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August 03, 2005
It's Argos for scholars
Reader No. 2274
The British Library works on the same abstract machine as Argos. Like Argos, you can even order on the internet for pick-up later. Extraordinary. Somewhere, a software engineer is crying 'synergy'. The difference, of course, is that at the BL you have to return everything before you leave. (Considering the quality of their goods, this policy might spare customers a great deal of distress and regret if implemented in its sister establishment too.)
Another strange thing about this great public institution is the privatisation of knowledge that its patrons spontaneously operate. Threads of research are solitary, separate, and spun in silence. There is no forum for communication, no bulletin board; you would think there would be people for whom it would be useful to make requests such as: "Working on contemporary accounts in verse of cutlery manufacture in late-17th century Denmark. WLTM someone working on the fork form in finnish folk-art". But perhaps an explicit display of the massive multiplicity of academic research agenda would drive us all to insanity. And, of course, it's one of the few places you can come to escape the great 21st century imperative: communicate!. If only people remembered to turn off their phones...
All that is lacking, I think to myself, is a properly seedy cafe within walking distance, as an alternative to the WIFI-saturated air-con ambience of the high-priced (and, especially in the case of the upper floor, decidedly shoddy) in-house facilities. It's simple to see that, given the sheer amount of construction work going on in the area, one need only follow the earguards, plaster-caked boots and bright orange waistcoats in order to find the unholy grail. So I proceed down the intriguingly-sussurating...
Ossulston Street with its nice chalked calculus-graffiti (pehaps something to do with the fact that it leads to the even more delightfully-named Polygon Road)
...and lo! there on Phoenix Road are the flourescent-jacketed masses, huddled over mugs of tea in the superb Golden Tulip Cafe. If rather than the inhouse StarBooks place, you'd rather get four times the volume of food for a quarter of the price, with 100% better presentation, service and ambiance, this is the place to go.
"Spaghetti on toast today"
"Spaghetti hoops is OK, yeah?"
"Just one piece though"
"Listen, I'll tell you secret, brother, but don't tell anyone else. One slice or two slice it's the same price"
"Yeah but I only want one - it's a waste, innit, you keep the second slice and you'll make a better profit"
"OK but I keep the extra hoops for you tomorrow."
The Cafes on Chalton Street play out an obscure geopolitical game: "Little Lebanon" nestles next to "EMPIRE". This whole area between St Pancras and Euston ('Somerstown') is worthy of investigation; one of those little pockets of normal life in the midst of buildings which one usually only passes through on the way to somewhere else. In its surprisingly peaceful ambience it equals the area around Coram Fields to the south of Euston Road, in fact it benefits, in contrast, from not really being the way to anywhere else.
Posted by robin at August 3, 2005 02:00 PM