Christine Presents Tom Stoppard

Jacquie's Email Dearest Literary Ladies! Full confession: I have never seen nor read a Stoppard play, although I have seen eight of the 12 films he is credited with writing, including at least 138 viewings of Shakespeare in Love. I am not proud of this fact -- the not seeing or reading a single Stoppard play. I'm fine with the Shakespeare in Love viewings stat. It's a truly great film.
   Luckily for me and the rest of you who have, without a doubt, both read, viewed, and possibly even studied many of Stoppard's works, Christine will be presenting on the playwright this Wednesday at our meeting at the Hastings-on-Hudson Public Library. Doors will open at 12:30pm; performance will begin promptly at 1pm.
   Until Wednesday! Jacquie

English Playwrights above: Simon Gray, David Rudkin, Harold Pinter, Alan Ayckbourn, Trevor Griffiths, Peter Shaffer and Tom Stoppard; by Al Hirschfeld in NY Times 7/10/77

Minutes It was an uncommonly warm day, 60° F the February day we met. We gathered on the terrace outside the Hastings Library’s Orr room. We chatted, nibbled on cookies, enjoyed the view of the Hudson and the Palisades, discussed whether we could stay outside for the meeting and remain unmasked. The sun was bright, the terrace warmer than the ambient air. We reluctantly agreed, though, we’d get cold sitting still. We masked up and went inside. The door remained open.

President Constance was absent (ill with a nasty GI bug); VP Joanna rang the bell, calling 10 members to order. Recording Secretary Christine passed on reading the minutes from the last meeting; she said she’d be talking a lot about Tom Stoppard. She didn’t know what our limit might be, hearing her talk. She didn’t want to test it. Our treasurer, Lori, was absent; no treasurer’s report. We spent no money since last meeting, so whatever it was on February 1, it’s the same.

Christine’s fascination with Tom Stoppard began with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, a performance she saw in prep school, with her English teacher and several other students. Afterwards, she and her friend Becky walked Boston’s Back Bay, questioning each other like the two soldiers of Hamlet. She explained that no special effort was needed to dress like Stoppard; he was notoriously casual, and his hair has remained shaggy and hardly combed to this day (he has thinning hair but he’s not bald). Christine’s usually bound hair was let loose (but neither shaggy nor uncombed); she wore a long scarf, pants and a jacket, studiously mismatched. For biographical information, she relied on Tom Stoppard: A Life by Hermione Lee.

We entered quickly into Stoppard’s work, with an exchange between Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. A snappy reading was done by Jacquie and Joanna. An excerpt:

Ros: What’s the matter with you today?
Guil: When?
Ros: What?
Guil: Are you deaf?
Ros: Am I dead?
Guil: Yes or no?
Ros: Is there a choice?
Guil: Is there a God?

Tom Stoppard was born Thomáš Sträussler in 1937, in Zlín, Moravia, Czechoslovakia to Martha and Eugen Sträussler. His parents were assimilated Jews; Eugen, a physician, was employed by the B’ata shoe factory. The owners were socially conscious; they provided many employee benefits, including unusual, for the time, a 5-day work week. In 1939, they transferred many of their Jewish employees to branches outside of Europe when Hitler’s invasion of Czechoslovakia was imminent. The Sträusslers went to Singapore, and fled there soon after to escape the invading Japanese. Dr Sträussler enlisted as a volunteer in the British Army; he died in 1942. Mrs Sträussler, Thomáš and a younger brother, Petr, fled to India. Their mother enrolled them in an American school in Darjeeling. She married Major Kenneth Stoppard in 1945; the two sons took his family name and anglicized their given names. All moved back to England in 1946; he and his brother were enrolled in school there. Stoppard believed that his transformation into an English school boy was a life altering stroke of good fortune.

Stoppard left school at 17, began working as a journalist. He enjoyed the work, although later regretted not going to university. He did an extraordinary amount of research for his plays, perhaps as compensation. In the early 50’s, he began writing radio plays for the BBC. In 1957, he saw Waiting for Godot. His reaction: the play “kept you amused, absorbed, occasionally puzzled and seemed to do so without really having any cards to play.” In 1958, the Bristol Evening Standard offered him a position as feature writer, humor columnist and second drama critic. In 1960, he wrote his first stage play, A Walk on the Water which was successfully received, but it was the Old Vic’s 1966 staging of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead which made his reputation.

Stoppard wrote more radio plays, more stage plays, and for television. He wrote screenplays, the best known are Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and Shakespeare in Love, for which he won an Oscar. He was immensely productive, enjoyed his growing income. He entertained, he bought a large and charming old house in Dorset, the Rectory. He married three times, divorced twice, had 4 children (2 sons each with first and second wives). He was generous to friends in need. His current wife is Sabrina Guinness, once romantically linked to King Charles III and a member of the wealthy and prominent Guinness family.

Christine noted Stoppard was “a voracious reader and researcher, and the evidence is in all his plays, dealing with subjects such a mathematics (Fermat’s last Theorem), landscape design, English poetry, brain studies, the Velvet Revolution, rock’n’roll, A E Housman, 19th century Russian intellectuals and revolutionaries and more.”

The success of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern was followed by Jumpers, in 1972 (concerning moral philosophy and gymnasts). Stoppard was able to draw parallels among the least likely subjects. In 1974, Travesties was produced; although one of Christine’s favorites, time prevented her from giving us anything more than this tantalizing description: “Travesties combines Stoppard’s defense of artistic standards with a satiric dismantling of the revolutionary mindset. Two kinds of revolutionaries, the Dadaist Tristan Tzara and the even more absurd Vladimir Lenin, were in Zürich during the war. Travesties is an inquiry into the slippery nature of memory and a withering comic attack on both Tzara’s and Lenin’s value systems.”

Stoppard was politically conservative, he was a supporter of Margaret Thatcher. He was the old-fashioned kind of conservative, one with a heart and ethics. He was knighted in 1997.

In the 1980’s, Stoppard translated several Czech plays. He befriended the Czech playwright Václav Havel, who later became president of Czechoslovakia after the Velvet Revolution (1989). In 1982, Stoppard wrote The Real Thing, creating a role, Anne, for his romantic partner at the time, the actress Felicity Kendall. The male lead, Henry, a middle-aged playwright, philosophizes about writing in a way that suggests Stoppard is speaking directly through him.

In the 1990’s, Stoppard had two successes with Arcadia (1993) and The Invention of Love (1997). The early 2000s brought two more plays: The Coast of Utopia, a 9-hour play performed in 3 parts, at 3 different times – the characters were Russian intellectuals speaking endlessly. Rock ’ n’ Roll (2006) moves between Czechoslovakia, from 1968 to 1989, and Cambridge.

Stoppard confronted his family’s Jewish roots in his work late in his career. His mother had kept her Jewish identity secret; he was aware that his father’s family was Jewish. He learned that all four of his grandparents were Jewish from Czech cousins in 1993. His grandparents, as well as many of the extended family, died in concentration camps. This tragedy informs his last play, Leopoldstadt (2020). The fate of an assimilated Jewish family, prosperous, living in Vienna in 1893, is traced up until 1955. They descend, from full citizenship in the Austro-Hungarian empire, to the status of subhumans in the Nazi regime. Few survived, most died.

Stoppard has suggested that would be his last play, but it is hard to believe a writer of his talent and energy could stop.

Respectfully submitted,
Frances Greenberg, substituting for Christine Lehner              

Carol Presents George Bernard Shaw

Jacquie's Email Hello Literary Ladies! What an incredible season it has been thus far. Luckily there is still so much more to come!
   This Wednesday, February 1st, Carol will be presenting on George Bernard Shaw in the Orr Room of the Hastings-on-Hudson Public Library. As per all our matinees, the doors will be open at 12:30pm and the pre-curtain discussion will begin promptly at 1pm.
   Where does one begin with George Bernard Shaw??? There's the fact that there seems to be a relevant Bernard Shaw quote for every occasion, such as:

"Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance."
"Those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything."

   And, since these reminders ARE all about ME, I have to mention my first live performance of Bernard Shaw in 1974 – Diana Rigg and Alec McCowen in Pygmalion. Sigh. I remember it vividly. We were sitting quite close and to the left, and I just remember looking up at Diana Rigg – how long and beautiful she was, the palpable charisma of Alec McGowen, the humor of the language, and, of course, the indignation and confusion I left with since it doesn't end the way the musical does! Where was the romance I was infusing into every line and action???!!! That's the power of the theatre – to be left with such intense memories, even after 48+ years.
   It is certain to be another wonderful afternoon of drama this Wednesday. I look forward to seeing you all! Until then, Jacquie

Christine's Minutes On the first day of February (rabbit, rabbit), thirteen members of the Literature Club met, yet again, in the Orr Room. (If you are tired of hearing this venue in the minutes, consider how tired I must be repeating it every fortnight. How I long for the opportunity to describe a member’s rococo living room and wax eloquent about a certain member’s cold salmon...)

But do not despair: we were greeted by the marvelous Shavian costume of our presenter. There, in front of the rather serene Hudson River, was Carol Barkin, in a flared skirt, a velvet embroidered wine-red jacket, over a classic ruffled poet blouse complete with ruffled cuffs. This perfect ensemble was topped with a straw hat beribboned with a flowered scarf. She did Eliza Doolittle proud.

President Constance rang the bell at 1 pm sharp. The minutes were read and accepted. Lori reported that our treasury remains at $129.50. Via Zoom, Diana introduced her mother, who is joining us from Mississippi, where Diana is visiting.

Recollected by the clear view of the iconic Hastings’ own water tower, Christine mentioned seeing an exhibition of Bernd and Hilla Berner’s photographs this past week at SF MOMA. The German husband and wife photographed industrial structures, focusing solely on their shapes, and the images are compelling and magical. Kathy mentioned seeing the show at the Met last year, and also loving it.

Speaking of magical, Joanna saw Orlando last week, in London, with Emma Corrin, who identifies as non-binary, most aptly cast as Orlando, themself.

Then the curtain rises, and we enter the world of George Bernard Shaw.

Carol began by explaining why she had chosen to dress as Eliza rather than Shaw himself: George was 6’4”, rail thin and sported a large red beard. (Unlike Carol.) And he generally wore plus-fours (a style made popular by Prince of Wales before he was Edward VII, an article of clothing Carol does not have in her closet.)

Shaw has been an interest of Carol’s since she saw Saint Joan with Joan Plowright, on the London stage. Then in college she saw The Devil’s Disciple, and she was hooked. She wrote her senior thesis on George Bernard Shaw.

George Bernard Shaw was born in Dublin in 1856. His father was an alcoholic businessman; his mother Lucinda “Bessie” Shaw, came from a wealthy family, but little of that money came to the Shaws. She was a beautiful singer and neglected young GB Shaw, who suffered as a result. Bessie’s singing teacher, George Lee, with whom she had been involved before Shaw was born, also lived with them. In the same house. Shaw suspected that this other George was his biological father, but it was never proved. Between the ages of 9 and 15, Shaw attended four different schools, and hated them all. So, he left school for good, worked in real estate (perhaps good fodder: exposure to many human frailties and foibles), moved to London and spent hours educating himself at the British Museum Reading Room – the safe haven and the petri dish of so many great and not great English writers. Around this time, he became a vegetarian, largely for financial reasons.

In the mid-1880’s, Shaw became a socialist and joined the Fabian Society. Founded by Thomas Davidson, it was becoming England’s most important intellectual organization, and Shaw was its most prominent pamphleteer. Shaw was also writing novels, and reviewing music and theatre. He reviled melodrama and admired Ibsen. Biographers write that Shaw was a pioneer of “intelligent” theatre, in that he asked his audiences to think.

Shaw was 38 in 1894, when Arms and the Man was produced. It was a greater success with the public than with the critics, and it made enough money that he was able to stop writing reviews. The Devil’s Disciple was his first big success in New York.

He was 40 when he met Charlotte Payne-Townsend at the Webbs’ country house. In his first letter to her, he advised her to not fall in love. Naturally, they were married the next year. It was not a perfectly happy marriage.

With the twentieth century came several critical and popular successes for Shaw: Major Barbara, The Doctor’s Dilemma, Caesar and Cleopatra, Major Barbara. In 1914, he wrote a pacifist pamphlet, arguing that both sides were at fault for the war, and this proceeded to make him rather unpopular in a time of rah-rah patriotism. Still, it could not go unnoticed that Shaw was good at writing propaganda, and in 1917 the government sent him to the Western Front. His report described the solders’ lives and the human cost of war and was well-received.

After only 500 years of dithering, defensive sophistry and petty politics, the Catholic Church canonized Joan of Arc in 1920, prompting Shaw to write his masterpiece, Saint Joan, in 1923. He was awarded the 1925 Nobel Prize in Literature; the citation notes his “idealism and humanity.” He spent the next four years writing his magnum opus, The Intelligent Woman’s Guide to Socialism and Capitalism, which went on to become a best-seller. It is still in print and selling. (Your secretary still has her grandmother’s 1928 copy, much underlined.)

Shaw continued to care deeply about politics, but lost faith in Fabian-style change. In the early 30s he wrote favorably of both Mussolini and Hitler, but still his plays got produced. His 1938 screenplay for Pygmalion won an Academy Award. When Charlotte died in 1943, he was surprised by how much he missed her. He lived on quietly in Hertfordshire, and died at 94 from complications suffered in a fall while pruning a tree.

Shaw wrote about a wide range of subjects, and often used humor to great effect. He had a way of getting his audiences to see things anew, from a different angle.

Aided by Carol’s brilliant bib/nametags for the characters (soon to be a Literature Club prop staple) members read two scenes from The Devil’s Disciple, and three scenes from Pygmalion. Carol explained Shaw’s preference for his ending, the ‘real’ ending, in which Eliza marries Freddy and not Higgins. Thankfully, he never saw Hollywood’s My Fair Lady. The plays continue to give much pleasure, and also much to think about.

Respectfully submitted,
Christine Lehner, Recording Secretary

Photo: The Hastings Water Tower, published in The Buzzer, the newspaper of Hastings High School on March 23, 2021.

Diana Presents Edward Albee

Jacquie's Email 
Hello Literary Ladies! We will be meeting this Wednesday, January 18th in the Orr Room of the Library for Diana's presentation on Edward Albee. Small talk begins at 12:30pm - confrontation beings at 1pm. Diana promises loads of drama, but alas, with our masks on, the sloppy drinking will have to be done in private and without an audience.
Here's a little something to whet your appetites. Even though our prior readings have proven our group's excellent acting chops, no one can emote with their forelocks quite like Liz and Dick! On YouTube: Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Elizabeth Taylor (Martha), Richard Burton (George)  –  the boxing match scene. 

Christine's Minutes 

On a blustery January 18th, thirteen members of the Literature Club gathered again in the Orr Room of the Hasting library, home to hard uncomfortable chairs graciously made comfortable by Jacquie’s collection of cushions.

President Constance rang the ceremonial bell at 1 pm. There were a few announcements. Joanna, in her library hat, reminded us of the upcoming documentary, The Automat, and discussion to follow, and then wearing her Arts Council hat, she told us about “Drinking and Drawing,” in this very same Orr room with which we are so well acquainted.

Meanwhile, Jacquie made sure that we were recording the meeting for Sharon, who is in Florida. Most importantly, we all welcomed. Gita back from her illness and recuperation – we are all so glad to see her again.

The minutes of our previous meeting were read and accepted. Having recently written a large check to the library, our treasury now holds $129.50. Recommended books included Trust, by Hernan Diaz, The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell, and The Golden Compass trilogy by Philip Pullman.

And now the curtain rises on our much-anticipated program on Edward Albee, by Diana Jaeger. Diana explained that, unlike some past presenters, she had not seen fit to dress as Albee. She did something rather creative and unusual: she placed next to her the perfect prop, a bottle of Maker's Mark, Albee’s favorite whiskey.

Lest anyone was still expecting to hear about Horton Foote, Diana explained that having read through Foote’s oeuvre, she decided it lacked sufficient drama. Additionally, one of his plays had been scathingly reviewed by Stefan Kanfer, husband to our own late member, May Kanfer.

The biographical information in this program comes from Mel Gussow’s Edward Albee: A Singular Journey (2000) Gussow was not only an important critic, but also a good friend of Albee.

We could just glide over the next part, Albee’s almost classic alienated childhood of the artistic son of rich parents, but as has been noted elsewhere, everyone gets their very own particular and peculiar unhappy childhood.

Edward was born in 1928 to a single mother, in Washington DC. The biological father was nowhere to be seen. The babe was then adopted by a wealthy childless couple in Larchmont, New York, the Albees, in need of an heir. They named him Edward Franklin Albee III.

Reed Albee, a successful theatrical producer, was rather short but loved tall women. Frances, his much younger-wife, called Frankie, was six foot two inches, and had worked as a model. Also in the household were Frankie’s alcoholic sister, and her mother.

Frankie, described oxymoronically, as a “genial anti-Semite”, was not maternal. The young Albee did not even eat meals with his parents.

In 1932 the story of the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby gripped the nation. There was no escape from lurid coverage of the event. The young Albee became very fearful and slept with a bow and arrow under his pillow.

In the classic trope of rich clueless parents, Albee was financially pampered, given legions of toy soldiers, tennis lessons, dancing lessons, boxing lessons and lavish birthday parties.

But there were two loving women in his life: Nanny Church, who encouraged his interest in the arts, and took him to museums and Broadway shows. And Grandma Cotter – she lived upstairs in the large house, and was isolated there with her asthmatic Pekinese dogs. She was an Albee play before there was such a thing as an Albee play. And then there was. Albee wrote The Sandbox  –  a 12-minute play –  about her.

But back to the miserable childhood. Albee was first sent to Rye Country Day, though in the winters he was pulled out and sent to a private school in Palm Beach, because his parents wintered there. After failing at RCD, he was sent to Lawrenceville, where he had his first sexual experience. He was tossed out again, and sent to Valley Forge Military Academy. Not surprisingly, he hated it. Lastly, he went to Choate, where he had a successful academic career.

He spent three semesters at Trinity College, before leaving for Greenwich Village, and his real life. By this time, he knew he was gay; he said he had known since he was twelve. Initially he lived at home in Larchmont, but in 1948 he had a serious break with his parents, and left the nest. When he was 21, he inherited money from his grandmother, which gave him $25 a week. It helped, but he still needed to work. He held a series of odd jobs; his favorite was Western Union, where he worked from 1955 to 1958. He said that he liked the flexible hours, the interesting people he met, and lots of walking. He also liberated one of their typewriters in order to start writing plays. And he did. He dashed off The Zoo Story in three weeks, and it was produced off-Broadway in 1959. He was suddenly the darling of the New York theater world. The plays kept coming: The Sandbox in 1960, American Dream in 1961, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? in 1962, A Delicate Balance in 1966. He wrote several plays in the seventies and eighties, but they weren’t his best. Then in 1991 Three Tall Women came out. The play was a huge hit, and Albee won the Pulitzer.

Albee’s first serious love was William Flanagan.

From 1959 to 1963, he had a relationship with Terence McNally, but they split after four years because Albee was unable to be open about his sexuality.

Then, in 1971, Albee met Jonathan Thomas and they were together until Thomas died in 2005.

In 1989, Frankie Albee, his mother, died, having changed her will to exclude Edward. This left him free to write about her. He found his adoption papers and contacted his birth mother. And to exorcise his demons, he wrote Three Tall Women (1990); there were only three characters and they were all variations on his mother.

According to Albee there are only 2 things to write about: Life and Death. Albee died in 2016 at the age of 88.

And now for some real drama: members read selected scenes from A Delicate Balance. This was an excellent choice, as it has six very vivid characters: Tobias and Agnes, a wealthy older couple; Julia, their fourfold-divorced daughter just come home; Claire, Agnes’ alcoholic sister; and their soi-disant best friends, Harry and Edna. In reading certain scenes across the whole play, we felt we had experienced the whole messy, emotional, theatrical, familial show.

Respectfully submitted,
Christine Lehner, Recording Secretary

Frances Presents Oscar Wilde

Jacquie's Email Hello Literary (and Serious and Good) Ladies!
First, I would like to welcome our newest member, Kathy Sullivan, to the group. Kathy, please be prepared for your investiture, which may or may not include a hood and a ride to an undisclosed location... Just kidding, although that is what I expected when I was first introduced to the fabled Literature Club of Hastings-on-Hudson!
   

 

   And now in all Ernest...our next meeting will be this Wednesday, December 14th for an afternoon of Oscar Wilde presented by Frances. Once again, we will be meeting in front of the dramatic backdrop of the Palisades in the Orr Room of the Hastings-on-Hudson Public Library. The doors will open at 12:30pm for pre-show chatter, with the bell to take our seats at 1pm.
   Masks requested but true identities will remain revealed. Fans are optional. Handbags will be checked at the door! xJacquie

Christine's Minutes Ten members of the Literature Club gathered, yet again, in the tried and true Orr Room of our beloved Library, where the chairs may be uncomfortable, or would be but for Jacquie intrepidly schlepping** (note correct use of the word) her cushions every two weeks, but the views are spectacular. Today there were white caps on the Hudson, always a delight to behold.

In the course of introducing ourselves to our newest member – Welcome Kathy Lewis! – we learned a few things about our older members, such as the fact that Fran would like to be called Frances, and Connie would like to be called Constance. Duly noted by your secretary. Kathy is a neighbor of Linda’s, and has lived in Hastings for over twenty years. She is an architect, and has two sons. We are pleased to have her join our select group.

President Constance Stewart rang the bell. The minutes of the previous meeting were read and accepted, with one important correction, regarding the word schlep. To schlep is to carry or haul something along. Schlump was the word used by Joanna, correctly; it describes a slovenly person, which of course Joanna is not, unless she is dressing purposely as a ‘schlump’. Your secretary always enjoys enlarging her vocabulary.

Constance went over the schedule for the coming year. In order to discuss how we would go forward, whether via Zoom, or at the library, or back to some version of normal, a brief Zoom meeting on January 11th was proposed.

Frances then entertained us with an afternoon of Oscar Wilde – who could be wittier? In the spirit of her subject, Frances looked very fin-de-siècle in her black boots, black velvet jacket and red velvet scarf.

But why Oscar? Frances explained that Barbara laid claim to Molière, and Christine scarfed up Stoppard, so quoi faire? We also learned she is possibly the only literate, highly literate, English speaker who has not seen The Importance of Being Earnest.

For the life, Frances referred to Richard Ellman’s canonical biography. Wilde lived in a time of the explosion of literacy, and photography. Frances passed around photos of Wilde’s tomb at Père Lachaise, of Wilde foppishly dressed and splayed upon a bearskin rug, and several other pictures of Wilde, his unenviable wife, and Bosie, his lover.

Nowadays, Wilde is regarded as a homosexual martyr. But naturellement it was more complicated than that, the three trials of Oscar Wilde. The first case was initiated by Wilde. He sued Bosie’s father, the Marquess of Queensbury (by all accounts a violent homophobic brute and philistine) for libel, and misspelling. Queensbury left a card at Wilde’s club, on which he had written that Wilde was a “posing somdomite”. Setting this trial in motion was the first very bad idea. It was Wilde’s younger lover, Bosie, Alfred Lord Douglas, who was eager to see his father humiliated in court. Against all advice and better judgement, Wilde proceeded, and lost the libel suit.

The second trial was launched by the government, accusing Wilde of “gross indecency.” But this time the jury could not reach a verdict – largely because the “rent boys” so vital to the government’s case, did not make credible witnesses. The case was dismissed.

For number three, the government again prosecuted Wilde for gross indecency, and this time they won their case. In 1895 Wilde was sentenced to two years of hard labor. The conditions were dreadful by any standards. After eighteen months, he was transferred to another prison where a humane superintendent allowed him writing paper. Each day he wrote his letter to Bosie, to be later called De Profundis, and each day the superintendent took away the day’s writing. Wilde saw his pages again when he was released.

After two years, Wilde’s life as he knew it was over. He was bankrupt. His wife Constance changed her name, and his two sons – whom he never saw again – grew up as Cyril and Vyvyan Holland.

But back to the beginning. Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde was born in Dublin in 1854, and died in Paris in 1900, in mortal combat with his wallpaper. “Either this wallpaper goes, or I do,” he said. And we know who went. Wilde’s parents were prominent Anglo-Irish Protestants. He studied at Oxford, and there, having elegantly decorated his rooms, he produced the first of his eminently quotable epigrams: I am finding it harder and harder every day to live up to my blue china.

In London, Wilde was a popular guest at dinner parties, and man about town. To support himself he wrote reviews, gave lectures, whatever he could. Then in 1882 the D’Oyly Carte Company sent him on a lecture tour in the US, to drum up an audience for Patience. One of the characters in the play, Bunthorne, was based on Wilde. In America, he was a great success, and generated publicity, for the play, and for Oscar Wilde, the dandy, the pinnacle of the British Aesthetic Movement. About that time, Wilde was heard to say, “There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.”

In 1884 Wilde married Constance Lloyd who was, by very good luck for Oscar, wealthy. In 1885 and 1886 their two sons were born.

Around that time Wilde was seduced by the Canadian, Robbie Ross, and became a practicing homosexual. He remained friends with Ross all his life, and it would be the loyal Ross who secured Wilde’s copyrights for his sons, and arranged his burial at Père Lachaise.

From 1888 on, he was immensely productive. The Picture of Dorian Gray came out in 1890. In 1892 Sarah Bernhardt performed in his play, Salomé. Then came A Woman of No Importance, Lady Windermere’s Fan, The Ideal Husband and in 1895, The Importance of Being Earnest.

The plays were all smashing successes. But then came the three trials, and it all came crashing down when he was convicted in 1895.

At last members read four delightful scenes from The Importance, giving us a chance to speak such splendid lines as “I can resist everything except temptation” and “To lose one [parent] may be regarded as a misfortune, to lose two looks like carelessness!” And Algernon regarding his aunt: “Ah! that must be Aunt Augusta. Only relatives, or creditors, ever ring in that Wagnerian manner.” And here is Lady Bracknell remonstrating Jack Worthing: “Mr. Worthing! Rise, sir, from this semi-recumbent posture. It is most indecorous.”

And one last one, just because: “All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That is his.”

Respectfully submitted,

Christine Lehner, Recording Secretary

Joanna Presents Richard Nelson

Jacquie's Email
Hello Literary Ladies! I hope you all had memorable Thanksgiving holidays with very little unnecessary family drama. I was home with the flu (and missed Thanksgiving at my mother-in-law's on Long Island) while the rest of my sisters and their families celebrated in Chicago. I have so far heard one sister's account of the weekend and the various little dramas that occurred, many of which she instigated. (Politics! Driving skills! Appropriate container size for leftovers!) I can't wait to hear from the others. Life really is the stuff of drama. It's going to be a veritable Rashomon!
   And what a perfect segue talk of family gatherings is for Joanna's topic for our meeting this Wednesday, as she will be presenting on playwright Richard Nelson. Since there have been more Literature Club firsts in the past few years than we can count, I wouldn't put it past Joanna to have us all prepare a meal as she presents!
   Once again, we will be meeting in the Orr Room of the Hastings-on-Hudson Public Library at 12:30 PM, with curtain at 1 PM. For all who wish to join us on Zoom, please let us know you will be tuning in, so we know to simulcast the presentation.
   Hoping I'll be joining you in person on Wednesday! -cough-cough-sniffle-sniffle-Jacquie

Christine's Minutes

Ten members of the Literature Club gathered in the Orr Room, where we had an excellent view of the pouring rain. We were joined again by Kathy Sullivan, as a guest. President Constance Stewart rang the sacred bell at 1 PM. Due to the recording secretary’s dereliction of duty, there were no minutes read. Due to the treasurer’s absence, there was no treasury report.

We were all pleased that Gita was able to join us via Zoom. Jacquie suggested that her emails announcing each upcoming meeting, should contain a link to the minutes. We discussed, not for the first time, what should be our Covid-careful protocol over the winter. Whatever we do, it was agreed that there will be no lunches served. Obviously, this remains a very sad thing.

The first words from the day’s presenter, Joanna Reisman, were: “I am not dressed like a schlump.” In fact, she was, untypically, dressed rather schlumpily. But this, she explained, was in homage to several characters in the Rhinebeck plays of Richard Nelson, her subject.

Richard Nelson was born in Chicago in 1950. His family moved a lot. Among his 45 listed plays, ten were produced at the Royal Shakespeare Company, the first in 1975. From 2005 to 2008 he was chair of the playwrighting department at the Yale School of Drama. Working with Russian translators, he has translated and produced several works of Chekhov. Nelson has won several awards. He has also written screenplays. Since the 1980’s he has lived in Rhinebeck. We could just walk down the hill and get on a train and visit him this very afternoon.

Joanna’s presentation focused on the Rhinebeck plays, known as the Rhinebeck Panorama. There are four plays about the Apple family, three plays about the Gabriels, and another 3 pandemic plays, written to be performed on the Zoom medium, revisiting the Apples, and then two plays about the Michaels. Nelson’s style of theater has deep roots in Chekhov. He strives for what he calls verisimilitude. All the plays are staged in the round, in a kitchen, and sometimes a dining room. There is lots of cooking and eating. Real food. A real refrigerator door opens and closes. There are adults, who could be you or me, speaking naturally, about personal experiences, politics, very current politics.

Each play begins with a dark, bare stage. Then the actors enter, bringing in the furniture and props, and setting the stage while the audience looks on.

In Nelson’s plays, there is minimal conflict; his characters do not try to impose their views; there are no great ‘reveals”. The characters already know everything – the drama exists in the audience becoming aware.

Nelson generally works with the same actors, to the extent that they feel like a ‘troupe”. Most notably, MaryAnn Plunkett and Jay Sanders, who are married in real life, appear variously as siblings, or as in-laws.

The actors wear no makeup (or if they do it is damn hard to tell), and they wear casual, often sloppy clothes, – hence we have Joanna’s un-characteristically schlumpy attire today.

The plays require a special very sensitive sound system, involving lots of tiny dangling microphones, so the actors can speak in normal voices.

Members read from Oscar Eustis’s insightful introduction to a collection of the plays.

(Meanwhile, in contrast to the warmth of cooking food in the Apple kitchen, outside the Orr room, the bare branches are whipping in the wind, and the flagpole is issuing an eerie screech in sync with each gust.)

Then, Joanna introduced us to the cast of characters in the first Apple Play: Richard Apple, a lawyer in Albany, his three sisters, Barbara, a teacher in Rhinebeck, Marian, also a teacher, Jane, a writer from the city, Tim, Jane’s boyfriend, an actor slash waiter, and Uncle Benjamin, who was formerly a well-known actor, but recently has had suffered a heart attack and has memory loss.

Members read from scene one, which opens on November 2, 2010, and is called “That Hopey-Changey Thing”.

Scene two is “Acting and Forgetting”. Scene three is called “American Manners.” The last scene ends with Uncle Benjamin reading a Walt Whitman poem, The Wound Dresser.

The third Apple play, called Sorry, occurs on the November 2012 elections. Barbara and Marian, now living together, are taking their Uncle Benjamin to the nursing home because they are unable to care for him any longer.

Members read a short scene.

(Meanwhile, the wind outside is still wailing for her demon lover…)

We also read from the fourth Apple play, Regular Singing. This one is set on the fiftieth anniversary of the assassination of JFK, November 22, 2013. We learn that Marian’s husband, Adam, from whom she separated after the tragic death of their daughter, is now dying, somewhere in the house. He remains offstage.

Then Joanna turned to the Gabriel family; these plays take place only months apart. But as in all the Apple plays, each play takes place in a single day. Again, members read a passage from Oskar Eustis’s introduction to the plays. Then we read sections from Boxes, and The Buzzards.

Following the Apple plays came the pandemic Zoom plays, and then the “modest” two-part drama about the Michaels.

Joanna ended her presentation with the program notes from the Apple plays. After which we all had to leave the warm upstate kitchen, and return to the blustery day in Hastings.

Respectfully submitted,
Christine Lehner
Recording Secretary

Lori Presents Anne Washburn

Jacquie's Email
Hello Literary Ladies! It's time to line up for more great drama! Our next meeting is this Wednesday, November 9th at 12:30 PM at the library. Lori will be presenting on the playwright Anne Washburn.
   If you'd like to join us via Zoom, please let our tech crew... I mean Sharon know. They're not the best seats in the house -- sometimes only partial view -- but certainly worth the price of admission! Sadly, for me, I will not be with you all this Wednesday, but I'll see you next time. Thank goodness for season tickets! Have a joyful Thanksgiving! -- Jacquie

Christine's Minutes
(Written from Laura Rice’s notes)

Eight members of the Literature Club, plus one guest, gathered in the Orr Room of the library on November 9th. The bell was rung at 12:55 PM. Linda introduced her neighbor, Kathy Sullivan. In Christine’s absence, Connie read the minutes. Lori reported that our treasury contains $389.

Linda noted that she has been having trouble with her email. Kate Atkinson’s new book was recommended, and Sharon told members about Plays for a Plague Year.

The day’s program was presented by Lori Walsh, on Anne Washburn. Right off the bat, Lori announced that there would be few biographical details, as they are scarcely available. Her age is nowhere listed, but we can assume she is “our age.”

To prepare us for Mr. Burns Post-Electric Play, Lori reminded us of the old days of TV, when a family might gather round the television in the living room and share the experience. She noted the way that certain episodes, in The Seinfeld Show, or The Simpsons, can become cultural touchstones easily referred to, and how they can connect people.

Anne Washburn was born Berkeley, California; she frequently acted in school plays, and also wrote poetry. She went to Reed College and studied theatre and literature. After college she wrote some radio plays, with success. She moved to New York City and attended NYU’s Dramatic Writing Program.

Washburn is considered an experimental playwright. She has co-founded the theatre company, the Civilians, and received many awards, including a Guggenheim and a PEN theatre awards. She is a risk-taker.

Her play, Ten Out of Twelve, was a love letter to the theater; it consists of direct quotations from tech rehearsals.

Mr. Burns was first produced in 2012 at the Woolly Mammoth Theater, in Washington. In 2013 it came to New York’s Playwrights Horizons, and received rave reviews. Members read aloud from reviews in The New York Times.

Washburn sets Mr. Burns Post-Electric Play in a post-apocalyptic time, after a great nuclear melt down. There is no electricity and people are wandering around, searching. There are three acts, covering 75 years. The first act takes place after the nuclear meltdown. The second act is seven years later, and the third act is seventy-five years later.

Lori then passed out copies of the play and assigned parts. Washburn has explained that she created the first act by inviting a group of actors to remember Simpson episodes, and she made a transcript of their talk. The importance of The Simpsons in American culture – our shared memory – was discussed. The episode that Washburn uses in the play is the “Cape Feare” episode from Season 5 of the The Simpsons.

 Lori played a recording of Washburn discussing significance of the episode.

The second act of Mr. Burns Post-Electric Play contains lessons on capitalism and the nature of art. It is seven years after Act One, and the strangers we met earlier have now formed a theater group which travels around performing Simpson episodes. The troupe has become well known for the quality of their commercials.

Members read several scenes.

The third act is about how cultural mythologies grow, and how they are framed. It is now eighty-two years after the nuclear meltdown. The retelling of the Simpson episode is now presented as a Greek tragedy. Mr. Burns is conflated with Sideshow Bob, as a mythic villain. The play is transformed into a musical, with songs from Britney Spears and Eminem, and of course, Simpsons theme music.

Members read various scenes.

Lori ends by explaining Washburn’s conviction that it is storytelling that will allow us to cope, and even survive the unthinkable.

Respectfully submitted,
Christine Lehner (from notes by Laura Rice)
Recording Secretary

Jacquie Presents Wendy Wasserstein

Jacquie's email: Hello, Uncommon Women All!!
I don't know about you, but I am SO excited it is finally almost Wednesday, October 26th when I will be giving my presentation on the plays of Wendy Wasserstein -- not just because I think it's going to be a lot of fun, but because after almost two years I will finally make my deadline! 
If the weather cooperates (I'm ever the optimist) we will be meeting in Sharon's lovely backyard at 12:30 pm. If the weather looks bad, we will meet at12:30 pm in the Orr Room of the Hastings-on-Hudson Public Library. Even though Broadway houses, and now the opera and the ballet, will be allowing audiences to be unmasked during performances, numbers are starting to tick up, and it seems like a good time to see if our library option is a comfortable one. (That said, if you have a seat cushion or two you can bring along, that might help make the library's stacking chairs a bit more comfortable. I can bring 11.)
Please look for my email on Wednesday morning for the final decision on where we will be meeting. In addition, carpooling might be helpful for avoiding limited parking options.
Again, if anyone would like to listen along on Zoom please let me know and we'll send you a link. Until then, Jacquie

Christine's minutes: In yet another first in these seasons of firsts, thirteen members of the Literature Club gathered in the Orr Room of the Hastings Library, and Lyn McLean joined us from North Carolina, via Zoom. The day started out foggy and remained weirdly warm and threatening throughout; but we enjoyed magnificent views of the Palisades all dressed up in colors, just for us.

President Connie Stewart rang the bell at 12:50. (I had 1:50 in my notes, but that can’t be right.)

The minutes were read and accepted. Lori, our treasurer corrected last month’s report. We actually have $389.50

There was an effort to keep our discussions brief, knowing that Jacquie had a grand program awaiting, and we did not want her to curtail it in any way. Still.

Sharon reported that she has a list of desired books from Debby Quinn, the Head Librarian, and she noted that they are all – but one – written by white men. The books are already ordered, so that is a done deal. Nor is this to say they are not good books, but the fact remains that women, of all colors, are woefully underrepresented. We all agreed this is an important issue, one that we can easily discuss at great length; it was decided that we will put it on the agenda for our annual meeting in March.

Laura asked what is our policy regarding inviting people who do not live in Hastings? There seems to be a tacit policy that all members either live in Hastings, or originally lived in Hastings (e.g. Louisa, Carla, Laura). Someone who lives in Laura’s building in Ossining has expressed an interest in coming. It is Catalina Danis, who lived in Hastings for decades, so we all agreed that would be fine.

In the spirit of Show & Tell, Diana announced that she has found the most wonderful small, portable light for reading in bed – and she showed it to us – it looked quite fetching draped over her shoulders.

The latest news on Gita: she has been living with a daughter in Long Island, but would like to return home. She does not expect to be attending this year, but that may change.

Now, at last, the lights go down, the chattering stops, cell phones are silenced and the play begins.

It was no surprise to anyone that Jacquie approached her topic with enthusiasm and imagination. She said that upon reading Wendy’s first play, Uncommon Women and Others, she became concerned that this play about the first world concerns of a group of Mount Holyoke alums, could seem, well, trivial, when lined up next to climate change, the war in Ukraine, the Dobbs decision, and the rise of nationalism and xenophobia.

But not at all. Jacquie plunged into Julie Salomon’s biography, Wendy and the Lost Boys (which she recommended highly) and began to see that the plays must be read in the context of their time and place, and also that – Derrida be damned – an understanding of the playwright, described as “complicated, fascinating, amusing, frustrating, intuitive, completely open yet enigmatic” could be, if not essential, an important key to understanding and appreciating the plays. In Jacquie’s view, the plays are not “classics per se”, but sociological studies reflecting the Baby Boomer experience, in real time, aging along with the playwright, reacting in real time. But do they still entertain us – which is, according to Tom Stoppard, the main task of theatre? Oh, indeed they do. We were well entertained all afternoon.

Before delving into the plays, we learned a bit about Wendy’s remarkable life. Beginning at the end, with the memorial service in 2006, attended by everyone in theatre, when Wendy was praised for her talent, her bravery – she had a child, Lucy Jane, at the age of 47, on her own – and her truth telling, as well as her invention.

Wendy Wasserstein was born in 1950, to Morris and Lola. And as was often remarked, she was “born into great material.” The family euphemism for death was that the deceased had “gone to Europe.” Hers was a family of über-achievers, who kept their secrets well. While Morris was a ‘decent, hardworking’ father, tiny Lola was the mythmaker. Wendy the playwright, Bruce the billionaire, and Georgette known as Gorgeous, only learned in adulthood of the existence of another brother, Abner, institutionalized since his childhood.

Wasserstein Brothers was a successful ribbon manufacturer in Brooklyn. While Wendy would describe her childhood as Camelot, her much older sister who was also her cousin, Sandra, experienced the hardscrabble childhood of recent immigrants. Wendy attended Yeshiva in Brooklyn, then Ethical Culture, and then Calhoun in Manhattan. She is described as a mediocre student. Still, she entered one of the Seven Sisters, Mt. Holyoke, in 1967 – just when college life was on the cusp of radical change. After college she returned to New York, studied with Israel Horowitz and wrote her first play, Women Can’t. In 1973 she went to Yale School of Drama where she met William Ivey Long, Christopher Durang, James Lapine, all of whom became fast friends and colleagues. Her play about Mt. Holyoke students, Uncommon Women and Others, had a production at the Phoenix in 1977 and was a great success. Next came Isn’t it Romantic. Then The Heidi Chronicles, her greatest and most indelible success. It opened on Broadway in March of 1989 and closed the following year after 622 performances.

The Heidi Chronicles is a brilliant history and send-up of 25 years in the life of Heidi Holland, art historian, and 25 years of women keeping up the struggle for some kind of equality.

Members were handed copies of the book, and assigned roles, as we would read pivotal scenes in the play. Act one, scene one features a high school dance, and awkward conversations between Heidi and a certain boy. Scene two in another dance, with Heidi and Scoop Rosenbaum.

It must be pointed out that every scene was accompanied by a song, appropriate to the period: we were treated to Janis Joplin, Jefferson Airplane, Aretha Franklin, and so many others.

Scene three is set in a church basement, where a women’s consciousness-raising group is meeting. Your secretary enjoyed the chance to read the part of potty-mouthed Fran. Jacquie summarized the next few scenes, each one emblematic of its era: a protest in front of the Art Institute in Chicago; we learn that Nixon has resigned, Peter, now a doctor, comes out, and Scoop is clerking for the SCOTUS; a wedding at the Pierre where Scoop married Lisa Friedlander; Heidi lecturing on art; and onward until Act 2. We read Act 2, scene 3, where Heidi is being asked to consult on a movie about contemporary women. And finally, the last scene in Heidi’s new apartment, with the now very rich Scoop, whom she chose not to marry.

As Jacquie said: “That particular paradox – of being better than everyone else but not good enough – [would become] a recurrent theme in Wendy’s life and in her work.”

Respectfully submitted,
Christine Lehner

Recording secretary