ALEXANDRIA: It is hoped the new library will be spared the intolerance that destroyed the old, reports Siona Jenkins in Cairo
Ancient and modern came together in Alexandria last night, as heads of state, royalty and celebrities gathered to revive of one of classical antiquity's most famous buildings: the Alexandria Library.
The official opening kicked off two weeks of cultural events featuring music, film and poetry from around the world, all designed to stress the new library's commitment to its ancient predecessor's reputation for tolerance and internationalism, and to revitalise this once-famous city.
At the centre of the celebrations is the library building, which has been christened with its Greek name, Biblioteca Alexandrina.
Eleven years in the planning, and funded by a number of countries and organisations, the eleven-storey structure is a semi-submerged disk built on what is thought to have been the site of its ancient namesake. Made of glass and aluminium, and insulated against the Egyptian heat with the same technology used in aeroplane wings, it is a futuristic sun illuminating knowledge and culture. The granite cladding of the outer wall is inscribed with letters from every known system of writing.
Inside, 85,000 square metres of floor space make it the largest library in the world. Fluted 21-metre high columns support the roof, which is angled so that sunlight can penetrate the galleried floors below. Its elegant stacks will house books and manuscripts focusing on Mediterranean, Arab and sub-Saharan African history and culture, as well as the ethics of science.
This is a rare moment in the spotlight for Alexandria which, despite a brief fluorescence immortalised by Lawrence Durrell at the beginning of the twentieth century, has been in slow decline for 1600 years. What little remains of the ancient city is buried underground or submerged in the city's harbour. And although modern Alexandria's ornate nineteenth century facades have been given a face-lift, it is debatable whether a new building, no matter how impressive, can recreate the tolerant, cosmopolitan atmosphere of the city's classical heyday.
The ancient Biblioteca Alexandrina housed some 700,000 scrolls and was said to contain "all the knowledge in the world". It was located in the Mouseion, an arts and science complex complete with laboratories, conservatories and even a zoo. The scholars who passed through its corridors read like a Who's Who of ancient learning: Hipparchus calculated the length of the year here, Euclid founded geometry and Erastosthenes calculated the circumference of the world. A team of rabbis translated the Pentateuch of the Old Testament from Hebrew into Greek.
Political instability and religious zeal are the most probable reasons for the library's demise. In 48 BC Caesar destroyed part of the building when he used fire to attack the city. In the fourth century AD fanatical Christian monks would periodically rampage through the city, destroying whatever pagan structures they could find. In 392 they succeeded in burning down the Serapeum, one of the city's most important temples, along an adjoining branch of the library. Finally, in 642, Arab invaders are said (somewhat dubiously) to have used the remaining scrolls to heat the city's bathhouses.
The reasons for these acts of destruction are as relevant today as they were in ancient times. Modern Alexandria is a sprawling metropolis of 6 million people, most of whom live away from the gleaming seafront in narrow streets crowded with substandard buildings. Islamist radicals have found fertile ground for their ideology here and their presence has prompted worries about censorship, which is regularly imposed on books and films by Egypt's religious authorities.
Ismail Serageldin, a former senior official at the World Bank, is the man charged with overseeing the Biblioteca Alexandrina's re-emergence as a world centre of learning. He claims that the library has special status that exempts it from the meddling of censors.
He spent the eve of the inauguration telling Egyptian television viewers that the library will transform Alexandria into a new Bilbao, the Spanish city that has been revitalised by Frank Gehry's stunningly designed Guggenheim museum. "People from all over the world already come to Egypt to see ancient remains," he said. "Now they will come to see something modern." The library should, of course, be much more than a tourist attraction. In a region teetering on the brink of war, with culture and freedom under constant threat from religious conservatives and totalitarian governments, scholarship and tolerance remain as valuable they were in the 4th century BC. If nothing else, the new Biblioteca Alexandrina re-affirms their importance.