Joanna Dobson Extract from Griffins Guarding Gold
A
nticipating the quiet decorum that lay the other side of the glass, I straightened my skirt, shrugged off the morning’s long car ride and, hugging the large book to my chest, pushed open the double doors. The red brick building at 32, Kommunistichesky Prospect is home to the Chevalkov National Library, named after Mikhail Chevalkov, Altaiborn writer, convert and disciple to Saint Macarius. Almost a century after its inception, the library declares its mission to include the task of preserving a corpus of literature that would document the spiritual heritage of the indigenous peoples of the Altai Republic. I showed my library pass at reception and made straight for the reading room on the third floor. Inside, formica tables were arranged in the style of an old classroom. Without the hint of a soft furnishing, the overall impression of the room was one of bare solemnity. Still shielding the precious tome, Petroglyphs of the Elangash Valley, Volume I, I approached the enquiry desk. The librarian who had conducted my introductory tour, one month previously, had been most accommodating, helping me to navigate the main card catalogue and even permitting me to peruse the stack of rare books that ran through the middle of her office, which was accessed via a white-painted door immediately behind the enquiries desk. It was on the top shelf of the rare books stack that the bottlegreen spines of the work in four volumes Petroglyphs of the Elangash Valley first caught my eye. I reached up for Volume I feeling the weight of the publication as it rested across my arm. Opening the embossed cover — the most recent date stamp read ‘10th September 1983’
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joanna dobson
