[video; open to both courts]

[athousandcurses]

Why... why would anyone do something like this?

[Someone has just found out about the library after returning to Caer Glaem, and judging from the stricken, teary state of her face and hushed voice, Grainne is pretty broken up about the attack. She honestly cannot understand why anyone would deliberately set fire to history.]

Why would you try to destroy something so valuable?

[She shakes her head. How could someone take something like books for granted, even so far as to burn them?]

So many things are lost to the ages that we will never retrieve, never regain, and that is with verbal history and story telling. We do not have "books" in our culture; over the years people have forgotten the histories we have passed down to our children because our history is only retained in memory. If someone is selfish or does not pass down what they know, it can be lost too easily! For everything that has been lost, we will never again know it!

[Don't mind the heartbroken, she just has Very Strong opinions on this.]

Do you not understand how wonderful such things are? How precious it is? Recording history in this way is almost a miracle! Can't you see why the loss of even one scroll is denying not just everyone living now, but those who come after us?

Why would anyone even attempt it...

Comments

[athousandcurses]

You are right... even my own words should remind me of that.

[Grainne seems to relax, or maybe settle is a better term.]

If they were never read, they would have no use to exist. I... suppose I feel the difference so keenly because I am unused to it.

[demonstrations]

[ Jinora's quiet for a moment as the older female finishes speaking. She can't imagine a world without books. Ever since she could remember she found solace in them. They were nice to read and she learned a lot-- in just the same way she explored just as much. Times and places she could no longer visit but still wanted to. That was the one charm that books held for her: experiences. Lost ones, new ones, and ones she could find herself.

History was important. But they were all living history. Korra was proof of that. The Avatar cycle being one that was a constant. Every generation had one and with them carried the history of their world. But, just the same, she knew it wasn't only the Avatar that carried on the traditions from the past. They might have progressed, but so did everyone. They built on from what they did before.

It's what it hits close to home and is difficult all at once. She can understand the loss of books-- it hurts to think about all that lost knowledge. But at the same time she knows it's not the end. She has to know. ]

Not only that, but for books to be written someone has to experience them. It's not just the books that are important. Experience is important, too.

[ The small is soft and perhaps a tiny bit sad as she shakes he head. ] No. It's not wrong to feel sad. I like books, too. [ A beat. ] But it's not the books that are the important part. We can learn things again and carry them on.

Things might be lost, but there will always be people to pick it up again.

[ It's said with a firm belief. If there's one thing she knows to be true it is that. When the Air Acolytes followed Grandpa Aang and when he family was born the Air Nation's baton had just passed on from its predecessors. Difficult? Certainly. But it wasn't the end. It's less an ending now then it was before. ]

[athousandcurses]

Yes. Yes, of course.

[Jinora, for all her young age, has managed to calm Grainne down. No small feat considering how fretful Grainne can be at times...

Grainne has heard of the libraries in Rome, and even whispers of a great library to house all the world's knowledge had made it to her land with all the visitations in recent years, and it fascinated her. Ogham is well and good, but her people didn't use it in the same manner as Rome used script... perhaps out of tradition, perhaps out of the difficulty in learning it, or maybe a whole slew of reasons.

If her life had played out differently, she may have liked to see a library back home. Maybe that's why she's reacting so strongly to this.]

There is always more to it than just words. Experiences... that's how words gain their meaning and importance.

[She smiles, softly.]

Thank you. Do you think we will be able to restore what was lost in the fire?

[demonstrations]

[ That earns a nod. ]

There wouldn't be any words at all if they didn't.

[ She doesn't pause at the question, merely nods. There wasn't a doubt in her mind about it, really. ]

We might not be able to get things exactly how they were said or written, but I'm sure there's a way. People might have the books somewhere else or there might be someone who remembers it. I remember the books I've read really well. Someone out there has the answers.

[athousandcurses]

We will have to do our best to make sure we find them then.

[She smiles gently.]

Thank you.

[demonstrations]

I didn't do anything except give a reminder when it was needed.