Day 10: English Preserves

English Preserves

Jam-Jelly-Marmalade-Conserve = Museum-Gallery-Collection-Reserve

English Preserves

The English like to preserve things. Lots of things. Whether it’s their history, their heritage, their way of life or their fruit, this country has a way of ensuring their most endeared traditions stay well taken care of. Why is that? It’s not to say other countries don’t have similar tendencies towards historical archiving and preservation of their goods, but the Brits seem to be especially good at this.

When I arrived in my apartment last week I found three things already in my pantry. “Bonne Maman” strawberry conserve, “Morrison’s” orange marmalade (the kind with bits of orange peel still in it) and Earl Grey tea. Now, if I didn’t know any better I would have thought this was an over-done, clichéd “Welcome to London” gift basket left to me by the best intending of landlords.  But I knew better.

This wasn’t some puka shelled-pineapple-coconut-orchid-lei extravaganza left in the center of the bed day one of a Hawaiian holiday package. You know, those convivial and corny arrangements tourists expect and hospitality concierges pander to, those trite offerings that say, “this is what you think the natives here are doing so we’ll support your misconceptions.” No, this was a genuine offering. The “natives” here really did have tea every day and they really did serve their favorite fruit preserves with it!

But their preservation is not limited to fruit and tea time alone. I have not walked down a street in London yet without running into a museum, a library, a gallery, or a collection that wasn’t preserving a part of this country’s legacy to some degree or another. From the theatrically large British Museum with room after room after room of highly treasured antiquity on reserve, to the more sedate, but equally robust, Wallace Collection of Master painters housed in a once-privately owned mansion, the breadth and scope of where and how this country preserves its treasures is vast.

But I suppose like any traveler who returns home with souvenirs, we like to find prime places and spaces to display our goods not just because we really like to look at them, but because we also really like our guests to look at them.   

...and let thy feel millenniums hence be set in midst of knowledge.

To look at them and think how cool we were for going to all those places. And for a country like England whose historical legacy is fraught with centuries of conquest and colonialization the world over, it’s consistent the appeal of wanting to show off the goods. And yet today, as I passed along the Egyptian mummies, the Rosetta Stone and the Elgin Marbles, with the droves of other tourists who came from buses lining the streets alongside the British Museum, I couldn’t help but think these displays of “English Preserves” were a lot like English marmalade, neatly packaged, nicely labeled and served up daily for mass consumption.

The Elgin Marbles

And as mesmerizing as it was to walk through the long hall of disarticulated Parthenon carvings stripped from the frieze and pediment of their original temple structure, I couldn’t help but wonder what it would look like to see these “fruits” on the actual tree they came from.

The Wallace Collection

The Wallace Collection is a National Museum in London that was created from the private collection of the Marquess of Hertford. He left the house and the entire collection to his son Richard Wallace when he died, who later donated the collection to the nation. The entire collection is still contained in the original Hertford house. 

Walls of Paintings!

The caveat for donation was that the entire collection stay together and no object ever leave the house, even for loan exhibitions. 

It was overwhelming to see Rembrandt, Velazquez, Titian, Gainsborough and Rubens all in one place. All these Master Artists under one private roof! The collection was immense! And it didn’t stop at paintings.

How could the horse even move!

There were rooms of armory, porcelain, jewelry and furniture. 

Every room looked like this!

The opulence was dizzying and a little exhausting, but so far, it has been my favorite museum yet.

The British Museum

This place is HUGE!

The British Museum is just a stone’s throw from campus. I have been going there in between classes and on lighter days to take in as much of it as I can. 

Walking through the halls is like going back in time (minus all the digital cameras and the kids on field trip running around). 

The Rosetta Stone

Fortunately, it is close enough to pop in whenever I’d like because I can’t imagine trying to see it all in a single visit! It is EPIC. When you stop to think of the all the riches contained in even one of these rooms it makes your head spin. Pottery, Buddhas, temple doors, mummies, jewelry, weapons, textiles, carvings, carpets, porcelain, glass, gold. . . .on and on and on. How did they get all this stuff?? And are they ever going to give any of it back? 

The Elgin Marbles

On the one hand it is reassuring to see the level of archival preservation and deference given these objects. After all one can only imagine what would have befallen them had they been left to destabilized or war torn countries. 

But on the other hand, there is a certain sadness I feel that they are kept so far away from where they were intended to be.