Worth A Thousand Words: The Calling of Samuel

"Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening." (1 Sam 3:10)

From The Crusader Bible,  fol. 20v (13th c.), The Morgan Library & Museum

I had a chance to see this manuscript in person over Christmas vacation. It is stunning. Just imagine a graphic novel, then transport it to the Middle Ages. Check out the rest here. 

Where have I been the past few months? Well, mostly over here, chronicling my marathon training adventures. I'll be settling back into my normal bookish musings soon.

Monuments Men: Fact and Fiction

When I first heard that Robert Edsel's Monuments Men was being made into a feature film, I was excited. The stories he captured about Allied efforts to save art, historic buildings, libraries, and archives in the wake of WWII are harrowing, remarkable, and inspiring, and make for perfect movie fodder. Plus, who doesn't like a feel-good museum story? The A-list casting made me skeptical (and George Clooney directing? Really?), but an extended preview featuring interviews with the cast about their passion for sharing the stories of the American Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives (MFAA) division and art preservation had me reassured (I'm also generally a sucker for Matt Damon films). But ultimately, the film disappointed me.

It fell short in so many of the ways films fail when they dramatize historical vignettes. With the exception of Jean Dujardin and Cate Blanchett, no members of the main cast were believable as art experts. The way in which the film played-up the team as 'mistfit soldiers' didn't allow the characters' individual stories as artists to breathe. I did enjoy Dmitri Leonidas' portrayal of Sam Epstein (Harry Ettlinger in real life), who had a soft, but striking personal narrative as a Jewish-American immigrant. But mostly, it felt as if I was seeing a caricature of the MFAA, rather than earnest stories. 

I was especially disappointed and irritated by the film's portrayal of Rose Valland (Claire Simon in the film-more French-sounding for American audiences, I guess?), who was arguably the most important figure in the preservation and recovery of French art during the war. This unassuming but sharp museum overseer remains one of the most decorated women in French history for her work in the Jeu de Paume during the war. First, the film deprives her of her credit by renaming her character (many of the men in the film kept their real names), and then creates a completely fictional, awkward, and gratuitous sexual tension between her and James Granger (played by Matt Damon). Instead of the intelligent, meticulous, and driven museum patriot she was, these moments in the film make her seem much more like a pathetic old maid who is desperate for male attention. A real missed opportunity to highlight a true heroine of WWII. You can read more about Rose Valland and other women of the Monuments Men here.

Life [Kind of] Resembling Art

Inevitably, the simplest default explanation of the archival profession to an outsider:

With one notable exception: I refuse to idolize Masons.

Some Things Never Change...

What my office looks like to non-archives corporate staff:

What my office looks like to me:

Who thought that a mere pile of boxes could be the cause of such shock and awe?

Embarassing Faux Pas of the Searching [Library] Employer

It amazes me that career advice columnists manage to survive. I am not sure if I am alone on this. But every time I see a new headline for '10 Things to Never Say in an Interview' or '5 Ways to Make Your Resume Shine,' I read the same common-sense or inane advice that has been repeated from time immemorial. Anyway, in libraryland there are many sites dedicated to navigating library school and the hiring process: Hack Library School, I Need a Library Job, Hiring Librarians, and Open Cover Letters. Letters to a Young Librarian also occasionally features some young career advice. Hiring Librarians has a regular feature where hiring manager at library organizations are interviewed about what advice they have for job-hunting candidates, covering everything from preparation and salary negotiation to etiquette and fashion. There should be a similar list for employers.

In their imaginary fantasy world, library
hiring managers probably wish all of
 their candidates are like Rex Libris.

One of my favorite job-search related blogs to peruse is You Ought to Be Ashamed, which focuses on the disastrously absurd in archival job postings, a la "Must have an MLS, Ph.D., be fluent in 5 languages, have 7 years programming experience. Salary: $32,000"). Sadly it is not updated that often. But I wish there were more ways for potential employers to improve their end of the job-search. In recent months, I have heard all kinds of embarrassments from job-hunters librarian and non-librarian alike, and one wonders what this world is coming to. To begin, here is a brief list potential employers should avoid.

Pope Paul VI on Archives

"Our pieces of paper are echoes and vestiges...of the passage of Our Lord Jesus in the world. And then, by reflection, having the cult of these papers, of the documents, of the archives, means having the cult of Christ, having the sense of the Church, giving to ourselves and to those who will come in the future the history of the transitus Domini in the world."

-Pope Paul VI, 1963

Lux in Arcana

In case you need an excuse to finally go on pilgrimage, or (if you don't happen to be religious) visit the Eternal City, this exhibit is your ticket. Lux in Arcana (Latin for "light on the secrets") is a spectacular showcase of 100 documents from the Vatican Secret Archives, never before shown to the public. The exhibition opened March 1st and runs through September 2012, at the Capitoline Museums in Rome.

Some of the items featured include Galileo's conviction, the letter instrumental to the Anglican schism begun by the affairs of Henry VIII, the document proclaiming the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, and the bull of Martin Luther's excommunication, among many other very cool things. If you can't make it to Rome, or simply want to whet your appetite for the real experience to come, the exhibition's well-produced website features a selection of the items, which you can browse here. You can also buy the exhibition catalog here.

I should have mentioned in the last post that the Vatican's reputation for clunkiness in web design also extends to the Vatican Museums (whose site seems to be stuck in the '90s), and to a lesser degree, the Vatican Library (which recently underwent a massive renovation a few years ago). The Vatican Secret Archives, on the other hand, has got itself a little more with the times with its very sleek website.

I dearly hope that I am lucky enough to have the opportunity to visit this exhibition sometime in the coming months. 

Links:

Lux in Arcana

Vatican Secret Archives

Vatican Library

Vatican Museums