Book Binge

We had a class at Trinity College this morning with Nick Johnson, an American who took off for Europe after college in the states to research German ensemble theatres in Berlin on a grant. From there, he got his PhD at Trinity, specializing in Samuel Beckett's prose work. Now he is teaching classes at Trinity and meanwhile is the artistic director of the up and coming Painted Filly Theatre (http://www.paintedfilly.com/). He also acts and directs. Yes, I was inspired and maybe fell a little bit in love. Nothing funny, it was just reassuring to hear someone describing my dreams as their reality.

Afterwards, I was feeling particularly hungry for some new art. As if the 20 plays I've seen in the last few weeks aren't enough, right? But art is paradoxical like that, the more you eat the hungrier you get. And each new flavor and texture is so delicious that you want to gorge yourself on it forever, until you are reminded that there are hundreds of others still to try.

So I stomped down the cobblestone streets of Dublin without a destination or a map or any real idea of where I was, which is always the best way to find what you want. For an appetizer, I found a little market with tables full of silver jewelry (I resisted buying another ring only because I have run out of fingers) and hand-bound leather journals (which I resisted only because of the two small crumpled bills in my wallet). There was a great vintage shop with pink walls and teal floors and beaded hangers with tempting frocks and jackets. Somehow I pried myself out of that store without a purchase as well. My thriftiness broke down at the sight of bookshelves with sale signs. For only four euro I bought a used copy of The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis and the 50th issue of the Poetry Ireland Review from 1996.

At this point, I needed some real food if I was to continue aesthetically fasting, so I crashed at a table outside Metro Cafe. I expected good things based on the many smiling faces filling the tables (note: always pick restaurants based on the diners, rather than the menu) and was not disappointed. It was more like a community than a restaurant, almost everyone at the tables around me knew the staff and caught up about their hangovers and their families in between ordering. The guy who waited on me practically ordered for me, and jovially begged me to trust him that the penne pasta salad with pesto was the best thing I could possibly order that day in all of Dublin, besides a Guinness, of course. He was right. While eating, I people-watched and flipped through my new book of Irish poetry. One of my favorite finds so far is Peter McDonald. I'll share a little exerpt from his poem "Day-trip to Iceland" that I found particularly striking after the conversation this morning about the difference between America and Europe's cultural scenes.

Although we started in Belfast,

my people in the recent past

took their part in the general flight

to a fresh suburban satellite

where homes increase a hundredfold,

and few are more than ten years old,

where culture is a shopping mall

and there's no history at all

To sum up the rest of the day, I hit two more bookstores: Books Upstairs and Dubray Books. Dubray was first, a little more commercial but with a great poetry and drama selection. I bought Marina Carr's play "Woman and Scarecrow" because we had talked about her in class and if the Irish love her, I will probably love her too. Also, a collection of poetry by Leonard Cohen, "Book of Longing" because my Dad sent me his Live in London cd's and I've been crazy for his lyrics for the last two weeks. His writings, like his drawings that accompany his words on many of the pages, are rough and sensual with simple lines and smudged edges that touch something very human and very deep. When I read it, my chest tightens in that way when you try to hold back an excess of emotion in a public place.

Books Upstairs is dark and musty with lots of little neon orange sale stickers on covers. Basically, heaven. For cheap, cheap I bought "...She Also Wrote Plays: An International Guide to Women Playwrights from the 10th to the 21st Century" because, well, duh. And "The Beat Book: Writings from the Beat Generation" which is the best beat anthology I've found, with 18 authors. I leave you with one of my favorite excerpts from Kerouac's "On the Road":

"We seek to find new phrases; we try hard, we writhe and twist and blow; every now and then a clear harmonic cry gives new suggestions of a tune, a thought, that will someday be the only tune and thought in the world and which will raise men's souls to joy. We find it, we lose, we wrestle for it, we find it again, we laugh, we moan. Go moan for man. It's the pathos of people that gets us down, all the lovers in this dream."