Writer Amy Lowell said about books that „they are more than books; they are the life, the soul and the kernel of the past times, the reason for which people worked and died, the essence and quintessence of their lives.” Books are those offering us the possibility of knowing our past. Moreover, they offer us the chance to dream and to believe in a better world.
We also went to the library, where the book reigns as a queen. And since in Bucharest there is a wealthy network of such places, it was fairly difficult for us to decide where will we step in first. Eventually, we opted for the head office of The Bucharest Metropolitan Library, located in one of the most beautiful buildings on 4th Tache Ionescu Street.
It is true that, until the end of October, „Mihail Sadoveanu” Library, the which that also serves as the head office for The Metropolitan Library, is closed for renovation, but this didn’t prevent us from discovering the interior of this special place.
From the Casino into the Library
As I said before, the library has been hosted, since 1967, by this impressive edifice about which there are a number of legends in circulation.
The story goes that the mansion was constructed by a wealthy lawyer for his family, but during the period in-between the two World Wars, it acquired a completely different destination because the lawyer was a gambling addict.
Stories even speak about the fact that, inside the house, a casino was improvised in which the important people of the day would come to relax. Things though took an unfortunate turn for the owner when, during a grim card game, the lawyer staked the very Mansion on Tache Ionescu Street. He lost the game and he was forced to leave the edifice. After that episode, the mansion passed into the ownership of a couple of landlords, so that in the end it would come under the custody of the state. The heirs gave up their entitlements to it and agreed that a library would operate within this edifice.
Today, in the house’s rooms, the game cards were replaced by volumes of literature, science, medicine, by rare and very valuable books.
Florentina Dobrogeanu-Ipsilante, (Specialty) Director within The Bucharest Metropolitan Library, brought us into the universe of books at „Mihail Sadoveanu.” Thus, we found out that the institution operates ever since around 1935. At that time, things started out „on paper”, but it took another three to four years until a headquarters was received. Moreover, in the beginning it didn’t have any branches. These emerged after the 1950’s, as the city acquired another dimension. The Metropolitan Library started out with about 7,000 volumes, and was located, in turn, on about four premises, before it ended up in today’s facility, housing the head office.
It Includes Mircea Eliade’s Library from Paris
And during our chat she shared with us a precious information that the readers fond of Mircea Eliade’s work should know: if they cross the threshold of this Library, they have the chance to see some of the objects that belonged to one of the most outstanding Romanian writers.
„In our custody there is significant part of Mircea Eliade’s library from Paris. It was donated to us, sometime around 1994, by his wife, Irinel Eliade. This collection contains books that Mircea Eliade was using, as well as leaflets from the conferences he participated in, invitations to conferences. We also have a cup, about which it is presumed it’s been used by Eliade, since it was given to us by his wife. The collection also includes ball-point pens, but the most interesting fact is that we possess around four or five very fascinating notebooks. They are notebooks such as there were those in the olden days, narrow, but tall. Just as those for telephones. As it appears, these notebooks are written by Mircea Eliade. They are written by an old Eliade. They date back to the years 1970-1974, when he already was fairly aged. And, in these notebooks, he recounts visits to Paris, visits to America, to Chicago. It is something unique,” told us Florentina Dobrogeanu-Ipsilante.
Unfortunately, these items have not yet been recorded and do not show up in the library’s online catalogue. That is the reason people don’t know about them and do not request them in order to examine them.
It’s not the only „hidden treasure” of „Mihail Sadoveanu” Library. With much feeling, Florentina Dobrogeanu-Ipsilante testifies to us that in this institution’s custody, there are very many books with a bookplate. „For instance, in the Oriental collection we have received from The Library of the Academy, there are very many books with a bookplate. There’s a need for an Orientalist to identify who the possessor was and afterwards to interpret biblioteconomically [translator’s note: biblioteconomy – the study of history, classification, of literary material] and describe the bookplate. The bookplate is in the form of a stamp. It is very interesting to see such books,” pointed out the specialist.
Author: Ștefania Enache
Photo: Corina Gheorghe
