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A Room At The Beach
The Sylvia Beach is a Hotel for Book Lovers
by Jerome Richard
Named in honor of the
proprietor of Shakespeare and Company, a famous Paris
bookstore in the 1920s, the Sylvia Beach is a 4-story,
somewhat ramshackle structure built in 1910 as the New Cliff
House. Most of the rooms have an ocean view. The
building was bought by two avid readers from Portland who
renamed and refurbished it in 1987. They wanted a place that
would encourage reading and conversation. Walking
along the beach, driving the The Sylvia Beach Hotel spectacular Oregon coast,
visiting the lighthouse and interpretive center at one end
of town and the first-rate aquarium at the other end are
additional activities. There is also a classy bunch of factory
outlet stores up the road in Lincoln City. Sally, like many
of the guests, was a frequent visitor. She started reading
Willa Cather as soon as she made her reservation. None of the rooms have numbers
and in some cases, you have to know something about the author. I knew the door
that said "Stell-a" must be the Tennessee Williams room, but it took
me a second to figure out that the three roses meant Gertrude Stein. The guests
who were staying in the Poe room told me they found the pendulum over the bed
unnerving. In my tour of the unoccupied rooms I was most delighted with the Cat
in the Hat mural in the Dr. Seuss room. Obviously, the last people who stayed
there were equally tickled. In the room's journal they wrote:
I tried on some of the
fanciful hats scattered about the room and wished for a moment that someone
would come in and read to me.
Agatha
Christie room
Colette room At the family-style dinner in
the restaurant called Tables of Content, the waitress urged us to play the
Sylvia Beach game. Each person is supposed to says two true and one false thing
about themselves; others have to guess which is the false statement. As a
conversation starter it seemed superfluous and we just went on talking,
especially as a man from Louisiana was trying to convince the rest of the table
that what he called "The
Confederate War" had
ended in a draw. The telltale heart of the Sylvia Beach is the third-floor library
with its assortment of upholstered chairs and couches. Here I felt like a guest
in someone's
slightly run-down mansion, as if I had come in response to a mysterious
invitation. People read or gazed out the windows at the ocean. Whispered
conversation occurred only when the mulled wine was served at 10 p.m. The hotel
cat honored me by choosing my lap to sleep on and I read until it was time to
rejoin Hemingway. None of the rooms have
televisions or telephones, and none of the guests seem to miss them. Each room
has a private bathroom with bath and shower, but no shampoo. Summer is the high
season, but some people prefer winter when storms make the ocean put on a show.
The Sylvia Beach is on the National Register of Historic Landmarks. B&B
here stands not only for Bed and Breakfast, but for Books and Beach. Some
rooms are wheelchair accessible, but the library is not. Wheelchair users must
enter the dining room from outside the hotel. Small children are discouraged
and pets are not allowed. The entire hotel is non-smoking. The
hotel is located several blocks off Highway 101, the scenic route along the
Oregon coast. The Sylvia Beach Hotel is at 267 N.W. Cliff St., Newport, OR, 97365.
Phone: (541) 265-5428. No e-mail, but there
is a website at www.sylviabeachhotel.com
with current rates. photos
courtesy The Sylvia Beach Hotel. |
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Willa Cather asked me how I
like Hemingway. She meant the room, not the author. I said I was intrigued by
the copy of his letter to a young boy, the antelope head on the wall, and the
pictures and books by or about him, some of which I had not seen before. The
bed framed in rustic cane also seemed appropriate. The attractive young woman
staying in the Willa Cather room introduced herself as Sally from Chicago. This
could only be the Sylvia Beach Hotel in Newport, Oregon.
