Believe me; no one is more surprised than I.
This morning I woke up fully prepared to skip the projected 6 hour session on archives. I've only skipped two classes in my life, though, and I don't think I could have borne the guilt of three.
It was amazing.
Kickoff was about what the archives are all about. Treasure is what they're all about. The archives aren't just boring journals; they're letters and memorabilia and pamphlets and marginalia and all sorts of other random tidbits from authors all across the times. Things people have found hidden in attics and barns and other random locations.
Then were the library presentations. Our library at Queen's, the Armagh library, the Linen Hall library, and the public records office. Histories of how racy and political libraries used to be, the stores of unpublished manuscripts and original publications with authorial annotations, and the sorts of paper scraps that make literary types drool.
Then THEN came testimonials by PhD students.
One of them is doing forensic linguistics, currently conducting research into a particular case of justice miscarriage concerning a suicide note and a guilty looking husband.
Another found a book in a used book store which led her on a journey of discovering a completely silenced author of the mid-1900s. No secondary resources written about her whatsoever, just primary text in the special collections section of Queen's, which led her to find some hidden letters and opened up her project of resurrection. By the end of her presentation, I was in tears. Sure, I can get through the final Harry Potter movie and The Notebook totally dry eyed, but tell me a story of refound literature and I'm all blubs.
We finished with a practical application of research for our particular area of interest and got to converse with a couple professors about our ideas. They gave me some ideas of other places for me to search and thought my projected subject would make for a fascinating study.
The Siren call of the archives had me entranced to such a degree that I actually began to entertain ideas of a PhD, the realities of which I know would not be to my taste, but still I agreed to attend an informational session.
Archives, man. Archives change everything.
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