I simply love books*. Not only do I own hundreds of them, but I continue to buy books at a rate which is not really sustainable… As we are fortunate to live in a city which is ‘book friendly’ (in terms of the number of bookshops, libraries, publishing houses, etc.), in an attempt to keep my passion for buying books somewhat in check, I try to borrow as many as possible from the university (and public) library (whose city centre branch is only some 30 minutes away from home on foot, at place de la Riponne) or from the municipal libraries. As for the latter, I tend to go for the main branch, whose location is also pretty central, being adjacent to place Chauderon – one of Lausanne’s main open space areas in the older part of the city.
Borrowed in 2006, 2007 or 2008; purchased in March 2015; look up Masaru Emoto.
From the main municipal library, I tend to borrow books on computing, nature, politics or societal topics, history, archaeology, sports, the arts, travel guides or books loosely classified under the umbrella label of the esoteric (with holdings as heteroclite to comprise a biography of one of the ‘fathers’ of ‘free energy’, Viktor Schauberger). I came to the latter category as I was trying to find information as wide ranging as possible on water a number of years ago, even though I had borrowed or purchased books belonging to the esoteric category probably some twenty years ago.
A particularly pesky piece of malware from Asia, not Russia, for once. 😉
On 2nd January as I was trying to locate the PDF version of a book still protected by copyright laws (reminder: a book falls into the public domain normally 70 years after the death of its author) from the computer of my parents (I had wanted to make a point more forcefully by providing evidence from printed material, i.e. in book format as opposed to web pages), I got my parents’ computer infested with various malware applications which were extremely hard to remove (because they would download again whenever the computer would connect to the Internet).
Books borrowed on esoteric subjects
Having failed to remove the malware (even though I had used the trial versions of three malware ‘killers’), I had to go back to my parents to sort out this problem after they had called me to inform me that they were getting prompts for fake IT technical support. Fearing that I would have to tinker with the registry of Windows (which I am not too familiar with), I decided to borrow a book on the subject from the municipal library at Chauderon. I also decided to borrow a study of a medieval church in the Jura chain of mountains I would like to visit in the format of an A4 novel with some very interesting illustrations (click here for the book’s website, in French). Housed in the section ‘sacred architecture’, I stumbled across a book I had never seen, entitled The energy grid of sacred places (in French).
Even though I am still a little suspicious of unorthodox science, I fully share the intuition of the English novelist David Herbert Lawrence, who wrote that:
Every continent has its own great spirit of place. Every people is polarised in some particular locality, which is home, the homeland. Different places on the face of the earth have different vital effluence, different vibration, different chemical exhalation, different polarity with different stars: call it what you like, but the spirit of place is a great reality.
D. H. Lawrence, Studies in Classic American Literature, volume 2, page 17
Screenshot from 94-lieux-sacres-et-particuliers-de-suisse-et-france-voisine
I also know that the region of Switzerland where we live is replete with such places. The above screenshot, taken from the page devoted to high energy places in Suisse romande and neighbouring France, posted on the website of an author of some beautiful books (I am tempted to use the epithet ‘unique’) on sacred places and buildings, their energy, their architecture from an esoteric perspective, should certainly put the point through – as far as such claims are concerned, that is, because, of course, everybody is entitled to remain sceptical and have their opinion on the matter; it is more a question of having had or of not having had the opportunity to experience D.H. Lawrence’s ‘vital effluence’ for themselves.
Stéphane Cardinaux’s books on sacred geometries; borrowed many times; purchased in January 2015
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Should you think that esoteric books (with beautiful illustrations) emerged only with the manufactured, ‘subversive’ (CIA-backed) hippie, counter- and Christian-shunning cultures of the sixties, seventies, eighties, etc., think again because there were plenty of such books as far back as the Middle Ages (technically these were not books, but codices – plural of the Latin word codex). One particular example is the so-called Voynich Manuscript (now part of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library):
[…] Many call the fifteenth-century codex, commonly known as the “Voynich Manuscript,” the world’s most mysterious book. Written in an unknown script by an unknown author, the manuscript has no clearer purpose now than when it was rediscovered in 1912 by rare books dealer Wilfrid Voynich […]
http://yalebooks.com/book/9780300217230/voynich-manuscript
Picture search for the Voynich Manuscript on Yandex
To put an end to an entry which might become a little long winded otherwise, I thought I would conclude with something in this vein:
Visit your local library as you are bound to find a book that will expand your knowledge, or even your consciousness, this being without the mediation of an electronic device such as a television set, the screen of some computer or even the narrow display of your so-called smartphone…
* I am also married to an ex library manager…
à la mode de chez nous 
Nice selection of books mentioned.
The Healing power of Water, isn’t it? (I don’t know French so I can’t be sure of the exact translation) and the voynich manuscripts, both are interesting.
Hello Kenneth, sorry I had not logged back on to WordPress for several weeks and I have disabled the notifications sent to my email account informing me of new comments… You are correct, the title indeed reads as ‘The healing power of water’ in English (English is basically a mixture of German and French). Voynich, this was part of my interest in ‘odd’ books, a subject I feel I ought to write about (but elsewhere [i.e. at my other blog, which anybody interested in would be able to find using the internal search engine here and the appropriate keywords] as this blog is supposed to have to do with Switzerland – even if I have not been very strict in that matter). To come back to water: few people are willing to explore this, but what makes Switzerland ‘special’ is the country’s extra strong ‘connection’ to water. If only people (living in this country) would get out a little more and explore this ‘connection’, they would be all the better for it.
Oops, Kenneth, I forgot to reply to your compliment (‘Nice selection of books mentioned’). I was simply hoping to get people to explore the esoteric section of their local library (here in Lausanne strangely catalogued under ‘NAVE’, not under the Dewey decimal system as for the rest of the books). Although I certainly do not borrow (or buy) books ONLY from this category, I am very glad that I abandoned the prejudices that had been implanted in me and that I dared to do so, (unfortunately) not that super long ago, because I have learned so much as a result. Such books greatly expand one’s knowledge AND consciousness. Sometimes they can even expand one’s ability to love fellow human beings. Life is so rich, there is so much to explore and, never forget, there is so much information out there which is NOT on the Internet.