Down the Turl of Ideas

 

Cloudy Grey Afternoon Musing -- 

When do ideas come to you? When do you capture ideas and how? Is there quiet, thinking time a certain time of day? Is there a place, a time, a method? Do you thrive on routine or on flexibility? 

Now the last day of many days
All beautiful and bright as thou,
The loveliest and the last, is dead,
Rise, Memory, and write its praise!

(Percy Bysshe Shelley)

Or, is it from your memory? Learning is a lifelong process and often something we learn about, read about, or experience comes back to us via memory. Either in an "ah ha" moment or a gentle reflection that reveals something. 

Fleeting like a fully bloomed flower, ideas tend to burst forth with wonder and delight, but if you don't capture it in some way, it fades and droops, and might be hard to retrieve again. This is a big reason why I journal and everyday let out some thoughts, even if it's not anything earth-shattering. 

I coyly inserted a little quote from Percy Bysshe Shelley as he was known for his big (atheist) ideas that got him expelled from Oxford, just down High Street, in fact, at University College. Despite his aversion to Christianity, his poetry is rather brilliant and not without lots of Christian imagery and language.

Turl Street in Oxford is one of my favourite streets. It connects Broad Street and High Street, so it a very handy path, but also is a central smaller street that is a source of many branches of paths diverging from it. It not only offers the cut-through to High Street from Broad Street, but along the way, it also provide a branch directly to to the Radcliffe Camera (Brasenose Lane) and then the other direction toward Cornmarket via Ship Street or Market Street. There are great shops along Turl, like Oxfam bookshop, The Missing Bean coffee shop, and some of the loveliest colleges (Exeter, Jesus, Lincoln). One of my favourite restaurants used to be there (a victim of Covid time). A spire can be seen at the end where High Street greets it (it used to be a church, now the Lincoln College Library). And a huge Horse Chestnut tree stands on the corner of Turl and Ship Streets behind the Jesus College wall, branching well above and over it to provide shadows and beautiful greenery to anyone along Turl Street.

Turl Street can be really busy sometimes,  it can get congested with delivery trucks and bikes, students, tour groups, and construction/restoration projects. The moments when I can capture it in a stillness is fleeting, and I try to embrace it almost by instinct whenever I turn onto Turl Street. I find that I reach for my phone to see if I will be able to snap a photo of the delightful street. The way the road curves ever so slightly as it approaches High Street is visually appealing, with the lines of shops on the right and Lincoln College on the left.

So when I think of ideas, I think of Turl Street as the guide - the street that leads to all kinds of directional paths branching off. It's one small road with 5 different possibilities. It's this visual and real life exhibit of how one idea has the ability to branch off into many ideas depending on where we take it. As humans, we have these amazing capabilities to plan, strategize, make choices, learn, adapt, change our mind, re-design. It's with a sense of appreciation and wonder I think of ideas and how we use them as the catapult into some exciting. 

Desktop Domain

 

Before my thoughts, surveying
Time's evidences old,
All deeds with comfort weighing
That thy handwriting hold.

-from Psalm 143 (The Sidney Psalter)

It can be a bit dreamy, imaginative, and reflective here at my desktop domain. It's a place I love coming to in the early hours of the morning, sometimes before the sun is peaking high enough to cast light through the window. Each morning this is my view. It is the spot where my journaling pages set my mornings in the right direction with reflection and prayer. With a cup of coffee within ready reach of course. I read a chapter in the Bible, currently reading through the Gospel according to Matthew. Next my current philosophy book is open for as many pages reading I can squeeze into my time (getting close to finishing Either/Or by Søren Kierkegaard). If I do have a time restraint, I will set my Minee timer for a visual representation of how much time I have.

Here is where I can let my thoughts stretch out. In my mind and onto pages. Window to my right, bookshelves to my left. An inspiring little location in my small home. I am so thankful for this little space. To have a pleasant space to sit with my journal and open up to the next blank page is a gift.

Sometimes I will jot out a story idea, with plot and characters. Sometimes I will write about an experience or something I have learned from a day or experience, which tends to provoke deeper thinking of things to work on or grow from, which then leads to prayer. Onto the blank pages often appear scribbles of prayers, because I know I need it and the source of everything I need is at the other end of that wordy jumbled prayer sentence. Thank you, Lord.

Take some slow moments for deep thoughts, musing, calm. Take a breath. Welcome a new day and all that it will bring.

Nor let thy face be hidden
From one who may compare
With them whose death hath bidden
Adieu to life and care.
My hope, let mercy's morrow
Soon chase my night of sorrow.

-from Psalm 143 (The Sidney Psalter)

Choosing Either/Or

 

It is now sufficiently clear that reflective love constantly consumes itself and stops quite arbitrarily now here, now there; it is clear that it points beyond itself to something higher, but the question is whether the higher cannot straightaway combine with first love. Now, this higher something is the religious, where rational reflection ends, and just as for God everything is possible, so neither for the religious individual is anything impossible.

- Either/Or, Søren Kierkegaard

Many philosophers and thinkers have asked the toughest question in created ways. Questions such as why are we here? What is our purpose? To these questions we have all perhaps tossed out our own answers, or tossed out the questions altogether. Too difficult to answer. Just go on living how we choose. Yet, everything we choose is a direction either toward ourselves (our own desires) or toward something bigger (the ethical and good).

I am reading Søren Kierkegaard's Either/Or, a not-so-usual book of two parts, written by pseudonyms. Part I is from the point of view of the aesthetic/hedonistic/sensual lifestyle. Everything is subjective and according to what he feels and experiences. He praises idleness and pleasure. Part II is from the opposing viewpoint. Judge Vilhelm taking stances against these lifestyle choices and voices his case from the side of ethics and accepting responsibility. Kierkegaard forces his readers to decide for themselves which viewpoint either that, or that, as the most life-affirming. Kierkegaard might conclude that we (most of us) find ourselves on the side of the aesthete in Part I.

For the aesthete asks what we all might ask, "What is the human race? Either the sadness of the tragic, or the profound sorrow and profound joy of religion. Or is that not the peculiarity of everything that emanates from that happy people - a melancholy, a sadness, in its art, in its poetry, in its life, in its joy?"

Just as in life, we are not given answers. The reader must confront such questions and choose their reasons for agreeing with a choice of oneself, or the choice of obliging the familial and social responsibilities. This sub-created conversation between two opposing views allows the reader to engage in a deeper way with these fictional characters as we grapple with the meaning of why we choose a certain way of life.

We choose from an either/or set before us almost everyday, so which side do we find ourselves on?

What is it, then, that I separate in my either/or? Is it good and evil? No, I simply want to bring you to the point where that choice truly requires meaning for you. It is on this that everything hinges. Only when one can get a person to stand at the crossroads in such a way that he has no expedient but to choose, does he choose what is right.

Being a Sub-creator

 

What really happens is that the story-maker proves a successful 'sub-creator'. He makes a Secondary World which your mind can enter. Inside it, what he relates is 'true': it accords with the laws of that world. You therefore believe it, while you are, as it were, inside. The moment disbelief arises, the spell is broken; the magic, or rather art, has failed. You are then out int he Primary World again.

- "On Fairy Stories", J.R.R. Tolkien

I sat at my desk whilst in Oxford, with a view at the window out toward the main quadrangle of Wadham College. It pleased me very much to sit there with a few books and my journal. Naturally, when I am in Oxford I feel the remnant presence of the footsteps of those beloved authors and thinkers - C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Dorothy L. Sayers, Owen Barfield, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Robert Burton. I walk the paths of Christ Church Meadow and admire the knotty, old trees that look like Ents (from Middle-earth). I shop in Blackwells Bookshop imagining Dorothy L. Sayers working there under Basil Blackwell. I pass by the Narnia door and lamp post off Radcliffe Square and imagine C.S. Lewis stomping by a few times a week to meet his brother Warnie for lunch at The Mitre. It is easy for me to see the beauty held in the imagination, from the past, and into my present. I think of how these places not only inspire me now, but inspired centuries of students and professors in various ways. 

I am there. My feet trod along the same streets. I seek to re-visit some of the books by these writers that I love, as if to have another conversation with them whilst walking in their footsteps. I want to know their daily life and routine. Where did they grab a meal and tea? What books were they reading? Did they travel out of town, by train, bicycle, or car? I might make-up a story in my head about a meeting or lunch they might take with someone, as I head down The High for a spot of lunch. I might imagine their wanders through the flowering meadows in the middle of the city. And I imagine them sitting at their desks at home, writing their next book. What inspired them that day as they were out and about?

Tolkien coins the term and ideas around sub-creating. He explains that God is Creator, of everything we know and don't know, see and don't see. He has gifted us with abilities to create as well, through art, music, words, work, business, etc. We are all creating a story to tell. So, we in turn become creators, yet since we are not God, we are sub-creators of a secondary world, underneath the umbrella of the one true God as ultimate Creator. It is under these realms of the creation we explore our talents and gifts by way of sub-creating.

When I first discovered this through Tolkien, I was so inspired. It was a way of explaining and confirming what I had always thought to be so important. To do good with what I have been given. For me that good has always been writing and creating something - whether that is journal entries, poems, stories, or blog posts. But for others, it might be completely different. Yet in the same air of creating 'something' it is sub-creating. It may never be complete in our lifetimes, yet it is not in vain. Our work, our efforts will be perfected in the heavenly kingdom. Tolkien's short story "Leaf by Niggle" is the perfect companion here to illustrate that idea. 

When I sit down at my desk to write wherever I am, I always keep this in mind. This idea of being a sub-creator, for it is a gift from the Creator. Just holding that thought close and near inspires me to do my work of sub-creating, even if it's only a few minutes, or a small thing.  

The Light of the World

 

A visit to Keble College Chapel, Oxford

To see "The Light of the World" by Holman Hunt (1827-1910)

Marvelous pre-Raphaelite painting.

Behold, I stand at the door, and knock; if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.
- Revelation 3.20

Tucked into a small side chapel in the grand Keble College Chapel is the great painting by Holman Hunt, "The Light of the World". Hunt painted two of these, the other original is in St. Paul's Cathedral in London. I have been blessed to be able to see both of the original paintings in person. On this recent trip to Oxford, I wanted to take a little time to visit the one in Keble College.

It was a windy, chilly day in Oxford. We had lunch on Broad Street at a new favourite spot, Theo's Cafe. Then, we took the little walk beyond the Weston Library and by Wadham College and Trinity College. Keble College comes next, which stands across the street from the beautiful Natural History Museum. Keble College stands out amongst colleges as it is both newer and also built in brick, so it has a very different tone. Grand and spacious it is though, and worth a visit. Worth a visit alone for the chapel. 

Entering the chapel by the huge wooded doors the immediate hush greeted us with a calmness and quiet from the gusty winds outside. A few other people were shuffling about the chapel as well. My feet took me straight up the center aisle feeling the immensity of the space, up the steps toward the altar, and to the right through the small door into the side chapel. To spend a little time with "The Light of the World.

The painting absolutely glows. I love the play with light and the dusky early evening light. The lantern light reflects off several other places in the painting showcasing the overgrown vine on the door, allowing the viewer to see that there is no doorknob on the outside of the door. One must open up to Christ - He will not force open the door. But He is always pursuing. He knocks. We have the freedom and choice to open to Him, or not. 

Christ holds a light, but He is also the Light of the world. He tells us to be lights of the world, as recorded in the Gospel of Matthew (Ch 5.14-16), which has always been my favourite verse:

“You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven."

I stayed in the chapel for a little bit. No one else was in there so I took my time. I could have stayed easily for an hour, just sitting there looking at the painting under different angles and light. To sit with my journal and write, and pray. It is a place that holds a quiet meditative closeness to God. A place I will go back to with a very glad heart.

Landscape of the Mind

 

"If I know nothing of my own garret," I thought, "what is there to secure me against my own brain? Can I tell what it is even now generating? - what thought it may present me the next moment, the next month, or a year away? What is at the heart of my brain? What is behind my think? Am I there at all? - Who, what am I?"

- Lilith by George MacDonald

You are in your mind all day. It is an extraordinary thing we have as humans, to be in thought, consideration, musing, pensiveness. Truly amazing, it is, as we can revisit memories and times from the past, all from our perspective. We can dream and sometimes remember dreams that might be realistic or outlandish. This is all both a gift and a challenge that we have such power in our minds. Because we have the choice of what we do with it all. While revisiting memories can be a joy, from some wonderful encounter, trip, conversation, or event, it can also allow us to choose to hold onto something that leaves us bitter, that stirs irrationality, or that causes us to resist ideas of reality. 

As humans we aren't very good at letting go and we tend to get comfortable in a mindset and don't want to step out into reality. We like the control of it, even if we know it's likely not the best for us to hold onto. We are too comfortable in our own way, and think it is not really anyone else's business anyway. We are each the ruler of our own thoughts and can do whatever we want to. A fierce independence separated from an objective moral value is the way of the world today, as C.S. Lewis wrote about. He points out that the moral environment is not something we invented, it is something we discovered. We hear often today that everyone can make their own values and do whatever they like, rather than subscribe to some "rules" that seem restrictive, and yet those who are living with that idea are actually abiding by the ideas that values are objective in order to stake their claims. If you truly step outside the objective values then you are running your life by irrationality and emotion of the moment. 

I have written several posts about my love for Lilith by George MacDonald. I am just diving into another re-read, because this book is beloved. It's fantasy, and so odd and strange in the best ways that leave me thinking and musing its questions and paradoxes. It begins with a young man, who has the views of a scientific materialistic mind, who has come back to his family home to live, and it's ancient and full of hidden passages. He sits in the library reading most days, until he starts seeing things. An elderly librarian of old days who appears then disappears. Rumors of the house being haunted leaves him skeptical, until he sees the old man again, and follows him through many twisting passages and staircases to an unknown quarter. He views a mirror into a landscape that looks into another world, and stumbles into it, landing in the other realm, met by this older man, who sometimes looks like a raven and sometimes an old man. The narrator doesn't believe he has come through a door, as he never saw a door (remember, he's a materialist and only believes what he sees), and Mr. Raven begins to befuddle his brain - 

"I never saw any door!" I persisted.
"Of course not!" he returned, "all the doors you had yet seen - and you haven't seen many - were doors in; here you came upon a door out! The strange thing to you," he went on thoughtfully, "will be, that the more doors you go out of, the farther you get in!"
"Oblige me by telling me where I am."
"That is impossible. You know nothing about whereness. The only way to come to know where you are is to begin to make yourself at home."

If this sounds a little bit like a mix of C.S. Lewis's The Last Battle ("I have come home at last! This is my real country! I belong here. This is the land I have been looking for all my life, though I never knew it till now...Come further up, come further in!") and The Adventures of Alice in Wonderland, I would agree. C.S. Lewis was hugely influenced by MacDonald, seeing him as his mentor (like Dante viewing Virgil as his mentor). Lewis Carroll was good friends with George MacDonald and spent a lot of time with the family. The writers and books speak to one another in real time and across time, it's wonderful. 

It invokes the wonder and mystery of the world beyond. Shown in ways that stretch our imaginations. So here we go on this journey of the landscapes of the mind, with George MacDonald and C.S. Lewis. Through the imagination of a story published in 1895, re-visiting with Lilith always opens me to the deeper landscapes, into places that offer seeing truth and wisdom, through doors leading further up and further in.

I reach for a landscape in my mind.
It is full of beauty and calm, a place
Familiar like memory from the deep,
But telling that it's only the surface.
There is so much more, we think
We know all the detail we see
It passes by us each day ensured
By our preeminence we feel free
While held fast in the grasp, held.
The hardest thing is to loosen the fingers
Strangely secure to grasp the control
Though preventing true freedom in divine 
Whence in release allows air to extol. 

Sundry Reading Days

 

As laughter here breeds laughter, there above sheer happiness shoots brilliant flares. Below, a darkening shadow marks the saddened mind.

- Paradiso, Canto 9, Dante

Readers read together and alone. The beauty of reading is that it can be solo, or you can read with others either at the same time, aloud, or silently. If you are like me attached to the physical book (the wonderful feeling, smell, texture, essence of the book itself), batteries will not run out, no books will run out of charge. No books will kick you out when your subscription time has elapsed. In fact, books invite you in - to deeper understanding, learning, and perspective. Inviting you to linger on the pages. 

Reader, are you constantly looking for more time to read? Etching out our schedule so that you squeeze a few hours (or more) into weekends to read? Cast aside other plans to read? Decide not to go out because you'd rather read? Ask everyone you know what they are reading? Ponder to yourself how anyone could think there was such a thing as too much reading? 

If you are wondering why someone would want to read so much, it's a fact of sundry reading that you get a wide variety of books to enjoy and learn from. Last weekend I finished reading Plato's Phaedrus, his take on friendship, and then finished reading The Divine Comedy by Dante in a modern translation I had not read before and loved it. Then I summed up last week by reading The Early Church by Henry Chadwick, which starts from the beginning of the church in the ancient world and into the first few centuries AD. Then, just for fun I threw in Die with Zero by Bill Perkins, a book about living experiences now to build up memory dividends and not waiting for some future date, and also My Salinger Year by Joanna Rakoff, a memoir of a young women in NYC entering into the literary agent world in the 1990s. 

In this delicious stew of books, we have philosophy, fiction/poetry, history, business/finance, and non-fiction. From ancient BC writings, to the current modern day ideas. I would argue that you cannot get this robust flavor or serendipitous compilation of ideas and thought-provoking encounters except by exploring the world of books and allowing such meetings to occur, mix, and provide a plethora of musings.

Perhaps you think me too fastidious to place such importance onto books and these chance encounters. But I would come back and say that books talk to one another across time, space, and my tiny apartment. C.S. Lewis is always referencing ancient writers and I go to my shelf to grab that book to read. Dante seeks wisdom as his mentor Virgil comes out of the ancient world to guide him. Books reference one another, play off one another, build off older ideas, describe ideas in context of today. The more I read, the more I learn about to read more from the references. Who were your authors reading? How did they formulate their ideas?  It's a cycle of research I am very glad to get on and around every corner there is a whole new shelf of authors to discover.

Values from C.S. Lewis

 

It's been too long since I read a C.S. Lewis book. But this is one I have been wanting to re-read for a long time, and to read with the companion book by Michael Ward, After Humanity. Why is is titled After Humanity? If you are familiar with the message of The Abolition of Man, you know it is C.S. Lewis's warning to humanity from his perch in 1943 (he gave three speeches at Durham University that became this book) on the affects of subjectivism and the future of humanity. Living the post-modern, post-truth culture that we are in today, this warning from the past is all too familiar in what is pervading all areas of our lives. It is not a cheerful message, and he hitting very close to home in today's world. 

Needless to say, likely because of its relevance and because I have read it a couple times before, I flew through the book again along with the wonderfully commentated companion book by Dr. Ward. Lewis's book is very slim yet dense and thought provoking. Of course, being familiar with the book already I knew what the arguments were and where Lewis goes with it all. But the deeper analysis of what he was saying, or what he was referring to, thanks to the companion book, I am able to better perceive the arguments he lays forth in his masterful ways, keeping in mind in such a slim volume he does not cover all angles and has some missing pieces such as addressing arguments that could be made against his own.

Are things beautiful, good, and true just for us as individuals, or can we speak and feel about them in ways that are us beyond our isolated perspectives into a shared discourse of objective value? (After Humanity, pg 14)

Lewis jumps right into the issue from the start, using a concrete example of school textbook which teaches on controlling language, and at the same time displays lessons on subjectivism (eliminating a sense of shared morality). Lewis then discusses the danger of entering these radical yet subtle ideals the authors of the textbook seek to do in controlling language. The sense of accepted moral objective Lewis calls the Tao (he uses this term as a means to be applicable to anyone in any culture, not based on religion, this sense of similar moral values that all would agree on and obey through life, no matter their religion). How straying from this set of moral values can lead to a very dangerous end.

Ward explains, "the universally accessible Tao, and all therefore agree in principal on the objectivity of moral value. The Tao is not something that human beings simply make-up; it is something they discover." When someone steps outside this moral value standard, they step into a void. They lose all sense of framework for practical reason and decent moral choices. They are free to act of course, against the standard morals, they can abandon objective value, they can choose to bring about their own abolition. This is the message of the book. 

Lewis writes, "You say we shall have no values at all if we step outside the Tao. Very well: we shall probably find that we can get on quite comfortably without them. Let us regard all idea of what we ought to do simply as an interesting psychological survival: let us step right out of all that and start doing what we like. Let us decide for ourselves what man is to be and make him into that: not on any ground of imagined value, but because we want him to be such. Having mastered our environment, let us know master ourselves and choose our own destiny."

Lewis stood from a place in history during WWII where totalitarian dictatorships and controls of government were very serious matters that were reality. He warns against having moral blindness, for to see through all things is the same as not to see.

If you are looking for a way to engage with today's issues from a perspective outside of today's culture, seek out C.S. Lewis. You will be wiser for it, and better equipped to face what we are seeing today.

Long Journey with Aquinas

 

I have been on this long 800+ page journey with St. Thomas Aquinas and his writings, which mingle philosophy and theology from his perch in history (1225 - 1274). It has been a fruitful and intellectual journey, one that has deepened my understanding and challenged me because I am no theologian and I barely know philosophy (my reading stack is always growing with philosophy books).  I had never read anything of Aquinas and when I learned that he drew from Aristotle and saw the importance of philosophy as a necessary tool for a deeper understanding of faith, I knew I had to get introduced to him. Now that we have been introduced, and I have completed this book of his selected writings, I thought I'd share a brief summary, though by no means do I feel well versed as I have only scratched the surface, and this summary will be woefully incomplete. 

As with any long journey, you want to have plenty of liquids to keep you going, so Thomas became my coffee companion in the mornings. I like to read philosophy in the morning, preferably when my mind is most awake and sharp (coffee surely helps with that). Accompanied by a cup of coffee I would read a few pages from Thomas Aquinas, exploring his ideas, which often had their origins in Aristotle, but not to copy or conform to his ideas, but as a spring board into deeper understanding of the Christian faith, showing how God reveals himself to us through images and likenesses. A reminder that there is truth to be gleaned in the ancient philosophers, though not all is true. 

Reading a few pages at a time was ideal, for Thomas is a deep intellectual and much above my head. He would often pose a question and then proceed to answer both sides of the argument. It is amazing to read as it guides you through the process of a debate. It strengthens his argument by already laying out the counter-argument before he proceeds. This aspect of his argument style writing is already stretching me in how to build a better argument. Instead of asking what I think or know is correct, asking what would the opposite reply be as well. It does draw out the reason of an argument if you lay out a reply and a contrary reply. Then you conclude with the response. That's what Thomas does, and I am learning from it.

He poses the questions and responds on all ponderings of life - About happiness, truth, goodness, evil, science, conscience, God's existence, divine nature, the soul, words, the ultimate end.  

...happiness is a good exceeding created nature. Hence is it impossible that it came about the action of any creature, but a man becomes happy solely through the agency of God, if we are talking of perfect happiness. 

I read these arguments about happiness and how it is so counter from our culture and its total embrace of "do whatever makes you happy", which is never going to fulfill because doing what makes you happy, i.e. selfish desires, will leave you empty as it excludes God, and fleeting desires will satisfy for a short moment, at best, but will always leave an emptiness because it's not letting that good thing lead them to something deeper, that is, God. Some enjoyment or pleasure is not true happiness, and if it doesn't lead one to reach deeper to desire the true end of that desire (the ultimate good of God), one will be left wanting and empty. Even going back to Medieval time in history these issues were around in culture. It isn't anything new, and yet how we have not learned from this, and grown even more robustly ignorant of this truth. Hence the consistently rising mental health issues,  broken families and relationships, and people walking away from church in general. 

It's difficult to quickly list or quote from Thomas because he builds these arguments in steps and cherry picking is not ideal. It's best to read the whole of a question at least, to get both sides of the argument and his conclusive reasoning. I am just dipping into Thomas and his writings (800 pages is a dip). To gain a better understanding and meditate on such ideas, which he draws from those such as Aristotle, Augustine, Boethius. It leads me to want to re-read those authors, who I am already friends with, but would like to hear more of their thoughts. One author leads to another - it's one of those great joys of reading.
What are you reading that has been challenging you lately?

A Peak into the Bodleian Libraries

 

Any instance I get to step foot into the Bodleian Library (any building of the many buildings), I feel like it's a special occasion. I have not taken a tour of the Bodleian in many years, probably 6-7 years ago, and I have been really wanting to go back in to breathe in the air of the libraries, to be close to those oldest books of the Duke Humphrey's Library, and enter the Radcliffe Camera again with the most gorgeous dome and classical round architecture amidst reading space and shelves of books. These dreamy locations are really the thing of dreams, my dream anyway.

  

I was not able to get tickets online before the trip, so I had given up hope that we would be able to visit this year. But as providence would had it, we got chatting with a lovely, friendly tour guide and information desk employee of the Bodleian, and learned we might be able to get tickets the day of if we arrived at opening time to collect the few remaining tickets they would make available. So of course we showed up to queue at opening time to get tickets for later that day. Thank you to our new friend at the Bodleian! 

The tour begins in the Divinity School, a gorgeous large room where originally lectures would have been held. It is now used for private events (even weddings), lectures, and preparation on graduation days (getting robed and moving outside to enter the Sheldonian Theatre which is just outside the Christopher Wren door). We moved into the Convocation Room beyond the Divinity School which was used for England's parliament in the 1600s during the reformation.

Then comes the library fun. We pass through the reader gates and climb the stairs up above the Divinity School to the Duke Humphrey's Library, which sits above it. This is the old library, where the books used to be chained to the shelves (thankfully that was removed). It features gallery style double decker layers of shelves, lower and upper reached by a tiny spiral staircase. The one section we were hanging out in housed about 14,000 books. Above our heads the ornately carved and painted square ceiling sections spotlighted many instances of the open book emblem, the coat of arms of the University of Oxford - Dominus Illuminatio Mea. It is taken from the beginning of Psalm 27, and it means "the Lord is my light". 

You might recognize this from several scenes in the Harry Potter films. Honestly though, that's a tiny aspect for me of the excitement. That's what gets the tourist booking tours, but for me, it's all about the books and the history. Bookish history and ancient libraries is completely fascinating to me - I read books about it, watch videos on it, and crave visiting such places as this, which holds such special treasures and history worth preserving. 

After going back downstairs and outside into the old quadrangle and through the walkway leading out to Radcliffe Square, we entered the gates into the inside sidewalk/lawn leading to the Radcliffe Camera. Upon entering the main door, there's a gorgeous floating spiral staircase that hugs the outside walls with wood. Each step closer to the lovely painted ceiling. The awe upon entering the large openness of the lovingly known 'Rad Cam' for a book lover, library lover, Oxford lover, is deep. There was a hushed silence as students worked. Every table and chair I could see were filled, lower and upper levels. I couldn't shake the grin off my face. I could see myself sitting on the upper level with some books at my elbow, working, reading, writing. This was a place for me. My ideal. I would be happy if everyone just left me there and I'd gladly spend the rest of the day right there. 

But, alas, I had to move on. We went to a different staircase that went straight down into the Gladstone Link, an underground section of the Bodleian with huge metal moving shelves that could be crammed together, more seating, and then onward into the space age tunnel (though the whole sections underground are from the early 1900s and used to house a conveyor belt that transported books from one building to another) that connects the Rad Cam to the Old Bodleian and the Weston Library even further away another block away. I love that there is an underground tunnel system connecting the main Bodleian buildings. It's another secret of Oxford that most people don't know about, and it peaks my imagination. Definitely one of the highlights of my visit.