travel notebook: bookshops

I’m thinking of  writing and history because I’m about to leave for a little trip to London where I am sure I’ll visit many museums and bookstores.

I stumbled on these stone tablets with folklore teachings about what to do when a tsunami hits in the New York Times. Apparently there are many around Japan. One tablet tells readers not to go below THIS level and sure enough the waters stopped more than 300 ft below the stone when the tsunami hit in March.

There is something exciting about messages from beyond the grave. In a way all writing brings us into a conversation with everyone else who ever wrote anything and made it public. It’s exciting to walk into a mind that lived 500 years before ours. Emily Dickinson wrote a lovely poem in this line of thought, about the frisson she felt reading old books, of visiting libraries.

A PRECIOUS, mouldering pleasure ’t is

To meet an antique book,
In just the dress his century wore;
A privilege, I think,

His venerable hand to take,
And warming in our own,
A passage back, or two, to make
To times when he was young.

His quaint opinions to inspect,
His knowledge to unfold
On what concerns our mutual mind,
The literature of old;

What interested scholars most,
What competitions ran
When Plato was a certainty,
And Sophocles a man;

When Sappho was a living girl,
And Beatrice wore
The gown that Dante deified.
Facts, centuries before,

He traverses familiar,
As one should come to town
And tell you all your dreams were true:
He lived where dreams were born.

His presence is enchantment,
You beg him not to go;
Old volumes shake their vellum heads
And tantalize, just so.

I prefer bookstores over libraries. Most libraries require complete silence and I work best in contrast environments. I like to have a bit of noise while I do my reading.  I’ve visited some awesome bookstores while traveling.

I love love Strand on 14th Street in New York City because the books are affordable and there is just an great avalanche of them. Classics and new releases. I adore 8 1/2 in Madrid which specializes in books on cinema. It’s tucked away in a corner of Plaza de España across from an inconspicuous fast-foody place that sells great fried chicken – a are treat for Americans in Madrid. I remember friends eating there and looking as if they might just cry because they were homesick for American food.

The bookstore is at Martin de Heros No. 8,  in case you ever want to head over there :)

I also like El Ateneo in Buenos Aires. It used to be a theatre. Now it’s the stage of thousands of books. People come to stare it at me, tourists like me but many locals come just to have a coffee and read. The theatre’s stage is now the café.

The only library I’ve ever loved has no books. I remember visiting this library in Ephesus and feeling as though I was on consecrated soil even though we were only a block away from what was the prostitution quarter.

Ephesus, an ancient Greek city, now part of the modern-day Turkey, was a hot spot about 500 years BC  because of its architecture. Though much of it has been destroyed the remains are breathtaking. The Library of Celsus is a two story building, with tall ionic columns that draws the eye upward and makes the edifice look more imposing. The ionic capital’s ends look like rolled  up papyrus manuscripts.

But all in all, I do my best reading standing up or  pacing the floor. I’ve seen people lay supine on the beach reading.  I never can manage it. I always end up napping or watching people. If I’ve stared at you, just know that I’m just distracted. It’s not your bathing suit. You look lovely!

Where do you guys do most of your reading? Any favorite spots?