Recently had my first visit to the Bodleian in Oxford. They have an exhibition of tomes of medieval romance at the moment and it's sooooo good. Well, it's books - from my point of view, they'd have to work really really hard to lose my interest (I won't be surprised to find that every one of their exhibitions is a total delight). Apart from the stories themselves of high honour and tragedy and adventure and lust and loss, there's the packaging - I like packaging and will always take a book's cover into account. Age-darkened leather, heavy old paper, close-written lines (shivering monks with eyesight failing, stooped over their work in poor light, surely), ornate decoration, dainty illustrations. I'm not terribly imaginative. I'd like to be, I really would, but when I look at time-worn steps and ancient drovers' roads, what I see and like is the stone, the creation - the creators and even the users rarely play their part in my thoughts. But old books, especially the hand written ones or those with later notations in the margins, they work in an instant. And they're things of beauty. In an ideal world I would settle down in there for a week or a month or maybe a year and just soak myself in them.
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