The
ancient library of Alexandria, Egypt, was, perhaps, the greatest library of the
ancient world. Built at the beginning of the third century BC, it may have
counted as many as 500,000 scrolls in its collection, before it was
accidentally burned down by Julius Caesar in 48 BC. In 2002… AD,
a new Bibliotheca Alexandrina was built, in commemoration of the old
library, but such a nice gesture notwithstanding, it should be plain ridiculous
to compare this new reality to the irreality of the real thing.
What
is the use of a library that does not exist? This question, worthy of a Jeremy
Bentham, reduces value to utility, and, in this sense, becomes
rhetorical. On the other hand, real value is not to be consumed by the consumer,
or even by a multitude of consumers. Its worth is larger than that of being a
commodity; its spark sets off a powerful brainstorm, sculpts a beautiful
fantasy, crystallizing as a radiant Platonic Idea behind the drab shadow
of reality, and begets morality as such.
…I have a weakness for
libraries filled with old books, illuminated manuscripts, tangible relics of
the past. My wife and I used to have a large private library, which itself has
become a memory. These days, as we can no longer hold any of those beauties in our
hand, we are happy still to be the lifetime owners of their splendid ghosts,
and, in our case, the radiant Idea that is, is so much stronger than the
reality of shadows, that once was.
Most
of those great ancient libraries of the world have disappeared from the face of
the earth, even though some may have partially survived as archaeological
finds, in the form of, say, clay tablets, which have been enthusiastically
unearthed and reverently studied. Such is the case with the great Library of
Ashurbanipal, which was the subject of my entry The Librarian King in
the Genius Section. But the greatest of them all--- the Library of
Alexandria--- was burned down to its foundation more than two thousand years
ago, long before there was a Russia to appreciate it.
During
my memorable month-long trip to Egypt in 1970, I was very fortunate to visit
the magnificent city of Alexander, where I admired its natural beauty,
the color of the Mediterranean Sea washing its beaches, its impressive large
buildings, its still surviving ancient monuments, the most remarkable of these
being the 100-foot-tall “Pompey’s Pillar”…
But
even more I marveled at what I could not see, yet felt. The Pharos lighthouse,
long destroyed, known as one of the Seven Wonders of the World. But,
above all, I marveled at the spirit
of the great Library-- not the present-day Library of Alexandria (built three decades after my time), which
is often represented as a successor to the old glory, although I had somehow
missed that purported connection, but the real thing--- the Great
Library that does not exist.
Which
brings me back to the question I have already been to, of how our memories and
mental associations prove more valuable than the everyday reality surrounding them.
There is a pretty reasonable explanation for this phenomenon, of course. Our
memory, being selective, retains only the best, most profound experiences,
and thus acquires a rich perennial value, which everyday reality does not and
cannot possess. Should I be blessed with something on that side
of the grave, I would not want that something to be somehow deprived of
the memories I cherish, so sweet that I would hate to see them die with me; but
that I may rather live on, just to have them all live on with me…
No comments:
Post a Comment