[16176] in Public-Access_Computer_Systems_Forum
FYI France : the Bibliotheque de l'Arsenal, Paris
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Jack Kessler)
Tue Nov 15 20:26:31 2005
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Date: Tue, 15 Nov 2005 14:00:46 -0800
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From: Jack Kessler <kessler@WELL.COM>
To: PACS-L@LISTSERV.UH.EDU
A respite... from the very difficult news emanating from the
Hexagone over the past few weeks: the Bib. de l'Arsenal is one of
the wonderful places in Paris which built the modern France -- as
the latter now copes with, and to some extent pioneers in, the
Globalization growing pains facing us all (more below) --
FYI France: the Bibliotheque de l'Arsenal, Paris
Unlikely combinations: the famous library, and its sites both
physical and "digital" -- plus, the ghost of Victor Hugo -- and
the cannons of Paris -- and Kyoto? -- and Georges Perec?...
* The library [tr. JK]
"The collections of the Arsenal originated with the library of
the Marquis de Paulmy, installed in 1757 in the residence of the
Grands Maîtres de l'Artillerie, in the heart of the old Arsenal
de Paris founded by François Ier, rebuilt by Sully, and enlarged
during the 18th c. by Boffrand.
"Antoine René d'Argenson, the Marquis de Paulmy (1722-1787),
already had assembled a magnificent and encyclopedic collection,
one rich in medieval manuscripts and prints. In 1786 he enlarged
this with a part of the collection of the Duc de la Vallière,
prior to selling the entire library to the Comte d'Artois.
"Nationalized by the Révolution, the collection stayed in its
location. Enriched with numerous and often valuable volumes
nationalized from the great abbeys of Paris, and with the
archives of the Bastille, the Arsenal was declared a public
library on 5 floréal an V (April 28, 1797).
"The library's real fame began with the arrival of the writer
Charles Nodier (1824), who presided over a literary salon of high
reputation there until his death. Throughout the 19th c., the
collections turned increasingly toward literature, particularly
the theater, thanks to obtaining the copyright deposit for plays
in 1837, and for history... From 1880 to 1914, the library
received a copy of every Parisian periodical...
"Today the Arsenal's acquisitions policy concentrates on,
* French literature of the 16th - 19th c.
* publications related to specific Arsenal collections
* bibliophilia, the history of the book, book-binding
* the history of the Arsenal building and its occupants
"Today the Arsenal collection is estimated at 1 million volumes,
12,000 manuscripts, 100,000 prints, and 3000 maps and plans."
* The site, physical
The Arsenal was indeed an arsenal, once: they did make guns
there, and they stored them there, right in what now is the
center of Paris or nearly -- across the river from the peaceful
little Ile St. Louis, and right next to the tranquil houseboats
of the Canal St. Martin, also known as the Bassin de l'Arsenal.
For the history, see the 1739 Turgot map of Paris, the section
"Marais & Iles" at folio 6: the following Kyoto University
Library version of that famous map offers the entire Plan Turgot
in wonderfully-accessible detail, showing the grand buildings,
elegant gardens, and esplanades of the old Paris "Grand Arcenal"
area very well -- also the Canal St. Martin site, still just city
wall ramparts at that time, no longer "moat" but not yet "canal",
leading up to the then-still-towering Bastille...
Kyoto University Digital Library:
Collection of French Architecture / Topographical Description Materials
http://ddb.libnet.kulib.kyoto-u.ac.jp/exhibit-e/f28/f28cont.html
http://ddb.libnet.kulib.kyoto-u.ac.jp/exhibit-e/f28/image/01/f28s0009.html
http://ddb.libnet.kulib.kyoto-u.ac.jp/exhibit-e/f28/image/01/f28l0009/f28l0009_3_2.html
http://ddb.libnet.kulib.kyoto-u.ac.jp/exhibit-e/f28/image/01/f28l0009/f28l0009_3_1.html
* The site, "digital"
To see more, online, by and about the Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal:
The descriptions above are translations of excerpts from that
offered by the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, of which the
Arsenal now is a part, online at,
http://www.bnf.fr/pages/collections/coll_ars.htm
The BnF offers links there to:
* une découverte des collections de la Bibliothèque de
l'Arsenal à travers le dossier Gallica / Anthologie des collections
http://gallica.bnf.fr/anthologie/page.asp?T2-2-2-ARS.htm
Gallica's digital library selections of works
from the Arsenal collections.
* un descriptif de la salle de lecture de la Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal
http://www.bnf.fr/pages/connaitr/ars_salle.htm
Photographs and descriptions of the reading rooms
of the Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal.
It is an interesting problem, the successful integration of a
famous old institution into a larger and more modern assemblage.
And it is a common problem, on campuses academic and corporate,
and within institutional communities citywide or professionwide
or nationwide: so often there is some precious "nugget", in
there somewhere, which for whatever reason ought to be preserved.
And too often this preservation effort is not successful:
collections become merged, and the "nugget" simply disappears --
or internal civil wars break out which balkanize the larger
institution, and its battling collections, at great cost in
finances and service inefficiencies and personnel frustrations.
The Web seems to help. Now we have the Arsenal, still, with its
catalog merged into the larger for efficiency: and with one
great collection gone to the "center", true, but with the others
retained in improved facilities -- and the famous old premises
preserved and functioning as well or better than before.
* Etat des lieux
And now we have physical site renovations, at the Arsenal:
"After the transfer to the BnF rue Richelieu site of the
collections of Theater Arts, which long were housed by the
Bibliothèque de l"Arsenal, the library was re-arranged within its
designated-monument building on the rue de Sully. Bringing things
up to date for security and cataloging are the top priorities...
"An architect specializing in historical monuments will oversee
the preservation of the library's building, which recently became
a designated monument in its entirety, paying particular
attention to the building's interior decor.
"No movement of the collections will be necessary... there will
be an increase in the rare books réserve...
"As of the beginning of this year [2005] the catalog of rare
books -- with its 150,000 entries covering the core of the
collection -- is available in the main BnF BN-OPALE-Plus catalog.
This catalog conversion will be rapidly followed by that of the
catalog of the Georges Douay Theater Arts collection...
"A third major recon project (60,000 entries covering 1880-1988)
will take place from the end of 2005 and go on for several
years... It must be recalled as well that in addition to its
million printed books, the Arsenal conserves an important
collection of medieval and modern manuscripts, and a prints
collection of great interest... [also] collections assembled
around the work of writers associated with the history of the
Arsenal itself (Mme. de Genlis, Nodier, Huysmans, Heredia, Pierre
Louÿs, Marie and Henri de Régnier)...
"...and of the writers of the Oulipo, thanks to the deposit
within these walls of the private collection of Georges Perec and
of the archives of the Association Georges Perec...
"And of course the literary evenings at the Arsenal will continue
throughout 2005, and exhibitions already are being and will be
programmed: the first, in 2006, will be devoted to Saint-Simonism
-- the second, in 2007, to the history of games."
-- from, "La Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal prend ses aises"
by Marie-Noëlle Darmois, in _Chroniques de la
Bibliothèque nationale de France_, no. 30 avril-mai-juin
2005, p. 3, ISSN 1283-8683.
* & Victor Hugo!
The Arsenal long has been a place for "literary evenings", and it
seems it still makes those a priority, revolutions and even
modern construction projects notwithstanding: one account --
" 'From 1819 to 1824, under the double influence of both André
Chénier and his 'Méditations', in reaction to the masterpieces of
Byron and of Scott, echoing the cries emanating from Greece,
fortified by the religious and monarchical illusions of the
Restoration, a collection of 'préludes' took form, dominated by a
sort of vague melancholy, idealistic, chivalrous in tone and with
an often exquisite overlay of precise detail...' [Sainte-Beuve]
"The Toulousains, the tender Soumet, the petulant Guiraud of the
red hair and Gascon accent, were the first to establish the tone;
Emile Deschamps proposed the creation of a group and the founding
of a review. That was 'La Muse française', a reunion of
distinguished young men and women -- too distinguished -- lovers
of poetry, royalists by tradition, 'Christians by convenience and
vague sentiment' [quoting Sainte-Beuve again].
"Each addressed the other by his or her given name: 'Alfred',
'Emile', 'Gaspard', or 'Victor'... The beautiful Delphine Gay was
'Delphine', to all. But when Jules de Rességuier, the most
troubador among these troubadors, tried to butter up Victor Hugo
for permission to call his wife 'Adèle', 'the young [he was 20]
and grave poet refused'. Familiarity was not Hugo's forté.
"The true center of the cenacle of 'La Muse française' quickly
became the good Nodier, and the meeting place initially his
parlor at rue de Provence, then, from January 1 1824, the
Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal...
"On Sundays, the salon lit up the Arsenal. One entered a lively
working windmill-of-ideas: there was Séverin Taylor, born at
Brussels of English parents, a French officer, friend of Vigny
and favorite of the powerful; there Sophie and Delphine Gay, the
latter radiant as the daylight and baptised 'La Muse française';
and Soumet, enjoying two great triumphs at the theater, 'the two
most beautiful tragedies of the era', Hugo called them...;
Guiraud, celebrated for his 'Petit Savoyard'; Alfred de Vigny and
Gaspard de Pons, in uniform regal blue; and of course the
Deschamps brothers, and the giant Adolphe de Saint-Valry...
"From eight until ten, they chatted. Nodier, standing at the
chimney, would begin a recitation: memoirs of youth or a fantasy
tale. Growing animated, he would become eloquent. Then a literary
discussion would open: 'André Chénier has gone too far,' Victor
Hugo would declare, 'his verse, with its interruptions and
run-ons, no longer is musical, and poetry above all is song'.
Nodier would protest: 'Chénier is romantic in his own way, which
isn't so bad... There are no fixed rules in art.' Emile
Deschamps, smiling, his fine lips revealing his elegant teeth,
would intervene: 'You'll come back to that, Victor...'
"At the stroke of 10, Marie Nodier seating herself at the piano
and the conversations ceasing, chairs pushed against the wall,
and everyone dancing... Vigny, pale and delicate, waltzing with
Delphine Gay. The serious men, among them the young Hugo,
continuing the discussion over in a corner in a low voice. Mme.
Victor Hugo, her 'spanish eyes' suddenly animated, dancing, and
her husband, from time to time, throwing her a troubled look..."
-- André Maurois, _Olympio, ou La Vie de Victor Hugo_
(Hachette, 1954) p. 113-115. [tr. JK]
The 19th c. French library: much of both the folly and the
grandeur of the Great European Era, all in a single image, with
the Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal playing its vital & central part: a
"community" & "face-to-face" & "physical" role -- one needed more
than ever, now, in the new Global Cities of our Digital Age.
Visitez the Arsenal: imagine the "intense discussion" --
20-yr-old Victor Hugo, over in the corner -- and the dancing...
--oOo--
Note:
One delight, of which Georges Perec would have approved very
much, in dealing with our new digital - toile - ouebbe - Matrix -
Globalized - whatever universe, is the sheer serendipity of the
associations which nowadays turn up: Paris, Hugo, cannons, Kyoto,
and Perec... all on one wordlist... Oulipo would be fascinated.
And yet nowadays this is a commonplace, on the nets.
The Plan Turgot was nowhere to be found, in France; so, *click*,
up it came in Chicago, at a "mirror-site" which failed to connect
because the original host-site in Manhattan was down; so, again,
simply *click*, and we are in Kyoto -- Ryoanji down the road, and
the Katsura Detached Palace nearby -- but here we are looking for
the 1739 Plan Turgot of Paris and so we find it, and in better
digital shape in Kyoto than it was in either Paris or Chicago...
One of the great interests of Victor Hugo was context. His novels
and his poetry are filled with wonderful description: evocations
of mood, portraits of a great den of thieves in Paris, and of the
illusory comforts of French provincial life, and of Waterloo --
all sometimes but not always, and rarely necessarily, related to
the "plot" of his writing.
So perhaps we are losing that, now. If the Plan Turgot appears
more readily, and more conveniently, and in far greater detail,
online in Kyoto than anywhere else, what becomes of the context?
Perhaps we will look for the Katsura Detached Palace on a
webserver somewhere in Toulouse, or in Kansas, along with Corbu's
Unité d'Habitation, and recipes for Tamil thali dishes. Perec is
laughing at us, I can hear him... It _is_ funny.
Note 2:
And all this is somewhat of a diversion, as I said, from the more
serious and perhaps pioneering if painful efforts, of the French,
in dealing with Globalization's new "labor mobility" mandate...
Longtime readers here already will know that I am a fan of Saskia
Sassen, the University of Chicago sociologist who writes about
Global Cities, and about the global überclasses and underclasses
(those two neither her terms nor mine) which they are producing.
Sassen makes the interesting point that the pools of migrant and
immigrant labor which many advanced nations are building up now,
in their highly-wired and stratispherically-wealthy cities, in
fact are necessities of life in the New Economy: who else is
going to flip the burgers, serve the Starbucks, clean the UV
resistant bomb-proof windows of the glitzy mile-high skyscrapers
-- also take out the garbage, wash the dishes, park the cars,
sweep up the papers in the parks...
Sassen herself calls them, carefully, part of "producer services"
-- she includes lawyers and bankers [_The Global City_ 2d ed
2001, p. 90ff.] -- one point about the lower-paid migrants and
immigrants among them being that if they are necessities we must
cease brutalizing them, and certainly "excluding" them, and it
might even be time that we all began providing a livable and
promising place for them, at least as long as the rest of us are
going to be relying on them -- a "de-nationalized place",
perhaps, along with the rest of us, in our increasingly -
globalized international and even trans-national economy.
For more on Sassen see,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saskia_Sassen
For more on the French, well, read any headline. What has
happened there, this month, already has happened in Germany
somewhat, and will happen in the US and in Japan and anywhere
else in the Wired World which has not kept up with its own
migrants and immigrants. Globalization growing pains...
BULLETIN. New at FYI France, "Seine St. Denis" libraries:
you've been reading about them in the headlines --
"Clichy sous Bois", "Aulnay sous Bois", the others -- now
see what the Seine St. Denis libraries are doing to help!
Have been doing for some time, in fact, but the work goes on...
http://www.fyifrance.com/fyi1plib.htm
STOPPRESSE. Also new at FYI France, "FYI France Resource
List: Immigration and France": books and other resources
on the recent troubles, from Saskia Sassen, & Messieurs
Le Pen and de Villiers, & the French government, &
various other observers both French and foreign --
http://www.fyifrance.com/indexa.html
http://www.fyifrance.com/immig.htm
--oOo--
FYI France (sm)(tm) e-journal ISSN 1071-5916
*
| FYI France (sm)(tm) is a monthly electronic
| journal published since 1992 as a small-scale,
| personal experiment, in the creation of large-
| scale "information overload", by Jack Kessler.
/ \ Any material written by me which appears in
----- FYI France may be copied and used by anyone for
// \\ any good purpose, so long as, a) they give me
--------- credit and show my email address, and, b) it
// \\ isn't going to make them money: if it is going
to make them money, they must get my permission
in advance, and share some of the money which they get with me.
Use of material written by others requires their permission.
FYI France archives may be found at http://infolib.berkeley.edu
(search fyifrance), or http://www.cru.fr/listes/biblio-fr@cru.fr/
(BIBLIO-FR archive), or http://listserv.uh.edu/archives/pacs-l.html
(PACS-L archive) or http://www.fyifrance.com . Suggestions,
reactions, criticisms, praise, and poison-pen letters all will be
gratefully received at kessler@well.sf.ca.us .
Copyright 1992- , by Jack Kessler,
all rights reserved except as indicated above.
--hjlm--
