Location: British Library, London
The main building for the library appears as a large modern complex, with walls extending around it on the road sides encapsulating a multi-level courtyard. Upon entering, one gets to glimpse the tops of the St. Pancras Restoration Hotel poking out. To skip ahead, whilst inside the library, a scale model of the building also revealed several floors for archives, which the author estimates to exceed a volume of twice the above ground building.
Unlike previously mentioned sites, this one is not particularly grandiose, and seems to echo the stereotypical English reserve in architectural standards. Inside however proves to be a great improvement, opening up with marble staircases going up to the first floor around an information desk, and rising up behind the initial vista is a large column which proved upon closer inspection to hold rows upon rows of old books, segregated off with glass panes. Even so, there is no real impression of a library, but more like that of a University study building, with its clean and modern appearance.
The first exhibition is directly up on the first floor, and it is a small collection covering the subject of Charles Dickens, and the Victorian fascination with the supernatural. This particularly timely exhibition is to give the visitor a background behind Dickens' famous work A Christmas Carol, and of the variety of activities Dickens' himself indulged in, mesmerism to name one.
The next area on this small tour was a permanent gallery, the Sir John Ritbalt Gallery: Treasures of the British Library. This gallery contained a large variety of texts and illustrations, dating back as far as the 12th century, composed up of texts, sacred religious texts, early colour illustrations from around the world, maps and views, and even music sheets. Even some contemporary works on Shakespeare are part of the gallery, but the music sheets drew a lot of interest, showing printed sheet music from around the Normal Conquest to more well-known works of classical composers such as Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven.
Early maps are also of especial notice, for the way that people before had viewed and drawn the world, with this changing in detail over the centuries. Particularly drawing to the attention are the mappaemundi, early flat-Earth based drawn of where many places were, and lastly, a detailed panoramic view of London, before and after the Great Fire of 1666, by Wenceslaus Hollar.
All the displays had descriptions beside them, to give the visitor a description and also explanation of each display item, and these serve as a great accompaniment to the illustrations. A room off the side of the gallery gives a view of the famous Magna Carta, a landmark civil rights document detailing 63 statutes, signed and officiated by the Great Seal in 1215 during the years of King John and his submission to Pope Innocent III. Through tax and power abuses, the barons of the time got together to create a liberties document, and require the King to sign it, thus, according to the Wikipedia article:
To conclude, this was a small overview of the British Library, and future visits would have to be based on articles of interest within the reading rooms, which are not open during Sundays.
Images are courtesy of a variety of sources from Google images. Information was from the British Library website.
The main building for the library appears as a large modern complex, with walls extending around it on the road sides encapsulating a multi-level courtyard. Upon entering, one gets to glimpse the tops of the St. Pancras Restoration Hotel poking out. To skip ahead, whilst inside the library, a scale model of the building also revealed several floors for archives, which the author estimates to exceed a volume of twice the above ground building.
Unlike previously mentioned sites, this one is not particularly grandiose, and seems to echo the stereotypical English reserve in architectural standards. Inside however proves to be a great improvement, opening up with marble staircases going up to the first floor around an information desk, and rising up behind the initial vista is a large column which proved upon closer inspection to hold rows upon rows of old books, segregated off with glass panes. Even so, there is no real impression of a library, but more like that of a University study building, with its clean and modern appearance.
The first exhibition is directly up on the first floor, and it is a small collection covering the subject of Charles Dickens, and the Victorian fascination with the supernatural. This particularly timely exhibition is to give the visitor a background behind Dickens' famous work A Christmas Carol, and of the variety of activities Dickens' himself indulged in, mesmerism to name one.
The next area on this small tour was a permanent gallery, the Sir John Ritbalt Gallery: Treasures of the British Library. This gallery contained a large variety of texts and illustrations, dating back as far as the 12th century, composed up of texts, sacred religious texts, early colour illustrations from around the world, maps and views, and even music sheets. Even some contemporary works on Shakespeare are part of the gallery, but the music sheets drew a lot of interest, showing printed sheet music from around the Normal Conquest to more well-known works of classical composers such as Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven.
Early maps are also of especial notice, for the way that people before had viewed and drawn the world, with this changing in detail over the centuries. Particularly drawing to the attention are the mappaemundi, early flat-Earth based drawn of where many places were, and lastly, a detailed panoramic view of London, before and after the Great Fire of 1666, by Wenceslaus Hollar.
All the displays had descriptions beside them, to give the visitor a description and also explanation of each display item, and these serve as a great accompaniment to the illustrations. A room off the side of the gallery gives a view of the famous Magna Carta, a landmark civil rights document detailing 63 statutes, signed and officiated by the Great Seal in 1215 during the years of King John and his submission to Pope Innocent III. Through tax and power abuses, the barons of the time got together to create a liberties document, and require the King to sign it, thus, according to the Wikipedia article:
...was the first document forced onto an English King by a group of his subjects, the feudal barons, in an attempt to limit his powers by law and protect their privileges.
To conclude, this was a small overview of the British Library, and future visits would have to be based on articles of interest within the reading rooms, which are not open during Sundays.
Images are courtesy of a variety of sources from Google images. Information was from the British Library website.
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