Another Visit to London

Old May 25th, 2015, 07:55 AM
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irishface...

This was the first time in years when there was a significant number of empty seats on a trans-Atlantic flight for us...just lucky. (AA/USAir recently added a PHL-LHR morning flight, so maybe that eased the crowdedness.)

Passport control in Philadelphia is usually pretty fast. (Except for Christmas vacation in 2012 coming back from Rome when unbelievably long lines made it take nearly an hour).

SS
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Old May 25th, 2015, 08:26 AM
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ssander - great report which I've really enjoyed reading. I don't know how many of the places that you have visited more than once that I have yet to see - I think I'd have to take a month off work to get round them all.

one day perhaps...

looking forward to your TR too, jj!
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Old May 25th, 2015, 11:29 AM
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I very much enjoyed your trip report. We will be in London next year, so making notes on some of your faves. There is always way more to do in London than we have time for!
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Old May 25th, 2015, 12:35 PM
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We have tickets for "Curious" and so am glad to hear good report; if you are readers, check out the book it's based on--it's as they say brilliant, too.

And we are headed to the Brit Lib again (4th visit), this time with tickets in hand for the Magna Carta exhibit. The place is a jewel, isn't it? And I rather like the juxtaposition of architectural styles there--am not a fan of much modern stuff, but to me it "works" visually but I don't have a very trained eye.

Again, thanks for planting some ideas for future visits, as I still won't have made it yet to several of the "smaller" museums you mentioned.

Glad for you that the foot issues had minimal painful impact.
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Old May 25th, 2015, 11:21 PM
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"this time with tickets in hand for the Magna Carta exhibit. "

I'd be interested in your views.

There's an understandable trend in the main London-area repositories of Western culture to produce special exhibitions, largely from their own archives, capitalising on all sorts of events.

Each involves a great deal of mutual back-scratching, with the Bodleian lending bits of its archive to the V&A, and the Queen's Collection lending bits of its to the Ashmolean or Fitzwilliam (to keep international shipping to the minimum).

They're all skilled at strong arming corporates into serious sponsorship. And there's a kind of freemasonry among the critics that serious, challenging reviews are somehow unpatriotic - or at least might cause future sponsors to question diverting money from paying their staff decent wages or reducing their prices towards their CEO's campaign for a knighthood.

But they've all got archives so huge only a tiny percentage is ever displayed, and their staff genuinely want those minor treasures to be seen more widely. Staging temporary exhibitions isn't cheap, with the cost of design standards inflating even faster than UK senior management, the EU bureaucracy or American universities' sports teams.

The BL's obviously got a particular problem, that what's in its archive can't easily be gawped at by more than one or two at a time in the way a Benin bronze or a big Turner can. As a result, its record on these exhibitions - I'd say - is patchy.

It doesn't help that Magna Carta's 800th comes towards the end of a year of severe commemoration fatigue in Britain, with Waterloo, Agincourt, the Battle of Britain, Lincoln's assassination, VE Day, Gallipoli, WW1 start, Churchill's overthrow and umpteen other events queueing up for their few minutes of temporarily restored fame.

It'd be interesting to hear the reaction of someone who hasn't been exposed to relentless BBC4 documentaries on each day's world-changing anniversary.
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Old May 26th, 2015, 03:15 AM
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Flan...

We usually don't go to those special exhibits here in the US.

I think the main reason is that I don't want to spend extra money on a special exhibit when the best items can usually be seen on a standard visit.

There have been some exceptions. The Vermeer exhibit in DC in 1995 was well worth it because he painted so few canvasses and they were spread all over the place. Having them all in one show was worth it to me.

On the other hand there was a Cezanne exhibit in Philadelphia that was a complete waste of money IMO. Too many nearly-identical paintings. A single trip to any major museum would show you the dozen or fewer Cezanne's needed to see the range of his work.

We did not choose to pay for the Magna Carta show this visit...we'd seen the regular display on previous trips to London. If not, we might have been tempted.

The bottom line is that I understand why museum's want to drum up PR with special shows...you just have to pick your spots and be a discriminating consumer (unless, of course, you have mega-bucks to spend).

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Old May 26th, 2015, 03:50 AM
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"Lincoln's assassination" I must have missed that one. Not a British thing was it (we didn't do it I mean?)

I see the play he didn't leave is in London at the moment
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Old May 26th, 2015, 03:57 AM
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Flanner--I will definitely be writing up a TR upon return and include my view.

Having seen 3 of the Magna Carta's (Salisbury, Lincoln and the BL's damaged one), I'm not really going to see "it" so much but hope to learn some from the accompanying exhibit stuff. Plus now there seems to be some huge embroidered thing that is rather...unique
http://londonist.com/2015/05/someone...pedia-page.php
If this element alone is anything like it looks like in this blurb, it'll be worth it! As this is my 4th visit to the BL and I've never plunked down more than a little for a few postcards and maybe a mug, I didn't mind paying a bit for an exhibit.

SS--I too have almost never paid for a special exhibit, but once in a while...
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Old May 26th, 2015, 04:15 AM
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"Lincoln's assassination" I must have missed that one. Not a British thing was it (we didn't do it I mean?)

I see the didn't an ancestor of Tony Blair's missus do him in?
I like: American: you burned Washington!
Englishman: did we really? I thought he died in his bed
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Old May 26th, 2015, 08:29 AM
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Ssander, loved your trip report. Building excitement for my trip in less than a month.

Looking for yours, janisj . . .
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Old May 26th, 2015, 09:19 AM
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nag nag nag

I almost started it last night . . . but didn't.

Will try (try) to get to it tonight
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Old May 27th, 2015, 11:31 PM
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ssander, loved your trip report, makes me really excited to visit London in about a month. This will be my 6th time in ten years and I feel so privileged to visit this great city as often as I have. The last time we visited 2 years ago, my daughter said to me as we were landing at Heathrow, "it's like coming home, isn't it?" She isn't coming with us this time, working and getting ready to go back to college, and has shed a few tears about it.
DH has never been to the British Library so we are sure to go there and also visit his favorite pub, the Perseverance. We are visiting some new venues so your remarks about the Courtauld are very timely. We bought the Art Fund passes on the advice of another Fodorite so have tickets to Savage Beauty at the V&A and hope to visit Leighton House.
Your "real time" trip report has helped to inspire this similarly affected victim of plantar facitis. Thanks.
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Old May 28th, 2015, 01:46 AM
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idesofmarch...


Re: plantar fasciitis:

The routine of tracing the alphabet with her foot before standing up and walking (after a sit-down of more than ten minutes or so) really helped.

She said that whenever she would forget to do it, her foot would remind her. Then after doing it, there would be virtually no pain.

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Old May 28th, 2015, 01:47 AM
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Food Note: Linda has informed me that I have mixed up some of the food descriptions -- got the wrong dates. Oh well...as I said, we never ate any high-end meals anyway.

SS
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Old May 28th, 2015, 03:06 AM
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"Plus now there seems to be some huge embroidered thing that is rather...unique "

The embroidery is in the free-entrance temporary exhibition gallery on the library's mezzanine (which has small, little-publicised but often remarkable displays) No tickets are involved.

The main Magna Carta exhibition texasbookworm has tickets for is in the paid-for gallery in the basement.
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