Daily Office:
Wednesday
¶ Matins: Between this and this: I just had one of my big ideas: Libraries in France are bookstores. (Bibliothèques are libraries, but never mind.) What if we altered the English definition, and publicly funded small bookshops?
¶ Lauds: The world’s “largest concert“: the Hamburg State Orchestra plays Brahms — all over Hamburg.
¶ Prime: It took me forever to realize what Formenwandlungen der &-Zeichen means. “&-Zeichen” is the (rather klutzy) German term for “ampersand.”
¶ Tierce: The good news is also the bad news: Orient-Express Hotels wants to back out of a deal with the New York Public Library that may leave the Donnell Library building standing.
¶ Sext: Keith McNally, owner of Balthasar and other eateries, would like to swat the bloggers who are swarming around his latest venture (which doesn’t open until next week), Minetta Tavern. Buzz, buzz!
¶ Nones: Amazing news: “Arrest warrant issued for Sudan leader.”
¶ Vespers: Maud Newton reconnects with Katherine Anne Porter, who has just appeared in the Library of America.
¶ Compline: This is a joke, right? The United Transportation Union objects to surveillance cameras in railroad engine cabs; recommends staffing same with two people.
Oremus…
§ Matins. Small bookshops with (free) lending libraries, that is. The bookshops would be not-for-profit, government funded operations. “Library science” would be folded into digital data management, and regular librarians (who are still widely thought to love actual books) would become bookshop managers.
The branch library that doesn’t have the particular book that you’re looking for is almost certain to be replaced, one way or another, by some sort of Internet service. Current best-sellers that everybody is reading will probably become digital downloads (Kindle or otherwise). But everyone will be able to own, or at least read, a bound copy of Wuthering Heights or the Essais of Montaigne.
The beauty of this idea is that most extant library buildings could probably spare the odd corner for a small boutique, where customers could by classics from the Library of America, Everyman’s Library, the Loeb Classics, and so on. Readers would be encouraged to spend some time with at least five percent of the titles on offer. I’d buy Emma, you’d buy Pride and Prejudice, and we’d lend to one another as needed.
§ Lauds. Do not miss the “teaser video.”
Hamburg is Brahms’s hometown; so, natch.
§ Prime. Nor do I know what the name of the site is. Wiedler.ch? Eine Stunde Druckgestaltung? Either way, be sure to visit the gallery.
§ Tierce. The deal would have brought in millions for library renovation, but it would also have destroyed a much-loved midtown oasis. NB: The Donnell has been evacuated and gutted. When did librarians become so hasty?
§ Sext. Maybe I need a new business model.
He added: “It’s like telling a date you’re great in bed before the clothes come off. It leads to nothing but disappointment. (Well it does in my case.)”
Those inside the small and avid micro-industry of restaurant bloggers are used to hearing the voice of Br’er Rabbit in the words of proprietors who beg not to be thrown into the briar patch.
“Restaurateurs typically like to roll their eyes and groan when the blogs write about them before they’re quote-unquote ready,” said Josh Ozersky, who writes about restaurants for the CitySearch blog The Feedbag (and was formerly a blogger for New York Magazine’s Grub Street). “In point of fact the amount of excitement we generate for places that after all are essentially in the business of giving you a piece of chicken on a plate is enormous.”
There you have it: the “chickplate” blog!
§ Nones. Who knows if it will work — but it sure beats war! Just imagine a United States that presses international courts to rid the world of future Saddams!
§ Vespers. I myself just opened the book on Monday afternoon, and read the What Maisie Knew-ish story, “The Downward Path to Wisdom.” In her entry, Maud quotes Porter’s favorable comparison of Colette to Gide and Proust.
Colette conceals her aim, her end, in her method. Without setting her up in rivalry with her great jealous, dubious male colleagues and contemporaries, let us just be glad of such a good, sound, honest artist, a hard-working one; we could really do nicely with a lot more “light writers” like her. The really light-weight ones weigh a ton beside her.
§ Compline. Does a person have a justifiable expectation of privacy in the course of performing a job at which lives are potentially at risk? I think not; and I certainly don’t take much comfort from the presence of a second person in the cab. What do you think?