25 April 2014

Always Shakespeare


Postcard sent by Laura (the UK) that fits perfectly in my album about Shakespeare. It's a quotation of his play Henry VI, Part 3. How suitable for a postcard!

The First Folio is the first collected edition of 36 Shakespeare's plays, published seven years after his death. And you can find it in the Bodleian LibraryLaura visited the Bodleian Library in Oxford and sent me two imposing postcards from there.



Duke Humfrey's Library. Built above the Divinity School in the fifteenth century to hold the University's manuscript Library, which had been greatly augmented by generous gifts of manuscripts by Humfrey, Duke of Gloucester, the Library opened in 1488. Sir Thoomas Bodley remodelled 'the great desolate room' from 1598-1602, when the present book presses where installed and the magnificent ceiling panels and beams were painted. The room is now used as the main manuscript and early book reading room of the Bodleian Library. 




The Tower of Five Orders. It is a display of classical architectural learning. Twin pairs of classical columns (Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, Corinthian and Composite) are mounted one above the other, each pair linked by a entablature. King James I, who visited Oxford in 1620, gave the University a copy of his own collected writings, an event which is symbolically represented by a figure of the King seated under a canopy on the fourth floor.

2 comments:

  1. The Bodleian Library is one of those places on my Bucket List!

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    Replies
    1. Considering how my friend Laura enjoyed the visit... you should go! I hope I could go one day too.

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