Writing Britain and The West End

July 2
Today was a low-level picture day. For 1 thing, it was blustery and raining, so we did not stop as often to take pictures outside. Secondly, though, we mostly went places where you can't take pictures, including a fair amount of time in the underground (bringing us back to the comment about it raining).

We had two main goals for today: go together British Library to see the Writing Britain exhibition and get tickets to see Sweeney Todd starring Michael Ball (if you've ever seen the Les Mis 10th anniversary concert, he's Marius) and Imelda Staunton (Professor Dolores Umbridge from the HP movies).

Writing Britain is an exhibition that explores how British authors have used the country itself in some way in their writing (as a character, motif, thematic base, etc). They had pictures, manuscripts, proofs, first editions, and recordings of readings from the different works. It was awesome. Dane and I are super nerdy, and I just finished a semester of Irish kit, and their were so many things in this exhibit that made me exclaim or laugh or sigh with love. Rather than arranging the materials chronologically, the curators divided the material into 6 different categories of how the authors 'wrote Britain' such as Rural Dreams, Waterlands (lakes, rivers, particularly the Thames), and Dark Satanic Mills (aka the industrial revolution). Within these sections ere included all kinds of writing from across the last 6 centuries. We were not allowed to take pictures, sadly, but here were some of the highlights: William Blake's notebook that he received from his brother with a draft of The Tyger crammed into a corner margin, a proof (which is like a rough draft the printer sends to the author for final revisions before the official printing of the book) that Dickens had revised, a handwritten manuscript of Chaucer's Csnterbury Tales from the 14th c, a painting of the Shire by Tolkien, James Joyce's manuscripts for part of Ulysses (I just had to read that for Irish lit- it took the entire semester because it is a brick), a 1000 year old book of poetry from Exeter Cathedral, an original manuscript of Alice's adventurer in Wonderland with sketches of the Queen of Hearts, and a manuscript of Dickens' Our Mutual Friend that he rescued from the sight of a train accident that he was in. He had helped being injured people out of the train car, and you can see blood smears on the page.

Two pieces in particular were my favorites. There was a printer's proof of Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw (My Fair Lady used the script and just added music, so if you've seen the musical, you've seen the play). Therwas a line missing from a scene that I know well, and it was so cool to see it written by hand in the margin. Its a good reminder of the process that writing is-- that it takes time and, in theory, can be ever unfinished (Shaw was adding this line at the last minute and the deadline had more to do with the printer than his sense of finality).

My very favorite piece was a portion of JK Rowling's origins. manuscript of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (the UK title of book 1). It is the beginning of chapter 6, when Harry is spending his last might with the Dursleys. If you know me, you know that I have an almost absurd love of the books, and have read them all many times. It's such a strange, cool feeling to know a piece of text so well and get to take a peek at its beginnings. You can see rough places that were eventually smoothed out. You can see gaps that were later filled in and some parts that stayed exactly the same. It's one of the things I love about reading- it really is like getting to know another person, and the more you read it, the more you understand it.

I did take one picture in the library (outside the exhibit) of this cool old printing press.



After the library, it was time for lunch, and then we headed over to Trafalgar Square to grab some coffee and let Dane work on his blog post for Oxford.



We settled into the front window seats of a coffeehouse right in front of Nelson's column and the National Gallery.




Ah! I almost forgot! Today was also the day we finally caved and bought umbrellas. Mine is super touristy, and I love it. It is covered with Londony things: red telephone booths, beefeaters, iconic buildings and the London eye.

After our short rest, we headed over to the national gallery. Again, Dane was skeptical that he would like it at all, but I think he enjoyed it (once inside he told me that to his surprise, I was right). my favorite rooms in the gallery are the impressionists paintings. Monet, Manet, Cezanne, Van Gogh, and others whose names I do not remember. I'm not a huge art fan. but I love seeing these paintings up close. Monet's paintings of the water lily pond behind his house are beautiful.

Between the Gallery and the play we had about an hour to kill for dinner, so we wandered down to the theatre to find something to eat around there. On the way, we found a couple mo of the telephone booth art






and this fun string quartet in the covent garden market.



They had choreography and everything.

I have dragged Dane to several plays throughout the course of our relationship. Not only was this one that he suggested we see, I think it turned out to be one of his favorites. I love Michael Ball's voice. and I got chills when he sang Pretty Women and Joanna, but Imelda Staunton stole the show with her Mrs, Lovett. She was hilarious! I knew that she was talented, because I truly hate her as Dolores Umbridge (because she's brilliant in that role) it was so fun to love her for the same reason here. The play is a little different from the movie (more lyrics to songs, a few extra songs) and it was awesome. I highly recommend it. I especially recommend this particular showing, though you'd have to come to London to make that happen. :)

One thing Dane and I have realized being here is that we are not really nightlife people. The only reasons we stay out late is if we are hanging out with other people, but if it's just us, we don't do much. So we were so proud of ourselves staying out so late. :)



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