My story begins with an abrupt change of sound. As one enters Radcliffe Square in central Oxford from either the High Street, Broad Street, or (my preferred route) the alley between Brasenose and Exeter Colleges, the noise of car traffic is almost entirely displaced by the quiet echoes of footprints and voices against a cobblestone floor and sandstone walls. While somewhat cliché to have as a favorite place, due to the abundance of visitors to this particular location, there is something to be said for the abrupt change to your senses that accompanies a walk through the square. On the western side of Radcliffe Square is Brasenose College, where I was employed part-time by the library while getting my masters degree. To enter the college, you walk through an old wooden gate under a stone archway. This opens to the main quad, to the south of which, and through another arch, is the new quad. At the southern end of new quad, worn down stairs lead up to a series of student dorm rooms, the halls lined with bags of linen. To the right, however, is a small door with utility suits hanging on its outside. Through this door you gain access to a very narrow, weathered spiral staircase that winds up to the top of the college’s tallest spire (Oxford is, after all, the city of dreaming spires). A portion of the way up this dizzying staircase, there is a large wooden door with old, black, iron locks and hinges. A large skeleton key opens this door with a loud clang. Beyond the door is a place where I would sit, staring, in awe of the most impressive collection of books I have ever seen, smelled, touched. This room is the antiquarian books room at the Brasenose College Library. Protected from sunlight and kept at a cool temperature, the room houses numerous books of incredible rarity: the second book to be printed on a printing press. A book of Cicero’s Works with marginalia that offer the first recorded use of the word “fuck” in a poem to a local Abbot. Huge tomes and small printed manuscripts, centuries old, sit on these wooden, dusty, shelves. Quietness prevails, as even alone, you do not feel comfortable disturbing their rest. There are few places to sit, save for two stools, one along each of two long counters on opposite sides of the room. From the windows on the southern wall of the room you can look down upon pedestrians walking the High Street, buying wine at the shop directly opposite the College. Cars drive by with regularity, but none of it is heard from the room in the spire. Here, you can see what, in Radcliffe Square, you can only feel: sound, smell, and sights all change in this place, and this is the story I most frequently tell people of my experience in England.
The Radcliffe Square, indicated by the circular building called the Radcliffe Camera. (image)
A view of New Quad in Brasenose College. The spire on the left houses the antiquarian book collection.
(image)
