Going Shopping

Here is a reading recommendation for you: an article about two guys going book shopping. I don´t much do bookstores anymore, because of my asthma, but I have certainly been exactly where these guys are. But seriously, how many books does it make sense to own? Perhaps it depends on the quality of one´s public library. Mine is excellent.

Favourite quote from this article: 

"you don’t get to be the best-read man in America by giving a damn about someone else’s taste. You buy and read books that entice you for small reasons like a good cover or an intelligent introduction, books that appeal to your eccentricities. You keep as many books as possible nearby because they are in fact the very record of your eccentricities."

I like that. I often sit to table with other enthusiastic readers and they go "have you read this? have you read that?", and more and more, I find that I haven´t read the latest novels, the ones on the best-seller-lists, that everyone reads. And if this used to make me feel embarrassed, it doesn´t any more. The world is full of great books, old and new. The only good reason to read something is that it adds to your own experience or gives you much pleasure. Making book choices to "keep up" is a waste of time. Unless, of course, you are a critic or something like that, and have to read for work. Which is a totally different thing.

I think that generally, one should follow one´s heart. In all matters. 

From My Photo Album

Oldest bookstore in Sweden. From last summer.

Visby, Gotland - Day Two

Of course, we had some blind luck with the weather. I credit the sun gods with the fabulous way almost all my photos turned out. Our hotel was also the best. Some complained about hot rooms, but I have to say, we were perfectly comfortable the whole time. I slept like a log.

Another perk on this trip was getting to fly via Bromma Airport in Stockholm. That´s the smaller, older airport, and I haven´t had the pleasure before. I took a few photos there, but they are all bad and pointless, so I will not bother you with those.

This, folks, is a place I have visited before. It´s an old book store, and the place where I bought my new bible in 1999 (yes, I have been here before, also curtesy of Swedish football), when the new translation had just come out. And guess what, Margareta was my companion that time, too!

This year I bought an autobiography that Margareta recommended. I will blog about it when I have read it.

It says "Café" on the sunblind, and indeed they had one, squeezed into the old defense wall itself. I didn´t get a very good picture of it, and besides, we didn´t have coffee there anyway.

The Town wall from the outside. What Valdemar Atterdag had to overcome.

Picturesque ruins are just part of the landscape here - the Victorians would have loved it.

I absolutely love the look of old stone constructions. There is such beauty in the patterns, the way things were made, and remember that this wasn´t supposed to show at all. This would have been totally plastered over and covered with painings or whatever.

Look at the detail of that!

Again, I had a most informed and enthusiastic guide.

The walk down by the sea shore.

Lover´s Gate.

It´s so impressive how they have preserved the medieval town´s structure, while still bringing Visby into the modern age. I imagine that many old cities could have had this kind of ambience, but either old walls and buildings have been torn down by utilitarian builders, or fires have taken their toll.

I am very excited to find modern artwork in places like this. The old bombed out cathedral in Coventry comes to mind. (Which I seem to have NOT BLOGGED ABOUT! Have to make amends and dig out those pictures!)

Another WWII bunker down by the harbour. I loved seeing this, my maternal grandfather spent seven years on this island, prepared to defend us against the Germans or anyone trying to have their way with us. He might have been sitting right here. Who knows?

As so often happens, the older generation is already gone by the time we ourselves are mature enough to have formed relevant questions to ask them.

Grey pears.

Me, in front of a pavillion in the Bothanical Gardens. (Photo credits to Margareta)

Red troll grapes.

In the evening, we went to an outdoor restaurant (in the old(?) grounds of the Freemasons, where we were treated to a medieval meal. As you can see, we ate part of the meal from communal wooden boards. Also on offer were whole roasted lamb, and an assortment of side dishes and condiments, such as a special kind of sweet, stewed cabbage.

Some questioned the authenticity of having a belly dancer for entertainment, but actually, hoards containing plenty of Arabian coins have been found on Gotland, and they would certainly have been dealing in slaves at some time. I don´t think it´s particularly unrealistic to imagine that one or two exotic men and women could have resided here.

After this, we walked home through a quiet and sleepy Visby, to nightcaps in the hotel bar, and a good night´s sleep.

Finds in our backyard

Ever since I moved to this town, almost 20 years ago, I have heard rumours about an antiquarean bookshop. A couple of times I have gone looking for it, like some ten years ago, but all I found was what looked like a closed cellar full of books. Perhaps I came on a wrong day.

However, a friend suggested the other week that we go, and of course I was curious to see if it actually existed. I am, after all, a bookworm and this town isn´t that large, I should know what´s going on. Bookwise. I do not pretend to be up to date on anything else...

And there it was! Open and all. Homemade, pretty little sign on the street. Not a main street location, you really have to go looking for it, but then again, I don´t expect the turnover is astronomic.

Of course I bought something. Somerset Maugham´s "Cake and Ale, or the Skeleton in the Cupboard". Just for the title. (I´m saving it for a trip, it looks like light reading and because it´s in EngIish I can leave it behind me.) I was a bit low on cash that time, so I returned a week later, and found some more lovely things I will blogg about later, when I have read them.

However, this buying of book has made me think about the state of my shelves. I do not have enough room. I suppose I could buy more shelves, but I´m not really a hoarder, and a hoard is what it´s beginning to look like. Just passing a few books to the welfare shop once in a while isn´t really enough. And I keep bringing in more and more books. It has to stop. I´m maturing to a decision, I think. Pretty soon.
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Tate Modern

I don´t seem to be able to walk past a bookstore without taking a picture. This is Tate Modern, that we visited for the first time this summer. It wasn´t planned or anything, we had an afternoon at our leisure and went to St Pauls Cathedral, because I had read in an article that there would be a great tea shop there. The shop was such a disappointment that we took our tea next door, at a french sandwich place instead, and then we just walked randomly, found the Millenium Bridge and walked straight on to the museum.

Actually, this time I was not the one pulling us in. There was an exhibition called "Exposed - Voyeurism, Surveillance and the Camera", and my husband wanted to see it. It was great, and featured artists such as Nan Goldin and Sophie Calle, that I have heard a lot of, but never before had a chance to see.

The architecture of the museum itself is also pretty awesome. I like the space and how they make use of light in a decorative way. I think of museum architecture a bit like fine jewellery, it is a mounting that should fit a great range of stones, from polished natural rock to finely cut diamonds. And everything in between. The aesthetics have changed a bit since the days of Elias Ashmole.