Beautiful Minds: Capture the spirit of Nobel achievement

British Library -- Temporary Exhibit
One day last week, I found myself in London with nothing to do on a late afternoon. Armed with an all-day Underground pass, I was looking for some place to get to. It was cold, and it was too late to get into any museums. I had left my gloves back in Chicago (foolishness, rather than hardiness) and so I couldn't wander the cold streets for too long.

Then, in a map of Central London that I'd picked up at the Heathrow Underground station, I noticed the British Library marked next to King's Cross station.

Being a big fan of libraries everywhere, I decided to check out the library and see their collection of books. As it turned out, I never got to see their rooms of books. They wanted me to apply for a "reader pass" and then I was told that it was too late in the evening to get one that day.

But I was in for a very pleasant surprise. The library had many special exhibits and to me, those were fascinating. In the John Ritblat Gallery they're showcasing the "Treasures of the British Library." The features of this room include the actual notebooks and manuscripts used by Da Vinci, Newton, Mozart's and Beethoven's musical notations, as well as some of the notebooks used by the Beatles.

I was fortunate in that there was a special exhibition on Nobel laureates on display at the time I visited. I spent over 2 hours on just that one. The overall topic was whether or not the "mileu" (the place where the Nobel laureates worked) had a huge influence on their creativity. (For example, why does Cambridge produce so many more Nobel laureates than Oxford?)

There is a room where they are showing 7 documentaries, running continuous ly, projected on 3 large screens. To me, these were the highlight of the exhibition and I recommend those films highly. It was especially great to watch the one on Tagore's Shantiniketan. (I believe those documentaries were made by an organization called NobelMuseet.) There were tons of sound recordings by the Nobel winners, but I was short of time.

(It was interesting to listen to Hemingway stiffly apologizing to the people of Scandinavia on being unable to come in person to accept his award due to his bad health.)

Anyway, if any of you reading this live in or near London, I recommend dropping and checking it out. (The special exhibition runs until March 15th, 2006.)

Category: Museums/Libraries