The Dublin Writer's Museum

As a previous entry suggests, yesterday I spent hours sitting in the park—St. Stephen’s Green—but I also spent some of that time wandering around, looking at flowers and fountains and the lake and ducks. There’s a stone footbridge curving over the lake, where a painter had a canvas on an easel (looked like the painting was more or less complete) and where lots of people stopped to admire the view. There are a couple of spots where big rocks overlook the lake, but unfortunately a railing prevented me from climbing on the rocks and sitting there, dangling my feet just above the water. I guess the city doesn’t want to be responsible for drownings. It’s funny, given what other parts of Ireland are like. It reminds me of that windy and rainy day we trudged around the Dingle Peninsula, climbing over slick stone walls to look at really old ruins. Well, actually, the 7th century oratorium isn’t a ruin—it’s been kept up for all these years. Amazing.

Anyway, from the park I wandered a bit through Temple Bar and saw street musicians and such, did not find the Internet juice café I used nearly two weeks ago, went back to the hostel and inquired about the Internet room, but it turns out the system is down, but there’s an Internet café down the street and around the corner on Parliament Street. So I went there—E2 per hour, but without the friendly service and nice ambiance. And no juice. I might try Temple Bar tonight and check my flights online. That sounds like a good idea.

It’s after 9 am, and I’m hanging out on a bench in the Archbishop Ryan Park, the one with the Oscar Wilde Memorial (the “Fag on a Crag”). The first tour of Oscar Wilde House is 10:15 am, so that’s why I’m in this neck of the woods.

All street lights in Central Dublin are friendly toward the blind. When the light has a red standing figure meaning “don’t walk,” there’s a slow and steady, deep beep. When it’s time to walk, and you see a walking green figure, there’s a sharp sound at first, like an SF lazer pistol, followed by quickly frantic beeps. It I think gets slower as it turns to a yellow standing figure.
Many pedestrians plunge into the street when the light is red, but that’s a good way to get hit by a bus. There have been a couple times I’m crossing the street and I see a bus coming right at me. Fortunately, because there are so many tourists, many streets have, painted in white at the edges of the crosswalk, an arrow and the words “Look right” or “Look left.”

The Dublin Writers’ Museum

In the Land of Youth
Irish Fairy Tales by James Stephens
Mary Lavin (1912-1996)
Brendan Behan—the drinker with the writing problem.
Elizabeth Bowen
Kate O’Brien (1897-1974)

Children’s literature:

Ella Young (1867-1956)—Celtic Wonder Tales (1910)
The Tangle-Coated Horse
Patricia Lynch (1898-1972)—The Turf Cutter’s Donkey
Meta Mayne Reid—The McNeills at Rathcapple
With Angus in the Forest
(And just what were ye doing with Angus in the Forest?)
Ellis Dillon—The Island of Ghosts

The Spirits of The Attic—Mary Arrigan
The Spirits of the Bog--ditto (She must be a very spirited writer.)
Banshees, Beasts and Brides from the Sea –Bob Curran

Truly Wilde: the Unsettling Story of Dolly Wilde, Oscar’s Unusual Niece by Joan Schenkar (Looking at just the cover photo, I thought I was looking at a female version of Oscar Wilde—the resemblance is that strong.)

The house that houses the Dublin Writer’s Museum is quite beautiful. It’s from the 1760s and was originally an Anglo-Irish aristocrat’s house and later home of whiskey-related Jamieson. There’s a wrap-around staircase with an extremely high ceiling from which hangs a big lantern, and over the stairs are two huge stained glass windows, with a fanlight at the top, and they date to the mid 1890s. Most of the rooms have molded and painted ceilings, and there are chandeliers here and there. After you go upstairs, you can wander into the library, which is mostly painted blue (lightish) and has very tall dark wood g lass-doored bookcases full of books by Irish writers. Then the other major room in that part of the house is the gallery of writers, which looks like it should have been a ballroom, but instead it was originally two rooms and the wall between them was taken out and replaced with Neoclassical, shiny goldish marble columns. It has crystal chandeliers, one in each half, with the wall moulded painted gold—it’s pretty much a white and gold room—and the windows are almost as tall as the room—which like the others has about a fifteen-foot ceiling. Rugs lie on the floor, two elaborate black fireplaces containing large bouquets of realistic flowers (some eucalyptus, so it’s probably combo of silks and dried). The room is circled with large gilt-framed portraits and bronze busts on pedestals—all, of course, Irish writers. Also, this is the room where I saw the one-woman 50-minute production of Irish Writers Entertain courtesy of the Irish Actors Theatre Company. It’s every day, seven days a week, at 1 pm, and I rather get the impression that it’s several actors taking turns, so it’s not always Eileen O’Sullivan doing it, although she did a fine job. It includes impersonations and songs, about Irish history.

When I first arrived at the museum, I was in footsore tourist mode, so after paying admission I went back to the café and had a pot of tea and a large scone full of chocolate chips. Afterwards, I took the audio tour, interrupting it to see the little play and then going back to the audio tour.

Now I’m at the Garden of Remembrance, right in front of the museum. There’s a curving patio off the street, with some bright flowers and a brightly painted blue and gold railing, and steps I haven’t gone down yet (though I intend to) that lead to more flowers and benches down below, and on the other end a flight of stairs leads up to a statue that I’m going to visit in just a bit.
I didn’t mention that from here I can see the writer’s museum. It’s actually 2 18th century mansions right up next to each other, with red brick facades and tall, skinny windows and ironwork balconies and big chimneys. Looks like typical Dublin architecture, but it’s more interesting inside.

Also, the Writer’s Gallery has “Fates” figures painted with a gold background, on the ceiling and on panels of at least two doors. Metallic gold background, that is.

It’s a bright sunny day and in the seventies—I was sweating by the time I walked all the way to the Writers’ Museum. This morning I walked from the hostel to Merrion Square, where I wandered around the park until about 10. Unfortunately, the notice on the door at A1 Merrion Square, Oscar Wilde House, stated that there will be no tours today, not till Wednesday! This was, like, a major reason for me to go to Dublin. Grrrr. Well, at least I saw it from the outside. But it's not as if I'm likely to return to Dublin, at least not for a very long time. I have so many other countries to visit.

After that disappointment, I walked through Temple Bar and stopped at Celtic Note, the music store, to find out if they’d found the North Clegg Cd, but no such luck. I did find pencils for my coworkers at one of those cheesy touristy shops, and also got a couple tiny bottles of Harp Lager. I then kept walking, across the Halfpenny Bridge, to O’Connell Street, up Abbey St., and I found the Busaras Bus Station that I need to get to in the morning, so I then went on to the Writer’s Museum, after a brief rest at the feet of Daniel O’Connor. The statue, that is. I wouldn’t be surprised if I’ve walked five miles today.

Later--
After my little occupation at the Garden of Remembrance, I went all the way back to the hostel (after walking through huge crowds, mainly on O’Connell Street, which has nasty fast food and arcades and stores more than anything else) and got the new password for the room (oddly I couldn’t find my original slip of paper—it must have fallen out of my pocket, even though I’m wearing my cargo pants) and got up to the room, where I dropped off my shopping bag from the museum and my raincoat and took my bottle of sunscreen with me to the rest room at the bottom of the stairs, where I freshened up and refilled my water bottle. Finally, I headed for the Queen of Tarts, the café that Bob said was really good for lunch (and I had said, “Oh, and what about dinner?” and I got a sarcastic comment about dinner should be just as good, unless they change cooks)—but it turned out they only serve breakfast and lunch, so dinner isn’t just as good. It was still just barely open, and she did say I could get something to go, so I got a couple of potato cakes and found a little grocery store-like shop where I bought cranberry juice, a banana, and a mint chocolate Cadbury bar. I then proceeded to the grounds of Christ Church Cathedral, but they chase people off the grounds at 7 pm. Oh well—I had a little bit of time sitting on the steps leading down into the foundations of an older church, rather fascinating thing in front of the cathedral. I wonder if this was unearthed in the 20th century.

Now I’m on a stretch of grass in sight of the cathedral, separated by an alley. Bad timing—some guy was yelling at a woman in the alley, and a couple of cops came along, and when the cops were done breaking that up, they came onto these grounds and were talking with a couple of young women—making me wonder if they’d be chasing off everyone here, but they walked off with those two, so I don’t know what that was about. So much for ambience during my dinner. Everyone was watching—there are several people here, as if it’s a public park, although it rather looks like the grounds of the butt-ugly government office building that’s on top of an ancient Viking treasure. I should have brought a shovel.

Since I’m not having a leisurely meal, maybe I’ll go wander around Temple Bar, although I’ve walked so much today that I don’t feel a lot like wandering, and I don’t feel like walking all the way back to the Gate Theatre to see the American play View From the Bridge (which I saw at the Rep during my Webster days), so I’ll go to Temple Bar, and at some point I’ll hopefully find that Internet café I used previously. I could also have some tea.