Ashli

During this past week, I decided to take advantage of the numerous museums in Edinburgh. Last monday I visited the National Gallery of Scotland in the center of the city. Known as the best free attraction in all of Scotland, the Gallery boasts works of art by Suerat, Matisse, Monet, Van Gogh, Degas (both paintings and sculptures), Raphael, Boticelli, and so much more. I absolutely loved the French Impressionism exhibit. Another moving exhibit was the "Seven Sacraments" by Nicolas Poussin. Described as one of the most important post-Renaissance works of art, the display was set in an octagonal room with the entry making up one of the sides and the seven paintings filling the rest. Here's a link to a page with one of the paintings: http://www.aboutscotland.com/edin/artngs.html

I also visited the Writers Museum. This particular museum celebrates three great Scottish Writers: Robert Louis Stevenson, Robert Burns, and Sir Walter Scott. The first exhibit I wondered upon was that of Stevenson. While looking at paintings of his homes, a lady (probably in her early 90's) asked me if I was an American. I'm not sure why it is so obvious that I'm an American, but I pleasantly responded yes, as I was interested as to why she asked. This interesting lady is a former English teacher, and she also has a slight obsession with Stevenson. She told me that Stevenson married an American lady, and that she was the first American lady he had ever laid eyes on. She repeatedly told me of Stevenson's letter about his wife, and that he said something like "her eyes were like shooting pistols." This dear, dear lady loved whatever he said. I think it's so funny she was so touched by an analogy of a woman's eyes to shooting pistols!