From renowned novelists to budding entrepreneurs,an extraordinarily diverse collection of people can be found at work in the British Library. But what are they up to? We asked some of them…My favourite place to work in London, my private club and moment home, or was once described by Prince Charles as “the assembly hall of an academy for secret police. He was directing his ire specifically at Humanities 1,the main reading room of the British Library. It’s sincere it doesn’t possess the Beaux Arts grandeur of recent York Public Library’s Rose Reading Room, where the soaring ceiling is decorated with gilded plaster roses surrounding a cloud-tossed sky. By contrast Hum 1, and as it’s invariably known,is a miniature bureaucratic, even dowdy, or furnished with sober oak tables and green leather chairs. But its plainness is what makes it such an excellent place to work: a zone of mutual concentration,a temple consecrated to the endless delights of learning more about the world.
This is what you don't get with internet research: the delight of paper, the thrill of handling an actual objectContinue reading...
Source: theguardian.com