The Bus Trip 7: Trinity College Dublin

James Joyce lived in at least two cities with diametrically opposed attitudes to timekeeping: Dublin, where no two clocks show the same time, and Zurich, where the second hand is sacrosanct. So here we are in Dublin, more or less at 8.30 in the morning, depending on which clock. 

There are really two main libraries at Trinity College Dublin, the new library and then the one that everyone who visits Dublin goes to, the Old Library. The College and its Library were established during the reign of the first Queen Elizabeth in 1592. It was a time of early imperial ambition for the English, a history that involves, by definition, Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific. Innumerable are the clergy and scholars trained at TCD and other Irish theology schools who found their way to the Antipodes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XzrE1uvJpE 

Housed within the Library is an object intrinsic to Irish historical identity, the 8^th-century illuminated Gospel Book known as The Book of Kells. Your tour guide could go on at length about this wondrous work, which is why it might be better for you to read something without effusive superlatives in every sentence. The Ancient History Encyclopedia: https://www.ancient.eu/Book_of_Kells/ 

TCD’s conservator, John Gillis, talks about the medieval binding of Kells: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=57&v=jDeXcGXYIkU&feature=emb_logo 

You can be like James Joyce and study the Book of Kells every other week, whether by googling ‘book of kells’ or joining the Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/TheBookOfKellsOfficial/ 

800 illuminated medieval manuscripts are now online: http://www.openculture.com/2019/02/800-illuminated-medieval-manuscripts-are-now-online.html 

And here is a crumpled piece of paper from my top pocket. It’s a poem about this part of Dublin and the Book of Kells entitled ‘K’ that was published a while ago in The Melbourne Age. The poem is a lipogram, i.e. this one uses all the letters except K, which is the subject of the poem. Gaelic Irish does not have a K, which was introduced into Ireland with Latin: https://wordsbyphilipharvey.blogspot.com/2020/09/k.html

 Philip Harvey

Tour Guide