Once Upon a Cat

~ AND BOOKS! ~

[2023: See Halloween & Christmas]

LESTER & FUQUA
Just Hanging Out in Their Citrus Boxes

One of the polydactyl cats at the
Ernest Hemingway House
JUST HANGING OUT IN KEY WEST
Digital photo taken by Marc Averette

For some readerly feline fun:

Hemingway's Cats
by Lindsey Hooper

a lighthearted novel
featuring cute cats with funny names such as
"Pawpa Hemingway, the grumpiest cat in Key West" (141)
&
Ernestine Hemingway, Lady Bratt Ashley, Kilamanjaro

Hooper loves a good pun, as she describes the cats (& humans)
hunkering down to wait out the frightful weather event:
"When Hurricane Harry met Tropical Storm Sally"
[More Wise Cats!]

**************

Following last month's heroic (real life) Book Woman,
this month's reading included a notable (fictional) Book Man,
Jean Perdu, the Literary Apothecary,
who seeks to heal his friends and clients
through prescribed reading.

Monsieur Perdu would no doubt agree
with (real life) journalist Will Schwalbe:

"Books can’t do anything by themselves.
They need us.
Today we need to read more than ever.
And we need to act now more than ever."

**************

Thanks to a few of my personal Literary Apothecaries:
Steven for Hemingway's Cats,
Katie for The Little Paris Bookshop
-- such fun presents for a girl who loves books & cats!

And to Igor, who says:

"This is a bookshop! We'll fight them on the Seine!

My favorite quote from
The Little Paris Bookshop:

"Do you mean: 'Sorry, I haven't finished what I wanted to say' or 'Sorry for being in love with you and only giving you headaches'?"

"Both. Any request for forgiveness. Maybe you've got used to feeling guilty for everything you are. Often it's not we who shape words, but the words that shape us." (37)

~ Nina George ~

Sorry, sorry, sorry . . .

Book Women

Thanks to Barbara McFadden for sending this vintage
photo of a reading, writing, bicycle - riding
Book Woman with Typewriter

Reading The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek [Kentucky] will open your eyes to a few things. First of all, you must brace yourelf to the nearly incomprehensible reality that this story takes place in 1936. The desperate living conditions for so many of the characters seem more like 1836. One way you know it's the 20th Century is the Pack Horse Library WPA Project.

These devoted librarians and their amazing steeds traveled to remote but inhabited areas, delivering novels, magazines, almanacs, newspapers, picture books, scrapbooks, recipes, medicinal advice, and even occasional treats of special food, such as herbs, teas, and fruit for the school children.

Thanks to my sister Diane for recommending this very inspiring historical novel which is introducing a new generation of readers to the Pack Horse Librarians -- and to the Blue People of Kentucky. We had no idea!

You would be a well on your way to completing a Great Books Course if you devoted a summer or a semester to reading all of the classic titles that nineteen - year - old Cussy Mary Carter delivers to her patrons -- Peter Pan, Peter Rabbit, Robinson Crusoe, Brave New World. Despite her own tough road in life, Cussy (named after her great - grandfather's birthplace in France) is determined to raise the consciousness and the literacy of the citizens of Troublesome Creek. She distributes not only the standards but also creates scrapbooks of unique selections from her own eclectic reading:

"The poetry section I'd made filled several pages, and I paused to reread one of my favorites, 'In a Restaurant' by Wilfrid Wilson Gibson. I loved how I could hear the music of the violin he'd written into it. Beside it, I'd pasted 'Trees in a Garden' by D. H. Lawrence. The poem was a pretty one about trees, and I could almost smell the naked scents of woody barks, budding leaves, and fruits." (52)

Out of curiosity, I just had to look these poems up and share them here:

Trees In The Garden

Ah in the thunder air
how still the trees are!

nd the lime-tree, lovely and tall, every leaf silent
hardly looses even a last breath of perfume.

And the ghostly, creamy coloured little tree of leaves
white, ivory white among the rambling greens
how evanescent, variegated elder, she hesitates on the green grass
as if, in another moment, she would disappear
with all her grace of foam!

And the larch that is only a column, it goes up too tall to see:
and the balsam-pines that are blue with the grey-blue blueness of things from the sea,
and the young copper beech, its leaves red-rosy at the ends
how still they are together, they stand so still
in the thunder air, all strangers to one another
as the green grass glows upwards, strangers in the silent garden.

Lichtental

D. H. Lawrence (1885 - 1930)


***************
In a Restaurant

He wears a red rose in his buttonhole,
A city-clerk on Sunday dining out:
And as the music surges over the din
The heady quavering of the violin
Sings through his blood, and puts old cares to rout,
And tingles, quickening, through his shrunken soul,

Till he forgets he ledgers, and the prim
Black, crabbèd figures, and the qualmy smell
Of ink and musty leather and leadglaze,
As, in eternities of Summer days,
He dives through shivering waves, or rides the swell
On rose-red seas of melody aswim.

Wilfrid Wilson Gibson (1878 – 1962)

***************
I learened that Gibson was best known for his poem "Flannen Isle," based on a true story of the mysterious disappearance of three lighthouse workers. My first thought was, Hey, that sounds like it would make a good movie! Sure enough that show exists: The Vanishing, a 2018 psychological thriller that I only came across because of reading The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek.

After viewing the movie, we followed up with a documentary that gave additional background, perhaps more factual, though much remains unknown. For example, the three lighthouse keepers probably did not kill each other; more likely, they were swept away in the storm. Still, you never know what facts or fictions may be revealed, or how one title will lead on to another, when you are being guided by the reading list of a learned Book Woman!

All - loving, tender - hearted Book Woman
Photo by Jay Beets

Me as Book Woman:
Likes to read aloud!

P.S. Try to find later:
Book Woman link
Read aloud link

Sacred Ground

~ Book Benches ~
Burgas, Bulgaria

Q: What do books stores & grief have in common?
A: "Where there is sorrow, there is holy ground."
~ Oscar Wilde ~

The Magic of the Book:
~ Hermann Hesse on Why We Read and Always Will ~

**************

Summer Reading So Far

Two old favs by E. L. Konigsburg:
Silent to the Bone & Outcasts of Schuyler Place

Two old favs by Muriel Spark:
A Far Cry From Kensington & Memento Mori

Two new mysteries:
Kiss of the Moonflower by Joe Benevento
Careless Love by Steve Zettler

Three sci - fis:
Recursion by Blake Crouch
Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang
The Machine Stops by E. M. Forster (2022 ~ Great Books)

One biography:
Irish Peacock and Scarlet Marquess:
The Real Trial of Oscar Wilde
by Wilde's grandson, Merlin Holland

Ariadne

A sad tale, no matter how it is portrayed . . .

Ariadne in Naxos ~ 1877
by Evelyn De Morgan ~ 1855 - 1919

from the novel Ariadne
by Jennifer Saint
~ My birthday present from Ben & Cathleen! ~
~ Highly recommended summer reading! ~

Dionysus: "I did not speak of my burning questions . . . the need to ask why. Why mortals bloomed like flowers and crumbled to nothing. Why their absence left a gnawing ache, a hollow void that could never be filled. And how everything they once were, that spark within them, could be extinguished so completely yet the world did not collapse under the weight of so much pain and grief" (176 - 77).

"But I have told you, Ariadne, that the other gods are not like me. I have walked among mortals for many years and I know the dizzying joys of humanity: the fragile, ferocious power of human love and the savage force of grief. When I share wine with mortals, we celebrate together and I feel the clustered hopes and yearinings, the pain and fears that you all share. In those sacred rites, as simple and ancient as the world itself, we raise a cup and we drink together, and our souls are freed from the constraints of the everyday. We find what unites us, what we have in common with one another. I have felt the gaping wound and the bruised, ragged edges of grief. I know that human life shines more brightly because it is but a shimmering candle against an eternity of darkness, and it can be extinguished with the faintest breeze" (178 - 79).

Ariadne Abandoned by Theseus ~ before 1782
by Angelica Kauffmann ~ 1741 – 1807

More about Ariadne & Dionysus

Bacchus and Ariadne ~ 1522–1523
Titan ~ 1488/90 - 1576

Indoors Outdoors

Thanks to my friend Nikki for sharing this one:
Sunshine in the Living Room, 1910–1912
by Peter Ilsted (1861 - 1933)

So beautiful to read indoors on a late Spring day . . .
equally lovely to sit outside . . .

Springtime or The Reader, 1872
by Claude Monet (1840 – 1926)

Taurus ~ Shakespeare's Birthday

****************

Gemini ~ My Birthday
An excellent birthday quote that most likely remains
true no matter what the ages in question:

"The truth is, your mother doesn't know any more
about being forty than you do about being twenty."
from A: A Novel ~ by Alan Lindsay

****************

Reading selection for a lush afternoon:
Rules of Civility ~ by Amor Towles

A few favorite passages:
93: "'Absolutely.'

"A neutral observer would probably have raised an eyebrow at my answer. There wasn't much jingle in my delivery, and one-word responses just have that way of not sounding very convincing. But the thing of it is, I meant it. Every one word of it."

156: "Dicky . . . took relative pride and absolute joy in weaving together the strands of his life so that when he gave them a good tug all the friends of friends of friends would come tumbling through the door."
[Similar to Mrs. Dalloway!]

323-24: "Life doesn't have to provide you any options at all. It can easily define your course from the outset and keep you in check through all manner of rough and subtle mechanics. To have even one year when you're presented with choices that can alter your circumstances, your character, your course -- that's by the grace of God alone. And it shouldn't come without a price. . . . I know that right choices by definition are the means by which life crystallizes loss."

P.S.
"You have learned something.
That always feels at first
as if you have lost something." 

from Major Barbara
by George Bernard Shaw

Flat Stanley

Flat Stanley takes Little Darby for a Walk

Many thanks to my great - nephew Judah for asking me to participate in the The Flat Stanley Project. Similar to the travels of my Panama Bag or the famous travelling gnomes who are kidnapped and taken on trips around the world, the idea is to send Flat Stanley out to meet new people and see new places. Then he returns to the schoolchildren to share his various adventures of life beyond the classroom.

If this is the first you've heard of the Flat Stanley books by Jeff Brown, now is the time to add these fun titles to that all - important summer reading list! Summer vacation is the perfect time to check out Stanley's Original Adventure, as well as the entire series of sequels. (You can also watch on youtube.)

Here's what Flat Stanley and I got up to
when he came for a visit in my neck of the woods:

First, meeting the pets . . .

Flat Stanley get a kiss From Darby.

Flat Stanely pets the cats, Lester and Fuqua.

Flat Stanley encounters another kind of cat --
and admires the very creative sidewalk art!

Second, some local highlights . . .

Flat Stanley has breakfast at our favorite restaurant:
Town & Gown Bistro.

Historic Amtrak Station in Lafayette, Indiana.

Flat Stanley crosses the pedestrian bridge
over the Wabash River. Lafayette on one side,
West Lafayette on the other (Indiana).

Welcome to the Renewable Energy House --
a perfect fit for Flat Stanley!

Third, a visit to campus . . .

Flat Stanley flies the flag at Purdue University,
West Lafayette, Indiana.

Flat Stanley goes for a “Spin” around the campus!

Flat Stanley has a chat with Neil Armstrong,
sitting by the Neil Armstrong Hall of Engineering

American Astronaut
Neil Armstrong
BS Aeronautical Engineering 1955
Honorary Doctorate 1970

Fourth, a well - earned rest . . .

After a busy afternoon, Flat Stanley
takes a nap in the stroller with Baby Ellie.

Biobooks from Friends

'Oh time where are you?'

Self Portrait ~ Time Flies ~ Frida Kahlo

Looking through some old reading journals,
I recently came across this line from 1981:

"So many things to read!
Or, as my dear, wise friend Diane says,
'Oh time where are you?' "

Thanks to my readerly friends who sent me the following
selections, life stories from various times and places,
which have enriched the first quarter of 2021:
Shuggie Bain (2020)
by Douglas Stuart (b 1976)

" . . . every single one of her children was as observant and wary as a prison warden" (51).

"Now, as the taxi pulled out into the main road, Agnes made a show of looking back and waving mournfully through the rear window with a long, heavy blink. She thought it was a cinematic touch, like she was the star of her own matinee" (90).

" 'Why the f--k did you bring me here?'

'I had to see.'

'Had to see what? . . . I thought this is what you wanted.'

'I had to see if you would actually come.'

She had loved him, and he had needed to break her completely to leave her for good" (110).

Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood (2016)
by Trevor Noah (b 1984)

" . . . Hitler is not the worst thing a black South African can imagine. Every country thinks their history is the most important, and that’s especially true in the West. But if black South Africans could go back in time and kill one person, Cecil Rhodes would come up before Hitler. If people in the Congo could go back in time and kill one person, Belgium’s King Leopold would come way before Hitler. If Native Americans could go back in time and kill one person, it would probably be Christopher Columbus or Andrew Jackson.

"I often meet people in the West who insist that the Holocaust was the worst atrocity in human history, without question. Yes, it was horrific. But I often wonder, with African atrocities like in the Congo, how horrific were they? The thing Africans don't have that the Jewish people do have is documentation. The Nazis kept meticulous records, took pictures, made films. And that's really what it comes down to. Holocaust victims count because Hitler counted them. Six million people killed. We can all look at that number and rightly be horrified. But when you read through the history of atrocities against Africans, there are no numbers, only guesses. It's harder to be horrified by a guess. When Portugal and Belgium were plundering Angola and the Congo, they weren't counting the black people they slaughtered. How many black people died harvesting rubber in the Congo? In the gold and diamond mines of the Transvaal?

"So in Europe and America, yes, Hitler is the Greatest Madman in History. In Africa he's just another strongman from the history books . . . (195 - 96).

George S. Kaufman [1889 - 1961]: An Intimate Portrait (1972)
by Howard Teichmann (1916 - 1987)

"Edna said she's rather work with George than anyone else . . . Later in their collaboration Miss Ferber acquired a country house, and for a while they worked there. Frequently, however, an impatient buzzer would sound; Edna would excuse herself and leave the room. A few minutes later, she'd return, work would resume, and then the buzzer would sound again.

"Infuriated by these interruptions, George demanded an explanation. 'Well, here in the country, help is so hard to get that I don't ring for the servants,' she said. 'When they want something, they send for me.'

"'They're acting like actors, Edna,' he bristled. 'Pretty soon they'll want their names above the title of this play'" (89).

"'Edna,' he once said, 'reminds me of a Confederate general. And I'm from Pittsburgh'" (90).

"Another time, when things weren't going too well with Strike Up the Band, Ira Gershwin saw two elegant Edwardian - looking gentlemen buying tickets at the box office.

"'That must be Gilbert and Sullivan coming to fix the show,' Gershwin quipped.

"'Why don't you put jokes like that in your lyrics?' Kaufman countered" (108).

"'You've heard of people living in a fool's paradise?' Kaufman inquired. 'Well, Leonora has a duplex there'" (125).

Five People in Heaven (2003)
by Mitch Albom (b 1958)

"Learn this from me. Holding anger is a poison. It eats you from the inside. We think that hating is a weapon that attacks the person who harmed us. But hatred is a curved blade. And the harm we do, we do to ourselves. . . . You need to forgive" (141 - 42).