Walking around New York

Saturday 24th April. A trip into New York for a chance to do a little more exploring on foot. No culture this time, just wandering about in the sunshine, visiting a few bookstores, cafes, interesting-looking shops. After getting out on 42nd Street, I walked to Bryant Park, which is a lovely sunny, leafy large square where lots of people hang-out quietly eating, drinking, reading. From there, I walked slowly downtown along bits of Broadway and 6th Avenue, past the Flatiron district and into Greenwich Village - which appeared much nicer in the sunshine than when I first scurried through in the March storms, especially in the area all around New York University. A few shops that you would have really enjoyed wandering around, including 'ABC Carpets and Homes', which, despite its name, didn't have carpets, but did have the most extraordinary chandeliers and giant wood-carvings on sale, along with other gob-smackingly expensive trinkets in general; there was also a small 'Conran Shop' franchise in one corner of the shop for those on a tight budget. I only a 'spent a penny' in ABC. But I did see a dog in a bag (lots of dogs, Morgan). Then a cafe for Turkey Chilli soup, and on southwards, further into Noho then Soho. Unfortunately the bookstore I was aiming for was shut early for a party, but there was lots of other stuff to look at. Extraordinary numbers of the young, glamourous and wealthy. Plus, of course, pennyless down-and-outs, desperate and hungry. Everything was phenomenally expensive. Even my afternoon coffee at a New York University hang-out was about £4. Walked back up midtown as it was just starting to get dark - stopping off to catch a jazz band playing in Union Square (play the video below) - and caught a train from Grand Central which got me back to New Haven about 10pm. Today, Sunday, was meant to be all about work. But I was invited out for lunch - to Alice and Frank Prochaska, historians at Yale about to move to Oxford. Very nice. Since then, I've been working on my talk for Tuesday, plus packing up a few books to go home in the post. Its starting to feel as if I'm almost getting ready to go...

An afternoon in Manhattan

Sunday 18th April. A train trip to Grand Central Station in New York - just under two hours from New Haven. Straight to MoMA. The star attraction at the moment is Marina Abramovic's show - part of which consists of the artist herself (dressed in a long, flowing, blood-red robe) sitting at a table in a large floodlit space, very still - and you can queue to take a turn sitting opposite her to stare back; part of her show also consists of completely nude actors standing very close together so that you have to squeeze (really squeeze) between the very narrow gap between them in order to get from one gallery to the next. I observed it all from a comfortable distance. Then headed off to see the permanent collection - just the usual motley bunch of Picassos and Matisses - plus an enormous exhibition of Henri Cartier-Bresson photographs. There was time for meatballs in one of MoMA's achingly trendy cafes (run, incidentally, by the same person who runs the Shake Shack - see earlier blog posting). Afterwards, I decided to be brave and take the lift to the 67th floor of the Rockefeller Centre - the 'Top of the Rocks', which, post 9-11 is, I think, the highest viewing platform in NYC and has the advantage of allowing you to look at the Empire State Building. I didn't throw-up. Though that might be partly because I stood well back from the edge. In fact, it was difficult to get a sense of how high up you actually were until you noticed how very, very far below the streets were and how very, very small the yellow taxis were. After the Top of the Rocks, I thought my tourist trail wouldn't be complete unless I faced Times Square - which is glamourously brash and 'electric' above head height and pretty tacky and unpleasant at ground level. By then, it was getting dark, so time to head back to Grand Central Station and a train back home. Packed - a Yankees game apparently. Tomorrow, the start of another working week. It's already difficult to believe that a few hours ago I was actually in New York and experiencing the iconic stuff there for myself. How do you 'fix' that kind of experience in your mind? (Post-script: woken last night by the loo making funny grinding noises again, even though it's been 'fixed').

Sunday Culture Fix

I didn't get to Boston yesterday, because I had a backlog of work to do at the apartment. I did get out for dinner, though: to the house in the country of Jay Winter, a Professor of History here whose field is World War I and its impact on twentieth century life. There were six other guests, including two who were at St. Catherine's College, Oxford in the 1960s as Rhodes Scholars, a Mexican sociologist, and the retired Rector of a university in Austria. Interesting discussions about war, the BBC, silence, cruelty to animals, and other topics. Today (Sunday), is mostly a work day, too. But it's been quite sunny outside, and I needed a break. I've also been trying not to put too much pressure on the dodgy loo here in the apartment. So I've been looking for a suitable location to do 'what needs doing'. The ideal place turned out to be the Yale Art Gallery. As you can see from the pictures, it's got a fantastic permanent collection: Pollocks, Rothkos, Van Goghs, Monets. Warhols, etc. But - and this is just as important - it's got clean, powerful, fully-working loos.

Psycho Loo

I awoke this morning to Armageddon in the bathroom. The apartment has an 'electric loo'. That means it makes a reasonably gentle grinding noise every time you flush it. Except last night. Then it made slightly more of a juddering noise than usual - and proceeded to keep half-waking me up by repeating this at intervals through the night. In the morning, I awoke to find the loo overflowing with water - water which I shall here politely describe simply as 'discoloured'. The floor was wet and stinking. An electric malfunction? A blockage? No idea, but it involved waking-up the owners and having to stand by, humiliated, as they proceeded to repair the damage with a vast number of towels, plungers, etc. A plumber was later called, but didn't arrive. So none of us know if the loo's been fixed or not, or whether it just had a momentary seizure last night. In either case, I now feel 'tentative' about my bodily functions, to say the least. I stopped off for some extra bananas on the way back from the library, in the hope that I can keep everything inside until I get back to the UK. I spent most of the day in a slightly darkened reading-room, avoiding the rain (the weather's changed again).But I have to admit to being a bit distracted. Finally, just as I arrived back at the apartment I heard voices singing 'Happy Birthday!' from the owners' place. I wonder if whoever's birthday it was had the breakfast they'd been hoping for this morning. My guess is, probably not.

Heatwave

A short entry. It's been a hot, sticky day. The TV news says it's been the warmest day in Connecticut since 1929 - with temperatures hitting 93 F just a few miles north of here. It was probably a few degrees cooler here near the shoreline, but only a few, certainly in the 80s. Trying to work in the reading room at the Beinecke was tricky, since the air-condition wasn't working, and it got progressively more oven-like as the day progressed. The doors onto the outside courtyard can't be opened, presumably because one of us might be tempted to run away with the Gutenberg Bible in our sweaty hands. I'm now back at the apartment. And - hurrah - a new internet connection's been hard-wired in. It works. Hence the update. Also: a package waiting for me with some Easter chocolates from Oxford, only ever so slightly melted. Thank you so much! Tomorrow, I have to give a brief talk to other researchers and librarians about my work; nothing too strenuous, just a few ad hoc minutes.

A New Routine

It's still warm and (mostly) sunny in New Haven, with temperatures in the 70s. Since the wi-fi at the apartment has all but disappeared, I've tried a new routine, which involves using the wi-fi in local cafes. On the way to the Beinecke Library I pass a cafe called 'Koffee' - seen here. So, at about 8am each morning I call in at Koffee and have a coffee. Which then entitles me to an hour online. I use it to catch-up on emails and the BBC and Guardian websites in order to find out what's going on the world (you can't really discover that by watching TV or listening to the radio). And that takes me to 9am, when the Beinecke opens. Between 9am and 5.30 (or 6pm: the precise duration depends on my stamina) I'm working in the reading room at the Beinecke - which is plush and quiet, though quite warm and a bit airless. I usually take a break at about 12.45, have a walk through the campus and find somewhere for a sandwich. On the way back 'home', I call in at Koffee again (I'm there now), and do some more online business - e.g. downloading essays to mark, draft chapters of dissertations to comment on, bits of admin. - for about an hour. Then perhaps I pick up some food for the evening-meal at a local shop (which is very expensive, at least if you want fresh ingredients). I get back to the apartment at about 7pm, then have the evening to work on the radio-scripts, with a break for cooking. That, I think, will be my default routine. But it will be nice to break it every now and then. I worked last weekend, so I'm tempted to have this coming Saturday off and catch the train to Boston. Until then, though, its mostly just me at the Beinecke.

Sunny Saturday

I've been 'silent' because of a lack of internet access at the apartment. A private company supplies the wi-fi, so, obviously, it's not very efficient. I'm now at 'Koffee' a cafe just round the corner, which has 'free' internet access, provided you buy one drink per hour. A photo will follow. News in brief, then. I've started my research at the Beinecke Library. It's plush and peaceful. As sometimes happens with archival material, you never know how good the material in the 'boxes' that are brought to you will be. On day one, it was a bit disappointing: Langston Hughes's luggage labels and bar-bills during his European travels in the 1960s, when I'd been hoping for long letters. But day two was more promising: drafts of speeches, showing his interest in TV and radio as platforms for communicating the ideas of the civil rights movement. And then there were the rantings of 'Bryher', who appears to be esteemed by literary scholars for being connected with all the great modernists. The first letter of hers I looked at boasted of how spiffing it was to 'break' the strike in 1926. So: another spoilt rich person - whose later letters to the BBC suggest she's a pretty narrow-minded intellectual. Give me Langston Hughes any day. I've been outside a bit: hard not to be, given that it's sunny, dry and warm. It really does feel like the beginning of summer on campus, with everyone lounging around on the grass in the quads (are they allowed to do that?). The Beinecke Library was open as usual yesterday (Good Friday) - there seems to be no indication anywhere that it is Easter - but I finished early to have a wander around some of the second-hand bookshops. The second-hand bookshops are great, though since I was over-weight with my luggage allowance coming over, there's a strong self-denying restriction on my book-buying instincts. One reason they're great is that they play good British music. A general rule of thumb here: if any place - bookshop, cafe - has intellectual pretensions, then it plays British music. Finally, the photos: Beinecke in the sunshine; the main quad in the 'Old Campus'; the house where I'm staying - I'm in the 'Library Loft', which is top left as you look at the picture. Heading back there soon, to get on with some work.