Walter Bieri /Epa

The architect Daniel Libeskind didn’t complete his first building until 1998 when he was 52. Since then he’s finished about 30 projects, including the Jewish Museum in Berlin, the Denver Art Museum extension, the Military History Museum in Dresden, Germany, and the master plan for Ground Zero in New York City. The architect was in town this past week to speak at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston.

Books:What are you reading?

Libeskind:I read a lot of books simultaneously. Here are just some of the books on my nightstand. I have one from the multi-volume collection of works by and on Edgar Allen Poe. Then I have “Spiritual Body and Celestial Earth” by Henry Corbin, which is an incredible analysis of Shiite religion and mythology. I have Jorge Luis Borges’s collected stories and Herman Melville’s journals. I have “The Shadow of Ideas” by the 16th-century friar and philosopher Giordano Bruno and W.G. Sebald’s “On the Natural History of Destruction.” I also have the second volume of Marco Polo’s travels, a Lydia Davis short-story collection, and Walter Benjamin’s “Moscow Diary.” Those are just for the week. I have another series of books for the weekend.

Books:When you are working on building projects do you turn to reading for inspiration?

Libeskind:Not really but I’ve memorized a lot of poetry, particularly poetry by Emily Dickinson, and when I’m working on a project a line will come up in my mind. The line might seem irrelevant, but it can lend a kind of an insight.

Books:When did you start memorizing Dickinson’s poems?

Libeskind:Maybe seven or eight years ago. Someone gave me a small book of her poems that fit easily into my pocket. I realized that while I was waiting for something I could memorize those poems instead of wasting my time.....Continue Reading

> via The Boston Globe