On the Coffee Table

Ever since my dad read his way through the entire World Book Encyclopedia, I have been intrigued by books that fill your mind with facts, odd items, and peeks into a world you might want to explore further. It's like going to a Tapas restaurant: if you don't particularly like something, no problem, you have ten other small bites to choose from. And if you have an adventurous palate and simply want to try a variety of things - enjoy! 

A side note - while in Nyack for the weekend, I visited a little used book shop called Pickwick Book Shop. In business since 1945, the little shop is filled, and I do not use that word lightly, with books on every conceivable subject, from romances and adventure novels to classics and old histories and non-fiction. The books are stacked to the ceiling in no particular order, and to my way of thinking that's part of the store's charm. You might go looking for a specific topic or type of book, and end up leaving with three of another kind altogether because they happened to catch your eye.

But back to my two most recent treasure troves of information it would probably never dawn on you to go looking for.

The first was actually loaned to me by a friend, and I promise I will return it - shortly. The Secret Museum is one of those books that you wish you had been able to write. The author, Molly Oldfield, quite clearly had the best of fun writing it. Accidentally stumbling onto the fact that most museums don't display everything in their collections, she took the idea and ran with it. What treasures might be found behind the scenes at famous, and a variety of specialty museums?

As you might know from visiting The Smithsonian, many museums have far too many objects in their collections to display them all, so they rotate many of them into a seasonal exhibit, or perhaps send them out on a traveling exhibit. Others, like our own Onondaga Historical Association, keep many items in a research collection for scholars and visitors who are looking for special topical information. Some of the "hidden" objects are simply too fragile to be out of a climate-controlled environment; others too precious; a few perhaps too disturbing. Whatever the reason, the curators have chosen to keep the item apart from the permanent or rotated displays. Oldfield made it her mission to visit as many museums as she could, with the objective to learn what was in their "secret" museum. 

The book's organization is a bit like the experience of visiting a museum. She begins each chapter, which is devoted to a hidden object or objects, by placing the museum on a map, a brief description of the museum's purpose, and, decorated with helpful sidebar imagery, a story of the history of the place, and her visit there - and what she found in their hidden collection. 

Her fist visit is to The Morgan Library and Museum in New York City. Not the first museum one would think of when visiting New York, the collection started with Pierpont Morgan in the heyday of wealthy collectors of all things rare and precious. Housed in the man's former home, among the many treasures to be found there include first editions and rare original manuscripts - like Milton's only existing manuscript of Paradise Lost, and Bob Dylan's pencil written lyrics for Blowin' in the Wind. In the archives - the "secret" museum, she sees a vellum version of The Gutenberg Bible. Her experience is described in detail: she stands to read it as the books were designed to be read standing by the monks who owned such treasures; she must gently turn the pages with an acid-free card; she can see the shimmer of the ink and smell the earthy aroma of the calf skin pages. The experience of actually seeing and touching the Bible, and knowing all that this single book represented - the democratization of reading, the alteration of religious history, and just dwelling on the concept of a world before books, is as moving as one might expect. 

But she doesn't stop there. 

In Suitland, MA, she see a space traveler's suit - yes, it has been in outer space. In The Vatican Observatory, itself a place many aren't aware has existed since the 1500s, she sees three pieces of billion-year-old Mars rock (validated by matching the gas bubbles trapped in the rocks with the Mars Rover's tests of the atmosphere of Mars). In the British Museum, she sees Tablet K.143 of the School Exercise Book of Arshurbanipal, King of Assyria. Cuneiform on a clay tablet, the book was apparently inscribed by the King himself as a boy. Oslo, Norway, is home to the KON-TIKI Museum, where Oldfield reads the Logbook of the famous raft expedition, which set sail in 1947, leaving from Peru and landing in the Polynesian Islands - just to prove it could be done. At the Royal Geographical Society in London she sees the actual hats of Stanley and Livingston, she presumes. And she even gets a peek at the actual dental tools used on Queen Victoria, which are house at the British Dental Association's Museum in London.

This list, varied and representative though it may be, is a small sampling of the author's discoveries. Her adventures are delightfully documented, as she conveys her own wonder and wit as she explores the unknown that's not-so-hidden for those who know how to look.

The second book I picked up at one of my favorite discovery book shops: Ollies. Ollies ("Good Stuff Cheap") is a great way to discover an unexpected print treasure and get it for a steal. This book is an oversize (8.5 x 11) illustrated book called simply Great Buildings. 

Since my Art History class in high school, I have been fascinated by public architecture and what we can learn about the times in which it was built. What is chosen for construction, from magnificent cathedrals to official national monuments, and how it is envisioned - secretive, soaring or simple - shares with us the minds and hearts of the people who felt compelled to spend massive amounts of time and treasure on their creation.

The book follows a historic trail from about 2500 BC to "the present," and travels through Europe and the near East, the Americas, and the far East, with excursions to Moscow and Australia. The buildings include temples, cathedrals, castles and palaces, arts and business centers, and even abbeys and homes. 

After a fine introduction to understanding how to "read" a building, from exterior and interior spaces, to order and repetition and the names for the purpose of various rooms and structures, each chapter is then devoted to exploring an example of enduring and marvelous architecture. 

We start with the Great Pyramid at Giza. The writers show us the material, a cutaway diagram of the construction and its interior rooms, and illustrate the chapter with photos that do their best to convey the building's scope and mystery. Each chapter tells us what is known about the builders, their time in history, and what the purpose of the construction was. Through the pages the reader travels to Mexico and a step pyramid; to Aachen, Germany, for a visit to the Palatine Chapel; to Granada, Spain, to see Alhambra; to Paris to see Versailles; and after Charlottesville for a trip to Monticello; and back to Germany to see Neuschwanstein Castle in Bavaria. Traveling forward in time there's a stop at the Chrysler Building in New York; and to Pennsylvania to see Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater. The Sydney Opera House and the Pompidou Centre give us a glimpse at the way architecture has manifested new structural materials and the power and simplicity of enormous spaces.

Either one of these books will let you out of "lockdown," if only in your imagination, and allow you to travel around and explore. Bon voyage!