The British Library and American Hot Dogs

Hello, everyone! It's been a busy two weeks here in London, and there are several highlights we'd like to share with you.

I have had a hectic two weeks of classes and research, but lots of fun and discovery. We both discovered the wonder of the British Library this past week, and have returned to find even more amazing things.

My instructor for the Research Methodologies Course, Dr. Elizabeth Evenden, was the chief bibliographer for the Holinshed Chronicles Project last year before an illness forced her to concede the honor to a colleague. She is a magnificent source for the British Library, and took us on a learning tour of the facility. Maria and I both secured our Reader's Passes, which enables us to enter and use all of the Rare Book Rooms in the library. Liz had already "reserved" the 1577 (original) edition of Holinshed's Chronicles, the enormous history source from which Shakespeare created plays such as Macbeth and King Lear, and we got to learn how to treat a rare text by handling it (carefully!) and reading it ourselves. We were also trained on how to discover the watermarks on ancient paper using a special light behind the page, and other amazing things as well, and are now "trained bibliographers" able to access all texts,available in the Britsih Library. Next month, we get to read from a First Folio.

I have now studied from original quartos of King Lear (1619), Titus Andronicus (1607), and many others, as well as the original copies of Palladis Tamia, Greene's Groatsworth of Wit. It feels incredible to hold history in your hands, my friends. When Maria and I walked into the rare Book Room, we both knew we had died and gone to heaven. We still feel that way after our second visit on Friday. Maria, while looking for extinct peerages in the Humanities Room, found a six-volume called Segar Baronagium Genealogicum, with every English peerage and full family history listed in it. Since she traces her family line back through several of these lines, it is truly a providential find for her personally. If anybody out there thinks they're related to royalty, or wants to trace their lineage (in any country), Maria is unquestionably the person to find that information for you! E-mail her at genealogy@wam-enterprises.com for more information. Her clients are astounded at the "finds" she makes: not only information, but records and pictures are out there of your relatives, so just let her know you're interested!

We wandered down King's Boulevard behind Kings Cross Station (Harry Potter's Hogwarts train left from Platform 9 and3/4 there!) also. Known as Eat Street on Wed-Thur-Fri, the vendors there have some amazing things to eat. We decided to go with the Big Apple Hotdogs...His sign said "If you find a better dog anywhere, I'll eat my cat!" OMG...amazing dogs, next week I'm going for the BBQ ribs. Saw the film Anonymous again last night too -- it's incredibly good the second time, too! Actually, even better the second time...!

Oh yes, our New Year's Eve plans are set. We're seeing Mark Rylance in Jerusalem that night, then (possibly) seeing him after the show! We will see Mark, Vanessa Redgrave, and several friends on Sunday November 28 at the Globe Theatre for a special screening of a new film Last Will and Testament, followed by a panel discussion with leading Shakespearean scholars, including my professor Bill Leahy, our friends Roger Stritmatter, and Charles Beauclerk, who we hosted in Sacramento during his CA visit many years ago. Wally is really looking forward to meeting Diana Price, since he is working on a model for evaluating evidence relating to the Shakespeare authorship question, and Diana is the authority on that subject! Should be fun!

Thanks for reading! More later!