Red Line meets Blue

A friend from college posted a list of must-read plays at the beginning of this summer. While I had read many of them, there are even more left on the to-read list. For example, to any theatre major's disapproval I've never read A Doll's House, or any Ibsen for that matter. I know he's great, but it's all based on hear-say.

So I went to the library today with a list of plays and playwrights. I thought I would pick up The Pillowman or maybe something by Alice Childress. I began searching, only to be reminded that I live in a small conservative [not as bad as Holland, but still...] town with a library that tries its best. Needless to say, Amiri Baraka was nowhere to be found. However, I did come home with a book of Noel Coward plays, The Birthday Party [I <3 Harold Pinter], The Cocktail Party by T.S. Elliot, and Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett. I have read a few of Beckett's plays and make references to Godot all the time, but have never read it all the way through.

While I was looking in the play section, I glanced over at the poetry section which was the bookcase next door. I happened to see a book called "Poems on the Underground". I couldn't help, but pick it up. It was a chance find. I opened it to the bookmarked page and read this:

Celia Celia

When I am sad and weary
When I think all hope has gone
When I walk along High Holborn
I think of you with nothing on

Adrian Mitchell (b. 1932)


It was a successful trip to the library.






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Note: Holborn is the tube stop I got off at for school
Note2: Poems on the Underground are actually poems that were on the Underground. It officially started in January of 1986 when these three people wanted a way to positively fill empty advertising spaces. Three years [1989] after the launch the London Underground agreed to provide all spaces for free and quadrouple the original number of spaces for poem. While it did not mention this in the foreward, my guess is this later grew into "Art on the Underground" which you can see in [nearly] all London tube stations. More on this later...