Books to soothe the soul: Trinity College Library
Une virée à Dublin s’impose, clairement.
It’s a thing when I feel stressed or anxious I find comfort in books. Not reading them so much as buying them. Reading when I’m anxious is often frustrating because I’m easily distracted and will typically find myself doomscrolling anyway. But buying books, especially in a used bookstore, has a way of soothing my nerves.
The Book of Kells is not something you read or even touch, but something you admire on your way to the long room upstairs, in the Trinity College library in the centre of Dublin.
I’ve been twice. Once with a then-10-year-old Eldest in 2016 and once in 2018 with a then-beloved. I had the same experience twice. I absolutely didn’t want to leave the place.
Most people pretend to go there for the Kells business, because it’s a prime example of western calligraphy and you’re supposed to want to learn about these things. Go hereif that’s you. I tried to pretend long enough until I made it upstairs to breathe in all that timelessly literate dust.
In addition to collections that include priceless medieval manuscripts, this library is an archive of books published. In the business it’s called legal deposit and every publisher is required to send the library a copy of every title published — at no cost, obviously — so they can be archived. In Canada we are required to send two copies of every book to Library and Archives Canada on Wellington Street, something I’ve done very dutifully since my first book in the 1990s.
The Trinity College library is also home to the 1916 Proclamation of the Irish Republic as well as one very famous harp.
It’s a breathtaking place where time stands still except for the dust that keeps accumulating on all this knowledge. Absolutely worth the detour.
Le college Trinity à Dublin est d’une facture relativement moderne, vu de l’extérieur. En fait, sur son site Web il s’évertue à mettre de l’avant son innovation, sa fine pointe de toute, en avant la modernité. Et en-dedans, il contient des trésors d’époques anciennes dont la valeur est inestimable.
J’y suis allée deux fois et j’ai toujours envie d’y retourner. Il y a bien sûr le fameux Book of Kells qu’on peut admirer — si vous êtes du genre à apprécier les reliques chrétiennes. Moi, bon. Bof, m’enfin.
La bibliothèque au deuxième étage, en revanche, ouah.
D’une beauté et d’une richesse à en couper le souffle. Et ces jours-ci, j’aime me les remettre en tête, histoire de me purifier l’âme après toutes ces conneries de guerre commerciale.
