Carla Presents Margaret Wise Brown

 Jacquie's Email

Hello Literary Ladies! Could it be possible that fortune is smiling down on us and the forecast is looking splendid for our in-person meeting this Wednesday???!!!

For fear of tempting the weather gods, I will not make too big a deal of this and merely say that we will be meeting this Wednesday, May 18th in Joanna's verdant garden for a brown bag get-together to celebrate our final meeting of this 2021-2022 season of the Literature Club of Hastings-on-Hudson, and to hear Carla's presentation on Margaret Wise Brown. To take advantage of the setting, the weather, and the fact that we will be together IN-PERSON, we will be meeting at NOON.

With that, I wish you all a lovely few days before our meeting. I will not bother you all with the tale that has plagued me lo these past 22 years of my mysteriously disappearing copy of Goodnight Moon...

Until Wednesday, Jacquie

Christine's Minutes

At last. Was the sigh of blessed relief audible across the border in Dobbs? It may well have been, as, thanks to some convergence of the planets, there no leaf blowers, no lawn mowers and no earth movers to be heard as fourteen members of the Literature Club gathered in Joanna’s lovely back yard for an in-person meeting. Additionally, a delicious luncheon was served to surprise our outgoing President, Fran Greenberg, along with our newest and very intrepid member, Sharon DeLevie.

President Connie Stewart thanked Joanna for her lovely venue, and thanked Fran for her exceptional leadership during the past two years of COVID 19, Zoom, and all the attendant uncertainties.

The minutes were read and accepted. The treasury is currently flush with $520.11.

For our final program of the year, what could be better than Carla’s presentation of the biography of Margaret Wise Brown, of whom it could safely be said that while we all know her famous Goodnight Moon, we knew nothing at all of her life and who she was. She proved to be a fascinating character.

Carla, in the persona of the “little old lady whispering hush,” wore an apron, a necklace full of vegetables, and rabbit ears.

The two biographies used in the presentation – in elegant juxtaposition – were Margaret Wise Brown, Awakened by the Moon, published in 1992, by Leonard Marcus, a prominent reviewer of children’s books, and In the Great Green Room, 2016, by Amy Gary, a former Director of Publishing at Lucas Films. Carla described the latter’s approach as being novelistic; additionally, it has a foreword written by James Stillman Rockefeller, Jr, MWB’s fiancé at the time of her sudden death.

Margaret Wise Brown was born in 1910 in then-fashionable Greenpoint, Brooklyn, the middle child of well-off parents, both with illustrious ancestors. Later, the family moved to Beechhurst, and then to Great Neck. Margaret attended both public and private schools, and later a Swiss boarding school. She went to Hollins College, her mother’s alma mater, and encountered her early mentor, Marguerite Hearsy, who encouraged her writing for many years. After college, Margaret moved to Greenwich Village, famously filled with writers and artists. She held various jobs and was also subsidized by her father. But then, hearing good things about Bank Street’s education program, she applied and was accepted as a student teacher. While there, she met William Scott, a publisher she would later work for. Margaret joined the Bank Street Writers Laboratory, a group of writers for children who met, read, and critiqued each other’s work. Had our own Carla only been twenty years older, she would have met Margaret, as Carla was in the writers’ lab in the sixties.

While on a ski trip with friends, Margaret grew tired of hiking up the hills (in those halcyon pre-ski-lift days) and returned to the lodge and wrote The Runaway Bunny. The motif and rhythms are based on a French Provençal ballad, of a woman threatening to leave her lover: a love story, recast as a hunt or quest, involving transformations (perhaps with some credit to Ovid?)

Around that time, Margaret met Michael Strange, the pen name of Blanche Oelrichs, a thrice-married older woman and intellectual. For the next ten years, they would maintain a somewhat tortured relationship.

Having been introduced to Vinalhaven by a friend, in 1942 Margaret bought a Wharf Quarry manager’s house, for the princely sum of $1600, the back taxes owed. There was no electricity and no indoor plumbing. She called it “The Only House.”

Margaret also formed a strong friendship with Ursula Nordstrom, the legendary editor at Harper, publisher of The Runaway Bunny and Goodnight Moon. She continued writing – in her short lifetime she wrote over 100 books. Soon many were published by the new imprint called Golden Books. Life magazine printed a profile of Margaret, along with photos. Have I mentioned that she was quite beautiful? She was also commissioned to write about children’s literature for the Book of Knowledge.

In 1952, while on vacation on Cumberland Island, she met the much younger James Stillman Rockefeller, Jr, nicknamed “Pebble”. They fell madly in love and were soon engaged. But then on a book tour in Nice, France, she went into the hospital after experiencing acute pain, and was operated on for an ovarian cyst and appendicitis. As she was recovering, she kicked up her leg to demonstrate her good health, dislodged a blood clot that quickly traveled to her heart and killed her. She was 42 years old. Dozens of her books are still in print and are translated into many languages.

To end this delightful presentation, members read aloud The Runaway Bunny and Goodnight Moon, sharing the illustrations with all, à la library reading time. I think we were all misty-eyed when the readings came to an end.

Respectfully submitted,
Christine Lehner, Recording Secretary

Carla's presentation in Joanna's garden

Barbara Presents Boswell & Johnson

Jacquie's Email

sigh!

Dear Literary Ladies: Well, if the pandemic has taught members of this club anything, it is flexibility, and I think we've all been successfully doing backflips and somersaults like it's nobody's business! And this week is no exception.

    First, we had plans (hopes?) to meet in Joanna's lovely garden to brown bag it in person. Alas, the forecast was not working in our favor, and our limber president made the difficult call of putting off our outdoor get-together for our final meeting on the 16th. We will be meeting this Wednesday on Zoom.

    Second – though this really only applied to me – I read in our booklet that Barbara was going to be presenting on Evelyn Waugh, which immediately got me excited because I was going to be able to share one of my favorite TV series photos of all time for all to gaze and sigh over

... only to then have the niggling memory that Barbara was not in fact doing Evelyn Waugh. In a confirmation email, she assured me she would be presenting on Boswell's Life of Johnson. This did not immediately bring up a humorous thought or any sigh-worthy images ... until the very writing of this sentence made me think of my favorite Johnson quote: “... when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life...” 

    And remembering that quote made me think of the black and white poster with this quote on it that I had bought at the Museum of London during my junior year abroad in 1985, which I proceeded to collage within an inch of its life with clippings from all of the magazines and brochures I was collecting. And remembering said poster was in the furnace room of my childhood home in Poughkeepsie, I then asked my 91-year-old father to schlepp down into the furnace room and take a photo of it for me to use in this email. 

    Patting myself on the back for this little bit of brilliance, I opened the photo he sent me ... only to realize that I misremembered the quote. This one is by some guy named William Dunbar. Nice, but he's no Johnson.

    Basically, I got nothin’

    Another moment to practice flexibility ...

    Luckily, despite all my nonsense, we will be meeting this Wednesday on Zoom at 12:45 pm when Barbara will be presenting on Boswell's Life of Johnson, which should prove to be a wonderful addition to our exploration of Biography as our year with this topic (and hopefully our need for flexibility!!???) winds down. 

    If you have even made it this far in my email, I apologize for this ramble. Until Wednesday, x Jacquie

Christine's Minutes

On account of your recording secretary’s befuddled state, following knee surgery on her third knee (editor's note: befuddled, yes, she means third knee surgery, not that she has three knees), President Connie Stewart made the following notes.

    Literature Club members attended a Zoom meeting on May 4, 2022. We were joined by Associate Member Jenny Goodrich, but missing Diana Jaeger and Lori Walsh. Recording Secretary Christine Lehner joined us briefly in person, impressive since she was only a few days out of major surgery, and for the most part she was a silent but reassuring presence during our proceedings.

    We have $460.11 in our account. Member Sharon DeLevie spoke to Debbie Quinn at the library about what books they may like us to donate this year. Debbie is going to discuss this with the library staff and get back to us.

    The members did our go round of catch-up chats, and despite the intimidating amount of COVID cases we are all hearing about now, many more of us are venturing out: members described attending the Holbein show at the Morgan Library, and Winslow Homer at the Met, going to the ballet, plans for a lovely green Mother’s Day celebration, and ventures to the theater. Some are traveling: Carol is packing for a trip to France earned many times over, and Joanna told of her plans to go to her high school reunion in Montreal--she attended the unbelievably named Miss Edgar’s and Miss Cramp’s School and filled us in about her days as a prefect handing out demerits for uniform infractions. I am very glad to know Joanna now, because we may not have gotten along in high school. Joanna also described her and Diana's big bike trip in Louisiana, and there may be a lesson learned in their conviction afterwards that they would rather bike a linear course with a clear destination in New York, than a circular route in Louisiana, despite the good music and food.

    Perhaps that echoes back to our discussion of this week’s leak of the Supreme Court draft of an opinion in which the conservative majority is now positioned for the first time in history to end a constitutional right: women's right to an abortion.

    Barbara Morrow began her presentation on Boswell’s Life of Samuel Johnson, by painting for us an image of the two men: the tall, powerfully built Johnson, indifferent to fashion, next to the short, plump Boswell, a dapper dresser. The two were a gift to caricaturists such as Max Beerbohm, who took full advantage of their odd pairing.

    Johnson, the son of a bookseller, was proud of being self-made, while Boswell relished his descent from the Norman conquerors. Johnson was already in his fifties when he met the twenty-something Boswell in 1763. Though initially put off by Boswell’s pushiness, Johnson soon came to enjoy his energy and optimism, and was pleased that Boswell was assiduously collecting material for the great biography that would emerge. As Shaw pointed out, Boswell was “the dramatist who invented Dr. Johnson.”

    The two men also shared a dread of looming mental illness. Johnson suffered from bouts of depression since his youth and would probably now be diagnosed as OCD. Boswell had radical mood swings that most likely were bipolar disorder.

    Like his famous subject, Boswell kept a diary which he wrote in a “lively, conversational style.” These volumes are now safely stored at the Yale Rare Books Library.

    Johnson was first known as the writer of essays on a wide variety of subjects, from debtors’ prison to first-person accounts of the female experience. Then, in 1746, a group of publishers commissioned him to produce a dictionary. When it came out in 1755, it was immediately recognized as a monument to, and within, the English language. For the first time, the more or less 40,000 words of English were defined and not merely listed.

    Early on in his labors on the dictionary, Johnson realized that his stipend from the publishers would not be sufficient to support him. He then appealed to Philip Dormer Stanhope, fourth Earl of Chesterfield, to be his patron. Chesterfield did not respond to the appeal; though eight years later he was pleased to imply he had supported the great endeavor. Johnson was withering in his famous letter to Chesterfield, regarding his misleading statements.

    Thankfully, in 1762 King George III, a voracious reader and admirer of Johnson’s work, awarded him a royal pension of £300 per year, a very comfortable amount.

    Samuel Johnson died in 1784 at the age of seventy-five, and Boswell immediately set to work on the biography. The first edition came out in 1791 and was a huge success. As with so many occurrences in life and literature this year, Boswell’s Life was a first. Never before had a biographer included in his work his subject’s actual conversation. Never before had a biographer been so uniquely situated to do so. Members read selections chosen from the vast and lengthy biography.

Respectfully Submitted,
Christine Lehner, Recording Secretary

Jacquie and Gertrude and Alice and Pablo and George

Jacquie's Email

“Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose” ‒ Gertrude Stein

“ ‒ neither vegetable nor fruit juice, please ‒ but raw baby artichokes, endives washed and cut in half, radishes and asparagus tips for example; with coffee to end a perfect lunch.” ‒ Alice B. Toklas

Dear Literary Ladies,

I really had the very best of intentions to present to you what I've learned about Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas, arguing that one can compare the art created by each ‒ Gertrude her writing and poetry, and Alice, her art in the form of caring for Gertrude Stein herself, as well as her own writing in The
Alice B. Toklas Cook Book ‒ where I found Alice's old fashioned way of writing out recipes and stream of consciousness musing on their lives together reminiscent of her life partner's literary style. Their lives were so expansive, as both witnesses and role players in the many extraordinary events of the first half of the 20th century in both America and France, where they knew everyone there was to know and played an important role in influencing the art and literature of their time, that I found I had bitten off way more than I could chew. I had hoped this single source of exploration would have made it possible for me to meet my deadline for tomorrow, but alas, olʼ Gertrude and Alice will have to be put off for another day. For that, I am truly sorry.
    We will still be meeting tomorrow at 12:45 pm on Zoom, at which time Joanna will unveil next year's theme (!) from NOLA, and we will read together a wonderful short story I'm excited to share with you.
  

 I leave you with one final image of two 18th-century children's armchairs upholstered with petit point sewn by Alice B. Toklas over designs by Pablo Picasso which are in the collection of the Yale University Library.
    I hope you all had a lovely weekend, and I look forward to seeing you all at what I hope will be our final Zoom-only meeting.
    Until then, until then, until then, until then ‒ Jacquie 

Christine's Minutes

In another historic first, in this year of historic firsts, our new Vice President, Joanna Reisman, joined the Zoom meeting from the inside of a car in a casino parking lot, in Houma, Louisiana. Joanna and another Literature Club member, Diana Jaeger, are traveling to Lafayette, where the intrepid travelers will start their four-day bicycle trip.  From such a distinguished location, Joanna dramatically announced that our theme for next year will be…. Drama.

Connie rang the bell at 1:10 pm. The minutes were read and accepted, with one correction. Lori sent in our treasury numbers which remain at $430.11. Sharon will speak to Debbie Quinn and get suggestions as to what books are wanted by the librarians. We will keep $200 in our coffers to pay for the booklet and any incidentals; the rest will be given to the Hastings on Hudson Public Library.

We next discussed the burning issue of the day – and not only for the Literature Club: When can we extricate ourselves from the getting-too-comfortable Skinnerian box of Zoom? The current plan is now that we will meet in person at Joanna’s on May 4th, while still zooming in for anyone who would prefer it.

Then in the course of apologizing that a family situation had prevented her from presenting her topic, “The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas,” Jacquie managed to entertain us with more than a soupçon of her presentation. For instance, the very fact that Gertrude and Alice knew everyone – and Jacquie too will come to know, such characters as Picasso, Hemingway, Matisse, Wilder and Paul Bowles, made it difficult to narrow down the focus. We learned that Alice B’s hash brownies are not actually brownies. They are more like fruit cake.  Though how Jacquie knows this is a mystery: the brownie recipe was not even printed in the American edition of the Toklas cookbook. But that is the kind of research and preparation Jacquie has not been doing while she was not preparing for her program. 

After the too-brief non-presentation by Jacquie, members read “The Falls” by George Saunders. The story was much enjoyed, and we learned about Saunders’ Story Club, which is available, online, to anyone who in interested.

Respectfully submitted,
Christine Lehner, Recording Secretary 

Linda Presents NiKolai Gogol

Jacquie's Email

Hello Literary Ladies!
Of course, Nikolai Gogol is much more than his “Nose”, as Linda will tell us all when we meet for her presentation on Zoom but having read his astonishing short story recently in George Saunders' A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, I thought it would be fun to look at a few artists' interpretation of one of Gogol's most famous creations -- and they certainly did not disappoint.
Until then, keep your noses clean! x Jacquie

Christine's Minutes

On March 30, 2022, fourteen members and one associate member of the Literature Club gathered, yes, once again on little screens brought to us courtesy of Zoom*. And since we have become so intimate – adept – with zoom, I thought I would share a few facts about this phenomenon.

*ZOOM was founded in 2011 by Eric Yuan and some other engineers. In 2013 they launched their software. In 2017 ZOOM’s valuation made it a unicorn. The company turned its first profit in 2019. On March 11, 2020, WHO declared that the spread of this new respiratory disease, the novel coronavirus, was now a pandemic. Millions of people started to work remotely, children had to go to school remotely, and even some Literature Clubs have had to eschew their lunches and – meet remotely.

President Connie Stewart rang the bell at 1:11p.m. She indicated that “where is spring?” should go on record as her first question of the meeting.

The minutes of the previous meeting were read and accepted. Our treasurer reported that, with a recent infusion of our annual dues, our treasury has swollen to a respectable $430.11.

As for our business: Joanna Reisman shared her screen to show us the ballot for next year. After winnowing from the cumbersome original list, we now have six choices for next year’ program: Nineteenth-century American and British Novels; Banned Books; Behind the Iron Curtain; Drama; The Harlem Renaissance; Literature from Canada. It does not bear mentioning that the last choice is new this year, and our program chair is by birth a Canadian.

Connie thanked Jacquie for compiling such a lovely collection of ‘noses’ to illustrate her email.

Today, Linda Tucker presented Vladimir Nabokov’s biography of Nikolai Gogol, originally published by New Directions in 1961. Linda suggested that as the book starts with Gogol’s death and that the word nose appears no less than thirteen times in the first three pages, we should assume that this will be no ordinary biography merely relating a life story. Nevertheless, our presenter did tell us something of Gogol’s short life.

Nicolai Gogol was born in 1809, in Sorochintsky, Ukraine. His father died when he was a teenager. After high school, Gogol left home to seek a civil service job in St Petersburg. Without connections, that turned out to be difficult. He had equally little success as an actor or a poet. He took money his mother had entrusted to him and traveled to Germany. Only when the money ran out did he return to St Petersburg and take a shabby civil servant job.

By 1830 his short stories about Ukrainian life were coming out in literary reviews. According to Nabokov, Gogol’s students at a girls’ boarding school thought he was very dull.

Meeting the revered Pushkin in 1831 meant a great deal to Gogol. By then Gogol was publishing his short stories, about “ghosts and Ukrainians”, according to Nabokov. The stories were quite popular, “The Nose” among them. When his play, The Government Inspector was produced in 1836, Gogol felt that it was misunderstood by the critics, and left the country to lick his wounds in Rome, for twelve years. There he started writing Dead Souls. In 1839 he made a quick trip back to Russia and read Dead Souls to his friends. Then, back in Italy he wrote “The Overcoat,” and kept working at Dead Souls. The first part of Dead Souls was published in 1841, with the name changed to the uninspired The Adventures of Chichikov, as Dead Souls was considered blasphemous. For the next six years Gogol traveled, looking for health and inspiration, but none. He was unable to finish Dead Souls, and actually burned all he had written of the second part. Gogol returned to Russia in 1848, and died in 1851, at the age of 42.

Following our immersion in Nabokov’s biography, members read passages from Dead Souls, “The Overcoat,” and finally, “The Nose”, a story initially rejected by the Moscow Observer as “dirty and trivial”. We also heard from George Saunders who, in his A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, explains the key scene in “The Nose” in this way: “The world is full of outrageous nonsense”.  Additionally, members learned some important vocabulary specific to Russian literature. Nabokov explained “poshlust”, and per Saunders, we discovered “a particular Russian form of unreliable narration called skaz”.

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that after spending quality time with Gogol, the world can never look quite the same again.

Respectfully submitted,

Christine Lehner, Recording secretary

Sharon Presents Zora Thurston Neale

 Jacquie's Email

Zora Neale Hurston

There are years that ask questions and years that answer.

Dear Literary Ladies,
    As this year continues to raise so many questions, we are so fortunate to be able to come together again this Wednesday, May 16th at 12:45 pm on Zoom to hear Sharon's inaugural presentation on Zora Neale Hurston.
    In addition, attached please find a draft of Joanna's inaugural topics ballot for your review. We ask that you come with any suggestions or changes you might wish to see before Joanna sends it out for an official first round of voting.

    Until then! Jacquie

Christine's Minutes

On March 16, 2022 sixteen members of the Literature Club gathered, yes, once again, on Zoom. From a quick check-in on the state of our membership, per our Zoom tradition, we learned that the woodcocks are emerging, that cappuccino is to be had in Williamstown, that some people are actually back to working IRL and wearing heels, that Carla has changed her topic to Margaret Wise Brown, and that we are all very concerned about Ukraine.

At 1:07 President Connie Stewart expertly rang the bell for her inaugural meeting.

The minutes for the last meeting were read, and accepted.

The treasury is still at $265.11, but there are hopes for huge gains in the coming weeks, as our dues are collected. Your $15 may be sent via check, Venmo, or Zelle to Lori, our treasurer.

There was a brief discussion of the list of possible topics, as circulated by Joanna. Literature of Adolescence was deleted, and Literature of Canada was added.

    Then, onward to our armchair travels to Florida, to Harlem, to Haiti, and back to Florida, all in an afternoon. Sharon, in her inaugural presentation for Literature Club, knocked it out of the park. Her subject, Zora Neale Hurston, was a novelist, playwright, anthropologist, folklorist, and a leader in the Harlem Renaissance.

    She was born in 1891, in Notasulga, Alabama, during hog-killing season. She was fifth of the eight children of John and Lucy Hurston. Zora, however, was not pleased with that birth year, and subtracted from it so many times that she ended up being born in 1901.

    When she was three, the family moved to Eatonville, Florida. Eatonville was one of the few all-Black incorporated towns in the country. Valerie Boyd, her biographer, wrote that her confidence derived from growing up in Eatonville, where she learned to experience “racial health”. Growing up without the “white gaze” she did not know she was ‘colored’ until she went away to school.

    When Zora was 13, her mother died, and many things in her life were altered for the worse. She was sent off to boarding school where she did not fit in. When she returned home, she discovered that her father had remarried, to the archetypal evil step-mother. The father, John Hurston, was a complicated man. He was a pastor of the Macedonian Missionary Baptist Church; he was also a philanderer, and sometimes violent. Several of Hurston’s protagonists are based on her father, including the pastor in Jonah’s Gourd Vine. After returning from boarding school, Hurston worked at many jobs, from a ladies’ maid in a theatre troupe to a waitress, ending up in Maryland.

    But all she cared about was getting her high school degree, and to that end, she shaved more years off her age in order qualify for free schooling in Baltimore. She excelled in high school and was admitted to Howard University. Her writing began to get serious attention. In 1924, her short story, “Drenched in Light,” was accepted for publication, and the next year she moved north to Harlem. Like Eatonville, Harlem was all black, and she became part of the Harlem Renaissance. At a 1925 Awards Dinner for winners of the Opportunity Literary Contest, Hurston won several prizes, for two short stories and for a play called Spears. Langston Hugues was there, and decided he wanted to know her – they soon became close friends.

    With her prize money, Hurston enrolled at Barnard. Thus began her lifelong need to accept financial aid from white people. This aid allowed her to continue with her writing, but it also led to complicated and uncomfortable situations. At Columbia, Hurston met Franz Boas, the renowned anthropologist. Anthropology was a perfect fit for Hurston, who never stopped loving and retelling the stories heard on her porch in Eatonville. In 1927 she received a fellowship to collect “Negro folklore” in the South, and collect she did, from Florida to Haiti and New Orleans. She discovered the use of ‘double words’ in Negro vernacular, and became a pre-eminent scholar of Hoodoo.

    Hurston’s anthropological work found its way into her novels, as did the language of her characters. Her use of this vernacular was often criticized, as it made Blacks appear uneducated. She was also criticized for not focusing on the plight of Blacks. But she was also defended by certain Black critics.

    Meanwhile, money was needed to live. Charlotte van der veer Quick Mason supported many Black artists in addition to Hurston. She only asked that she be called “Godmother” and that her identity be kept secret.

    Hurston’s 1928 essay, ‟How it Feels to be Colored Me,” published in a white journal, set out her views on race. In 1930 she began working on a play, Mule Bone, with Langston Hugues, based on a short story of Hurston’s. But things between the two grew complicated, and in the end, the process destroyed their friendship.

    Hurston’s three marriages were all brief. Her longest relationship was with Percy Punter, a graduate student at Columbia, who later became the inspiration for Teacake in Their Eyes Were Watching God.

Hurston’s best-known work, Their Eyes Were Watching God, was written over seven weeks in Haiti, and was published in 1937 to very little notice. Even though it contains a rare incidence of what is known to beekeepers as “Apian-porn.” Then in 1973, Alice Walker ‘discovered’ Hurston and her work. Since then, millions of copies have been sold all over the world, it is taught in schools everywhere, and even a Halle Berry movie has been made.

    The writer’s life did not end well. She struggled financially, had serious health issues, and died in a welfare home in St Lucie, Florida in 1960.

    But Walker’s discovery and resuscitation has wrought great changes. Eatonville now hosts a Hurston Festival every year, and there is a Zora Neal Hurston National Museum of Fine Arts.

Sharon shared with us her experience of hearing the latest biographer, Valerie Boyd, speak, on January 7, which is Hurston’s birthday. She then emailed with the writer, until her untimely death at 58.

    Zora Neal Hurston remains with us. Her play written with Langston Hugues, Mule Bone, was finally produced on Broadway in 1991. Her words keep resonating, as her quote: “There are years that ask questions and years that answer.”

    Members read from Hurston’s autobiography, Dust Tracks, from Jonah’s Gourd Vine, from Their Eyes Were Watching God, and from Valerie Boyd’s Wrapped in Rainbows.

Respectfully submitted,
Christine Lehner, Recording Secretary

Annual Meeting 2022

Jacquie's Email

Hello Literary Ladies!!! It's somehow that time of year again - March!!! Along with hopes for warmer weather, crocuses, and peace in Europe, it's time for our Annual Meeting.
    Our agenda includes:

• The nominating committee will announce our fearless leaders for 2022-24 - president and vice president. (This is not an election year for other officers.)
• A discussion on whether to continue on Zoom? In-person masked? Lunch? (As Fran pointed out, we owe Sharon many!)
• Begin a discussion of topics for next year. Attached please find a list of topics since the inception of the club to facilitate brainstorming. (We've done biography twice before, and in 1912-1913, German literature was the topic. Hmmm.)

I look forward to seeing you all on Wednesday in your neat little rectangles on my computer screen. Until then! Jacquie

Christine's Minutes

On March 2, 2022, fourteen members of the Literature Club met, again, on Zoom, this time for the time-honored ritual of our Annual Meeting. Our pre-meeting chat ranged from books to new kitchens to blizzards in Montreal to the last great Auk.
    President Fran Greenberg rang the bell for the last time as our president. The minutes were read and accepted. The treasury remains at $ 265.11
    The nominating committee presented their slate for a new president and vice president. Their two-year term will begin next meeting. Because of COVID constraints, we were unable to have our usual ceremony for the "Passing of the Bell", with fifers, drummers, baton-twirlers, and book jugglers.
    The committee nominated for our next president, Connie Stewart, and for vice opresident, Joanna Reisman. Both were unanimously acclaimed. All members applauded Fran for her excellent presidential term, especially in what have been exceptionally trying times. She has been a reassuringly competent presence at her computer guiding us through the shoals of Zoom. In her farewell speech, Fran generously declared that the Literature Club is “a superb organization to be president of".
    Our first topic of the meeting: to Zoom or not to Zoom, that is the question.

Whether ‘tis nobler to stay in our screens
And miss the pleasures of Another’s
Living room, and A Literary Lunch
Or to take arms against a mess of mandates
And by opposing them, to risk the wrath
Of Omicron. To Zoom, a known Path.
Or not to Zoom, tis a consummation
Devoutly to be Wished for.

If not absolute consensus, then there certainly was agreement and a willingness on the part of every member to be considerate to all other members. We agreed that each of us should feel safe. The decision, such as it was: we will continue with Zoom through our April 20th meeting, when Jacquie will present The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas.* After that we hope to be able to meet outside and unmasked. One important sidebar: for many presenters it would be very helpful to know ahead of time whether or not we will Zoom, as that can affect their preparation.
    Our second topic was to discuss suggest possible topics for next year. Joanna helpfully provided the list of the suggested topics from last year, containing lots of the old chestnuts. New suggestions included:

• Crime and criminals
• Literature from Countries threatened by Russian land-grabbing and Putin’s madness? Or more succinctly, Writing from Behind what Used to Be called the Iron Curtain, or even, Reclosing the Iron Curtain.
• A book or an author that changed my life
• Banned Books – not band books as this secretary originally understood and then wracked her brain searching for rock’n’roll books.
• Books from a single specific year

OR, we could revisit The New York Times’ list of Comforting Reads.

Meeting adjourned at 2:40 pm
Respectfully submitted,
Christine Lehner, Recording Secretary

*That program has been re-scheduled for the end of the season.

Connie Presents Joe Orton

Jacquie's Email

Dear Literary Ladies: I fall back on this quote by the Portuguese poet Fernando Passeo whenever I need to, say, rationalize the fact that I read 72 books last year but my basement is still a mess. (Somehow, I am able to ignore the fact that I have many friends better read than I who have very well-organized basements AND attics... and have also knit a few sweaters in that time...) Yet what we all know is that if anything, literature helps us understand life - meet it head on with greater empathy and understanding of other people. We are not ignoring life in literature; we are maybe just finding ourselves in more satisfying locales and with more interesting characters experiencing more agreeable situations than we might currently be enjoying. And examining literature through the biography of the authors has also inspired, taking us from the (extra)ordinary to the sublime! And now we have Connie's presentation on the playwright Joe Orton to look forward to. Please be on the lookout for the Zoom link from Sharon. Until then, Jacquie

Christine's Minutes
It was frigid outside, but thirteen members and one associate of the Literature Club were warm, inside our rectangles of pixels, and warmly entertained, on February 16, 2022. During our pre-meeting time to catch up, we discussed books, the delights of emerging from COVID, and the wonderful news that Diana has one liberal relative in Mississippi.

President Fran Greenberg rang the bell at 1:06, and announced that we will again be recording the program. Christine read the minutes, and they were accepted. Lori reported that our treasury remains unchanged. As for new business, Fran suggested that we discuss when, and how we will go off Zoom and resume meeting in person. Our next meeting, being our annual meeting, will be a good time for this discussion.

Then, without further ado, it was time to settle down for some serious entertainment and Connie’s program about the English writer, Joe Orton. With her usual aplomb, Connie dressed for the part with a faux leather jacket and scarf.

Connie began her program with the biographer, not the subject: and we learned that John Lahr could himself warrant a biography, so interesting is his life. The son of Bert Lahr, the Cowardly Lion portrayer so well-known to crossword puzzlers, John Lahr was for many years the drama critic for The New Yorker. He also wrote novels, and biographies of several actors and playwrights, including his father, Dame Edna, Frank Sinatra, Noel Coward, and Tennessee Williams. His writing has won many awards and he is considered one of the greatest living literary biographers. Lahr is now eighty years old, and lives in London with his wife, Connie Booth, better known to some of us as Polly in Fawlty Towers.

Joe Orton died in 1967 at the age of 34.

Lahr’s biography, Prick Up Your Ears, came out in 1978. Additionally, he has edited Orton’s complete plays, and his very compelling diaries. Arguably, Lahr has played a key role in assuring Orton’s importance as a playwright.

Orton was born, John Kingsley Orton, on January 1, 1933, in the Saffron Lane Estates, part of council housing in Leicester. He was the first child of Elsie and William Orton. William was gardener, and quite aloof from his family. Elsie worked as a machinist, stitching underwear from 8 am to 6 pm. Yet she always ran home at her lunch break to cook lunch for her 4 children. She was strong, vivacious, and surprisingly prudish. She was often cruel to her children, yet she recognized Joe as a gifted child, and sent him to a private school, where his teachers found him to be semi-literate. All he cared about was the theatre, and at 16 he left school to pursue that ambition.

In 1949 he joined the Leicester Theatre and decided to apply to RADA. He took dance lessons and sought advice from everyone and anyone. He studied elocution with Mme. Rothery, whose lessons and coaching would make a real difference for Orton. With another of her students he performed a scene from Midsummer Night’s Dream, and won 3rd place. Then, with an uncharacteristically generous contribution from the Leicester Educational Committee, Orton applied to RADA. On his 18th birthday he took the train to London. He auditioned for RADA and got in.

He moved in with a fellow actor, Kenneth Halliwell. Kenneth was older than Joe, better educated, and withdrawn. His mother died as a result of a wasp sting, when Kenneth was 11; he was in his early 20s when his father committed suicide. (This kind of background that should set off alarm bell.) Halliwell and Orton continued to live together after RADA, and in 1959 Halliwell bought a 10 x 17 bedsit. In that small space, they read, wrote, and lived frugally. All their books came from the public library, and they began to subtly change or make collages of book covers. Their collages are now regarded as works of art, but in 1962 the response was less enthusiastic. Halliwell and Orton were caught in a police sting, and they were sentenced to six months in prison, in separate prisons. As with so many things, they reacted differently. Orton found the experience of prison oddly liberating.

In 1963, the BBC accepted his play, The Ruffian on the Stair. His next play Entertaining Mr. Sloan was a huge success. The American premier was directed by Alan Schneider, who – I feel compelled to point out – also directed the American premiere of Waiting for Godot and lived in Hastings on Hudson.

Orton’s next play, The Good and Faithful Servant, was poignant and angry; it was followed by the “boulevard farce” Loot. Loot was originally panned, but after several rewrites, it re-opened in 1966 and was a triumph. All along, as his career was ascending, Orton continued living with Kenneth in the bedsit. They often traveled to Morocco together and reveled in the sexual freedom they found there. But Kenneth’s career was going nowhere, while Orton’s was soaring. He was approached by Brian Epstein to rewrite a Beatles’ script. It was never produced, but by then he was writing What the Butler Saw.

Meanwhile, in December 1966 Orton began to keep a journal, and kept it almost daily until his death. In it he detailed his many sketchy sexual encounters, as well as arguments with Halliwell. Then, on a hot day in August 1967, Halliwell bludgeoned the sleeping Orton to his death. He then took an overdose and killed himself. His suicide note directed the reader to Orton’s diaries, “especially the latter part.” Alas, the previous nine days’ worth of diaries have been removed, by person or persons unknown. After this, Orton was more famous for being murdered by his lover, than for his plays. But that would change. His last play, What the Butler Saw, brought farce to high art.

Club members read several selections from John Lahr’s Prick Up Your Ears, from Orton’s own diaries, and saw several photographs of the plays. We had another Literature Club first – pictures of male nudity. Then we were treated to a snippet of the brilliant What the Butler Saw, on YouTube.

As Connie pointed out, there is no butler in the play.

Respectfully submitted,
Christine Lehner, Recording Secretary