moving buildings this week and I have not heard if the Reading Room is even open. Registrar: Otherwise I’m not sure I can help you. ![]() Registrar: And you have ordered your material a few days ahead of time? I’m sure then that you have reserved a place in the Reading Room? I’m here to register for a reader’s card. Me (trying not to throw up, which is always unimpressive): Good morning. I finally gain entrance to the registrar. I find my way to admissions and stand in queue (British for “line”) in front of four scholars dressed far more professionally than I am. I have to go to the Clarendon Building-think the press-but it is not named. The attached quadrant has named each of its doorways in Latin: Schola Grammaticae et Historiae and Schola Naturalis Philosophiae. I arrive early to the Bodleian library in Oxford, very nervous and quite intimidated. ![]()
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