Dubliners

LOOK! Photos from Dublin

See? Dublin

Statue of James Joyce with an awesome cane and hat.

I don't know what this is,

it's just a giant metal spike

in the middle of Dublin.

This is a very old theatre, that I wound up seeing An Ideal Husband in.

This is me at the Oscar Wilde House.

Sorry, no, James Joyce center.

In other news, it was a GREAT hair day.

That's before the wind got to it.

So the inside of the James Joyce center was lovely.

very stately

chandeliers

This is James Joyce's death mask.

And these are chairs that belonged to him, or a friend of his. Or something.

Furniture from his house.

I just really like this hat.

Yeah, so

the house was nice.

Oh this is a map of Dublin made out of pages from Ulysses.

I don't know where they got this house.

But it was very nice.

And I mean, the exhibit isn't very easy to photograph, so I took pictures of the house.

This is the actual door of the house where the events of Ulysses are set.

and they moved it here.

to this house

in all its glory.

It's a church!

Also, the elections for Ireland's members of the European parliament were happening, so there were posters up all over for that. Apparently there's a water tax that people are angry about.

PRESBYTERIANS!

This restaurant is right next door to the Irish Writers' Museum and the Irish Writers' Centre. So I thought it was cute.

This is the Black Church.

The Remembrance Garden.

The... Jameson Distillery

A pub Dr. O'Neill sent me to.

*chuckles*

The Liffy is the river that runs through Dublin.

I don't remember what that building is.

Oh! We're on day 2 now. It's Trinity College.

And very impressive and intimidating it is.

But it was a nice day.

So this is the belltower, it has 2 bells in it, both of which are normally used, but right now they are broken.

This is the exam hall, which is identical to the chapel. Because in one you are examined by God and the other you are examined by man. Also, the architect (who was French?) never visited Ireland, so they never bothered to pay him. Which I find very funny.

That is the oldest building on campus

But the bell tower is prettier.

It was also very green and very lovely.

This is a page from one of the manuscripts they have. Unfortunately, after I took this, they told me no more pictures of this exhibit. Whoops!

Fortunately, they let me take pictures in the Long Room of the library

because that was cool.

And it looked right for a library.

Books, and staircases

and busts of famous people

I HAD to selfie with Shakespeare.

It's just so...

LIBRARY.

This is the oldest harp in Ireland, and they put it on everything.

Like, Guinness, and their passports.

I just want to sit in there and read!

Proclamation for the Irish to rise up against the British.

TWO whole stories of books!

Trying on hats makes me very happy.

Some more lovely lawns at Trinity.

National Library of Ireland

See? Library.

It was a magnificent building too.

Very imposing.

Appropriately "library"

and just pretty.

Where I had lunch!

And now the identical national museum.

That's the library, though.

And this is inside the museum.

Which was very impressive.

and not just because it held cool, old things.

it had those too.

But the building was cool.

Look, St. Stephen's Green. Upside down. For no apparent reason.

That's better.

Anyway,

it was a very nice day

and St. Stephen's Green is a lovely sort of English garden.

A nice place to chill and read for a bit.

Which I did.

The entrance to the Green.

This is a street.

This made me so, unspeakably happy.

St. George's Arcade (upside down)

outside of the Charles Beatty Library

There are gardens there too.

Dublin Castle

The garden on top of the library (where no pictures were allowed)

and the view from the library.

Christ Church Cathedral

The choir here, along with that at St. Patrick's were the first to perform Handel's "Messiah"

They are rightly proud of that.

Ireland's oldest pub

Where I had diner.

I'm not sure what that building is.

But I found the posters from Twelfth Night

and they were fun to selfie with.

And this is the theatre where I saw Twelfth Night.

And this is the theatre where I saw An Ideal Husband.

Oscar Wilde himself.

It was a very nice theatre.

This is a building.

That is somehow important.

Old city walls of Dublin

Which are definitely important.

A nice garden on top of the walls.

a church likewise on top of the wall.

The site of an older church by Christ Church.

Windows of the cathedral.

which is a very impressive building.

and I only took one picture inside, because I wasn't there as a tourist.

St. Patrick's Cathedral.

It had a lot of ornate tombs.

This is a stone found near the site of the well that St. Patrick used to baptize people.

it was a very impressive sort of place,

as Cathedrals generally are.

So this used to be the chapter door, and there was some sort of blood feud between two families, and one of the heads of one of the families got ran into the chapter house by the other family

at which point he realized how dumb this fight was, and tried to make peace, but the other family, understandably, was kind of wary. I say understandably because I've read A Song of Ice and Fire. And so the guy INSIDE hacked a hole through the door and stuck his hand out to prove that he was sincere. It worked. Thankfully.

They had some very old banners

I can't decide if it's pathetic or awesome, but it's a very interesting experience walking around Europe while reading A Song of Ice and Fire.

And now I've started the show.

Cool staircase up to the organ.

I just want to speak from one of these pulpits.

It would feel so powerful.

This is the bell in memory of the Huguenots who fled to Ireland.

A little chapel in the nave.

and another at the rear.

It was a nice place. 

There's something really comforting about walking around cathedrals.

And I thought this was a particularly nice view.

More stones from by the well.

So Jonathan Swift is buried in this cathedral.

He wrote Gulliver's Travels

and apparently had a much more scandalous life than I knew.

But I'm not even sure I knew he was Irish.

Why does my phone do this?

Imposing Cathedral shot.

Nice garden outside.

it was a nice walk, even if it was raining.

all the pretty flowers.

The final pub Dr. O'Neill recommended

Oscar Wilde's statue.

Oscar Wilde's monument.

He looks so cool.

I though the fact that they advertise how much water is used in the performance is amusing.

Oscar Wilde's house. Now American College Dublin.

And this is where Oscar was born.

According to that plaque.

The Liffy.

I look so intense. But it's a picture I didn't mean to take.

For a while I was the only one in the movie theater onboard the ship. So I had fun with that. 

On the continent again, I can't wait to be on the continent again....