Tuesday 31 July 2007

St. Paul's Cathedral Library ~ 17 July 2007

The St. Paul's Cathedral Library is a relatively small, but immeasurably valuable, institution. It has been the cathedral's library for nearly 300 years, and it holds 13,500 volumes. The librarian, Joe Wisdom, gave us some historical background before taking us to the library. They believe that originally, the library's collection may have been stored along the length of the triforium. Also, the library was in the west end of the cathedral, where it expanded vertically rather than horizontally so as to conserve space. The room where Christopher Wren's great model of the cathedral from the 1670's is displayed used to be a library chamber, based on the book-related objects carved in the room's columns.

Onwards and upwards, Mr. Wisdom brought us to the library, a single room filled with ancient manuscripts that are under constant conservation. After the Great Fire, the library lost most of its books, so they had to be replaced with other collections (for example, Henry Compton, the Bishop of London, donated his entire collection). The domed ceiling of the library, Mr. Wisdom explained, simulates the feeling of a tent, so the reader's thoughts can soar! Wow, the architecture of a library has a lot more depth and significance than I realized. He also pointed out the iconography of the carvings in the library's columns: a skull above a book, surrounded by wheat and grapes, symbolizes how the library supports the church's message of Christ's triumph over death. One part of the library's collection that was interesting to me was a large Bible from the 16th century that was laid out on a small table, rather than on the shelves. We learned that this is used as an object lesson, to show how some books have the potential to cause damage to other books, because of the large brass knobs and buckles that embellish the cover.

The cathedral library is a private library, but it is open to anyone who will make good use of it. The librarian must be cautious and find out why exactly the person needs to use particular documents, as library security is certainly a major issue with a collection of this age and value. Therefore, patrons may only look at three documents at a time. Another issue which Mr. Wisdom informed us about is conservation. While we visited the library, a conservation exercise was currently in progress, led by conservators and assisted by a team that performs cleaning and minor repairs. The conservation projects are typically funded by grants.
It is also important to preserve the environment in which the books are stored, in addition to conserving the books themselves. As part of the library environment issue, I learned that there are actually specific types of bugs that destroy books, depending on the climate and location. Mr. Wisdom emphasized to us that with early printed texts, having duplicates does not decrease the value of the copy (as it may seem with current texts). Each copy is just as significant; they wouldn't dare to dispose of one copy because they already have another! This makes perfect sense, but it is another area which I was not aware of before this tour. I also learned the difference between conservation and restoration: Restoration involves making a change to the document, while conservation simply maintains the document. Joe Wisdom spoke vehemently against restoration, as he stated that any alterations done to a document should always be reversible.
This is an inspiring library and our tour was incredibly informative. :)

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