The Adventure of the Well-Earned Doctorate
This 221b Drabble is for et_cetera55 who begins an awfully big adventure tomorrow.
If the going should ever get hard, hang in there - one day your thesis will be part of that collection.
The Most Magical Place on Earth
He first heard about it when he was six but the image has never left him in all these years. The British Library. Every book ever published in the UK, every journal, every thesis, all for omnivorous readers like him.
At eight years old his classmates yearned for Disneyland, but it was The Library that called him. At sixteen, when they dreamed about bars that didn't ask for ID, he'd dreamed of getting his Reader Pass. At 21, when they speculated about the stripclub on Tottenham Court Road, his mind had been half a mile northeast, in that redbrick building on the Euston road.
The world has changed since he first heard about The Library. The internet absorbed everything; smartphones put it in his pocket. Still there was something about those stacks - tangible reminders of the breadth of human understanding - there to be learnt from and forgotten again, safe in the knowledge that The Library would always be there.
Even now he has to fight down a pang of nausea when he thinks of Alexandria.
He walks in again this morning. Another case, another set of connections to be made.
He lets his head fall back and drinks in the sight of the towering shelves. It's still the most magical place in the world. He will always adore these books.
If the going should ever get hard, hang in there - one day your thesis will be part of that collection.
The Most Magical Place on Earth
He first heard about it when he was six but the image has never left him in all these years. The British Library. Every book ever published in the UK, every journal, every thesis, all for omnivorous readers like him.
At eight years old his classmates yearned for Disneyland, but it was The Library that called him. At sixteen, when they dreamed about bars that didn't ask for ID, he'd dreamed of getting his Reader Pass. At 21, when they speculated about the stripclub on Tottenham Court Road, his mind had been half a mile northeast, in that redbrick building on the Euston road.
The world has changed since he first heard about The Library. The internet absorbed everything; smartphones put it in his pocket. Still there was something about those stacks - tangible reminders of the breadth of human understanding - there to be learnt from and forgotten again, safe in the knowledge that The Library would always be there.
Even now he has to fight down a pang of nausea when he thinks of Alexandria.
He walks in again this morning. Another case, another set of connections to be made.
He lets his head fall back and drinks in the sight of the towering shelves. It's still the most magical place in the world. He will always adore these books.