Museums and the Macabre

Tuesday, March 24, 2006
London

The downside about having a lovely week in Italy is that you are snowed in by the amount of work that descends upon you on your return. I was a slave to my PC all day and only took a breather for half an hour to eat my lunch. I worked from 6 am until 10 am non-stop, energizing myself with cups of coffee and then Greek yogurt with muesli. Then, my second session of the morning began after I had spoken on the phone to my brother Roger in Bombay.

Among the many tasks I completed today was bringing my blog up to date, writing my Veneto travelog, creating an itinerary for our forthcoming tour of the Ancient World--Rome and Istabul--finalizing bookings at our hotels in Rome, Istanbul and for one night at Gatwick airport, completing the transcribing of an interview I had started a week ago with Claire Jansen, rescheduling a number of interviews with prospective Anglo-Indian subjects, sending Llew a list of things I need him to bring me from Connecticut and responding to email as it kept pouring in. Phew!!!

On and on it went until at 3. 30 pm. I only stopped because I had received a call earlier in the day from Paolo, a friend of my colleague Robin Goldfin from NYU, who was given my number by Robin and decided to call and get together with me. Paolo is a musicologist at a university in Sao Paolo, Brazil, and is in England to give a paper at a conference in Oxford this coming weekend. His few days in London have been devoted to walking around the city aimlessly and taking in whatever he can without creating a fixed agenda--so very different from the way I travel!!!

When he called, I suggested we meet at 4 pm at Holborn Tube station as I hoped to finish the bulk of my pending tasks by then. I was right on time and Paolo arrived just a few minutes later. It seems that we had been introduced exactly a year ago in Manhattan at the Cornelia Street Cafe in Greenwich Village where Robin had requested me to participate in a Faculty-Student Reading of Creative Writing. I had read an essay I had written about meeting Lady Penelope Chetwode, wife of the late Poet Laureate Sir John Betjeman, many years ago in India. The essay has not yet been published because I am holding on to it in the hope of publishing it as part of a collection of essays entitled "Close Encounters of the Anglo Kind'.

Anyway, it was nice to see Paolo again and since it was such a beautiful day with the sun shining benignly down upon us, I suggested a self-guided walk from my Frommer's Book and Paolo was all for it. The walk in entitled 'Museums and the Macabre' and seems to be better suited for rainy days as a great part of it is undertaken indoors. Despite the disclaimer, we set out briskly towards Lincoln's Inn Field where we discovered the Hunterian Museum in the Royal College of Surgeons. This building itself is a venerable space, devoted to the granting of the letters that magically added authority behind the names of all the 'specialist' doctors that once treated me whilst I still lived in India--FRCS (Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons). This old and celebrated institution was established in the 18th century and John Hunter was one of its founding members and greatest acquirer of anatomical 'pieces' that comprise the bulk of his collection. Since both Paolo and I are 'Humanities' folks, we felt a bit squeamish as we gazed at the extraordinary exhibits that comprise this gallery--body parts of every kind of creature including men and women are placed in glass cylinders and preserved in formaldehyde. There were skeletons galore and all sorts of information pertaining to the study of the anatomy and the many items that were used as instructional tools by the college over the centuries.

Getting out of there, we crossed Lincoln's Inn field where daffodils in various lovely shades of yellow were blooming profusely. In the center is a covered gazebo which is where public executions used to take place in the reign of Elizabeth I. It is supposedly a haunted part of the former 'field' (now park) and the cries of tormented hung criminals are said to be heard at night.

Then, we found ourselves at the famous Sir John Soanes Museum which I had last visited about four years ago and found thoroughly fascinating. Soanes is the architect of the Bank of England building (aka The Old Lady of Threadneedle Street) but his passion was the collection of architectural fragments from buildings all around the world--his favorite being the Neo-Classical style. In this unusual space, the visitor will find a treasure trove of columns, statues, sculpture, figurines, urns, even sarcophagi and a small section devoted to paintings--the most valuable being William Hogarth's series The Rake's Progress.

Since we arrived there just 15 minutes before the museum could close, the guards were kind enough to let us in without paying the entry fee of 3 pounds. Since I knew my way around the house, I led Paolo up to the main highlights including the Paintings Gallery where another guard was kind enough to open up the concealed paintings that hang in a very distinctive way to allow for maximum display opportunity. He told us that this is the only place in the world where such a unique design might be seen. As we toured the 18th century rooms, we were struck by their grandeur and abundance of decorative detail. Paolo was so intrigued by this space that he has resolved to return to it as it "deserves a second look", he said.

Out on High Holborn, we made our way towards Russel Square passing by some lovely squares along the way, each of which had newly flowering trees. We remarked how beautifully London has been planned and designed and Paolo, who was returning to the city after 19 years, told me repeatedly that he "could very well live here". Then, we were at the School of Oriental and African Studies and in Woburn Square and Gardens which, I discovered, to my astonishment, is right behind the Birkbeck College Building in which I teach!!! This is how stupid you feel when you have traversed the entire city on foot but haven't discovered your own backyard, I thought, somewhat ashamed of myself.

Across Malet Street we went towards the Petrie Museum of Egyptian and Sudanese Art--but since it was 5. 30, it had already closed for the day. By this point, I suggested we stop for a drink as we'd already been walking over an hour and a half and I was ready to rest my feet. In the Print Room Cafe, a part of University College, London, to which my Dean Fred Schwartzbach had introduced me several months ago, we found comfortable sofas and sank down gratefully with large mugs of peppermint tea. After a good half hour, we got up again, to complete the last part of the walk which took us into the main building of the university to see the 'auto-icon' of Jeremy Bentham, one of the founders of the college. Since I had seen this rather bizarre exhibit before, I did not find myself overly fascinated by it, but Paolo certainly thought it weird.

By this time, it was close to 7 pm and I was tired and wanted to return home. On my way back, I found that my new found friend John Thomas whom I have interviewed as part of my research had stopped off at my building to leave me his collection of Lovejoy DVDs. John has been reading my blog and discovered that I made a recent trip to Suffolk. Since Loevjoy is set and shot in Suffolk, he offered to lend me his DVDs. I have not heard of this TV series and so I'm looking forward very much to sitting and watching it. In fact, I am so annoyed with Lovefilm.Com who have been screwing up with my account so often of late that I am seriously thinking of cancelling my membership with them. If I have Lovejoy to watch, it will probably keep me busy in the evenings and with the TV programs I enjoy habitually, I don't believe I will miss Lovefilms. com at all.

It was 9 pm when I started to doze off on my couch after a dinner of 'steak pie for one' from Marks. I decided to respond to my body's indication that I needed sleep and after brushing and flossing my teeth, I sat down to write this blog, then went straight to sleep. There is still so much I have to accomplish tomorrow. I had better get all the rest I can!