The quickening pollen

Julia ♦ August 18, 2023 ♦ Leave a comment

This artwork was copied from an old book catalog leftover from my days as a librarian.
I was unable to find out who the owner of the image might be.

“Books are the bees which carry the quickening pollen from one to another mind.”
― James Russell Lowell

If you suffer from seasonal allergies, the term “quickening pollen” might not sound like a good thing. But in the sense that Lowell intended it, the concept is quite exciting.

Suppose you could somehow time travel to have tea with Charles Dickens, or C. S. Lewis, or Jane Austen (my three personal favorites) or, for that matter, with an unknown diarist of a bygone era who could tell you what life was REALLY like back then? Would you pass up the chance? You are in luck. You can have tea anytime with any of the great or ordinary minds throughout history who left a bit of themselves behind for us in their words.

From Euripides to Einstein, from Sophocles to Steinbeck, countless fascinating people are available, with stories to tell and lessons to impart. And in the here and now, our opportunities to tap into other worlds through reading have never been more abundant. Books come in several formats, and everyday people all over the world now share their experiences via blogging and online publishing.

Wherever you are, the air is swarming with the excitement of minds connecting with each other over vast geographical distances and centuries of time. Head to a nearby hive via your local or online bookstore or library for some intellectual cross-pollination. Then buzz back over here and share what you’ve picked up.  As always, thanks for BEEing here!

This post was first published seven years ago today. The original post, comments and photo are linked, along with two other related posts, below. These links to related posts, and their thumbnail photos, do not appear in the blog feed; they are only visible when viewing the individual posts by clicking on each one. I have no idea why, nor do I know how they choose the related posts. That’s just the way WordPress does things.