Archive for the ‘Where to Go?’ Category
February 23rd
NY Times writer Patricia Cohen had a fascinating article in the Arts section on February 11, 2010. It was titled” “Where Faulkner Found His People: Characters’ Names Are Inside a Plantation Diary the Writer Knew Well.”
“The climactic moment,” the article begins, “in William Faulkner’s 1942 novel “Go Down, Moses” comes when Isaac McCaslin finally decides to open his grandfather’s leather farm ledgers with their ’scarred and cracked backs’ and ‘yellow pages scrawled in fading ink’ –proof of his family’s slave-0wning past.” 
The diary that was a source for Faulkner for names, incidents and details was penned in the mid-1800s by Francis Terry Leak, a wealthy plantation owner in Mississippi. His great-grandson, Edgar Wiggin Francisco, Jr., was a friend of Faulkner’s since childhood. Mr. Francisco’s son, now 79, recalled the writer’s frequent visits throughout the 1930s, and said Faulkner was fascinated with the diary’s several volumes. Mr. Francisco said he saw them in Faulkner’s hands and recalled that he “was always taking copious notes.”
Sally Wolff-King, a scholar in Southern literature at Emory University who discovered the connection between Faulkner and the journals, called it “a once-in-a-lifetime literary find.” A short preview of her findings was available in the fall 2009 issue of The Southern Literary Journal; her book “Ledgers of History: William Faulkner, an Almost Forgotten Friendship, and an Antebellum Diary,” is due out in June from Louisiana State University Press. 
Has a chance find of a diary in a friend’s house, a yard sale, flea market, antique store or junk shop given you a character or inspired a story?
February 2nd
We have a sighting! Neither Karen nor I has made it to the theaters to see It’s Complicated, the romantic comedy starring Meryl Streep, Alec Baldwin, and Steve Martin. But several friends and readers have, and they’ve been able to confirm that one of our planners does indeed make an appearance. Writes a friend:
“The funny thing about Meryl Streep’s character (in the movie) is that she forgets appointments and meetings. Steve Martin’s character gives her the gift of the leather bound Quo Vadis planner to help her remember her appointments with him. When she opens the gift, the back of the planner is face up. The imprinted Quo Vadis label is displayed before she turns the planner over.”
Note that we did *not* pay for product placement, which is part of the reason we’re so excited about this! Director Nancy Meyers is apparently just a fan of Quo Vadis — as is Meryl Streep.
February 1st
Guest blogger Laurie Huff is a planner aficionado and frequent traveler. She currently lives in Tirana, Albania.
When your daily patterns are mostly predictable, your planner needs are straightforward. You know what your home and work life consists of, and your planner needs are usually consistent from week to week.
But all this is turned on its head when traveling. What works fine at home or in the office may break down when you’re out in the world. Unpredictable things happen while traveling (which of course is part of the fun of traveling in the first place), and you need a planner that is flexible enough to handle out of the ordinary needs. This is especially true when traveling internationally. Suddenly you need information at your fingertips such as international dialing codes and time zone information that you might not normally need in your day to day life. Especially for people who travel frequently, whether for work or pleasure, you need a planner that can handle your day to day life as well as your travel needs.
Several years ago while traveling back to the US after living in Nepal, I spent 3 weeks in Paris and 3 weeks traveling around Scotland. That year I used an Exacompta Daily Pocket planner, and that little book was a champ. The book itself is tiny, light, and took up no space at all in my bag. But the page size is still substantial, and having a page for each day was great during my entire trip. I used that little book for everything. Each page had plenty of room to write flight reservation details and phone numbers of hostels I stayed in. While in Paris I took a short course in French language, and the daily pages held my lesson reminders and reading assignments. On one page I drew a map of how to get to a new friend’s apartment off the Champs-Elysees for dinner. I recorded each place I went on my journey around Scotland. In the cover pockets I tucked in slips of paper with people’s email addresses, ferry schedules and postcard stamps. I filled the pages with the location of that excellent crepe place, the quaint restaurant where we ate a delicious dinner, and the cool shops I found on the little side streets. Now it’s an excellent record of my trip, and when I look through that little book the memories come right back.
Last fall on a trip to Budapest I didn’t even bring my planner because the one I was using at the time was too bulky. Besides, I was only going for a week, surely I could live without my planner? No, of course not. I had forgotten to notify my credit card company that I was traveling, and when I used my card to pre-pay my hotel the early warning protection caused it to seize up. I needed to call the US from Hungary to rectify it. But what is the code to dial OUT of Hungary for an international call?? If I’d had my planner with me with its page of international dialing codes, I would have had that information at my fingertips. But instead, with no planner (and no internet) it took me about 30 minutes of searching and asking people before I found out it’s 00, like much of the rest of Europe. By the time I placed my call, the Fraud Protection office was closed. 5 minutes ago. So I had to wait until the next day to call. Lesson learned: don’t leave home without my planner and its list of international dialing codes!
My most recent trip was to Scotland over the holidays, and I brought along my Minister planner (with its list of international dialing codes, time zones and extensive maps, which I love). I didn’t really think I’d be using it much during my vacation. I wound up using it extensively, to my surprise.
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January 25th
Guest blogger Lito Apostolakou is a freelance author, historian, and feature writer at Suite101; she also has a fascinating blog on the history of writing instruments. Here, she writes about seeing one of Leonardo’s notebooks.
It doesn’t look like much, in fact the humble notebook is no bigger than a pack of playing cards, yet it is one of the most precious objects on display in the new Medieval and Renaissance Galleries in the Victoria & Albert Museum in London. The notebook of Leonardo da Vinci which dates from 1490-3 is one of five owned by the museum and it was bequeathed by English collector, John Forster in 1876.
It is packed with tiny handwriting, notes about geometry, hydraulics and weights and (curiously) with drawings of hats. At the time Leonardo compiled his notebook he was working for Duke Ludovico Sforza in Milan and he was probably required to create costumes for court festivities – hence the hat drawings. The notebook seems to be suffering from ink corrosion (due to the iron gall ink Leonardo used) and is very light sensitive. It was a privilege to have seen it.
December 28th
I just got back from a week-long trip to Stuttgart to visit family (which is why it’s been so quiet ’round here lately, speaking of the gift of time!). Spending Christmas in Germany is one of my favorite things; I’m not particularly religious, but there are all sorts of local traditions that make it enjoyable. There are pastries like Stollen and Lebkuchen. There are ornate, hand-carved wooden pyramids, and live candles on the Christmas trees.
And there are open-air Christmas markets, where you can buy a lot of those things. The markets can get a little kitschy (many of them have become major tourist events), with vendors hawking trinkets and schmatta you could find pretty much anywhere. But there are usually at least a couple of stands that sell nice things like hand-made ornaments or the aforementioned pyramids. You can also get hot, spiced Glühwein if you get cold, and it’s not uncommon for friends to meet up for a glass or two at night — or during the day.
What are your favorite holiday traditions?
December 24th
The last few weeks have been spent rushing around shopping, cleaning, decorating and preparing for Christmas. I’m ready for the holiday except for the most important thing: an unhurried heart to receive the fullness of the season. For that, I need to give myself the gift of time–preferably in a bookstore or museum. In the presence of books and art I feel calm and centered.
I’m heading to the Brooklyn Museum to see James Tissot: The Life of Christ. The exhibit includes 124 watercolors selected from a set of 350 that depict detailed scenes from the Bible. It marks the first time in 20 years that any of the Tissot watercolors has been on view. 
Born in France, James Tissot (1836-1902) enjoyed great success as a society painter in Paris and London in the 1870s and 1880s. Returning from London to Paris, he planned to produce a series of paintings of fashionable Parisian women.
One day, during Mass at the Church of St. Sulpice, he had a vision of Jesus tending to people in a ruined building. After this experience, he abandoned his former subjects and embarked on an ambitious project to illustrate the New Testament.
In preparation for the work, he made expeditions to the Middle East to record the landscape, architecture, costumes, and customs of the Holy Land and its people, which he recorded in photographs, notes and sketches.
An interactive view of Tissot’s sketchbook can be seen here. The sketchbook is made of wove paper bound in leather, 9 1/8 x 6″.
First presented in Paris in 1894, the watercolors were received with great enthusiasm, and a highly publicized exhibition later traveled to London and the United States.
In 1900, at the suggestion of John Singer Sargent, the Brooklyn Museum decided to acquire the series. The purchase funds were raised primarily by public subscription, spurred on, in part, by exhortations in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle newspaper urging readers to contribute to the campaign.
The exhibition runs through January 17, 2010.
To all who celebrate the holiday – warm wishes for a peaceful, blessed and very merry, Christmas.
December 2nd
Remember the untitled romantic comedy we blogged about earlier in the year? Directed by Nancy Meyers and starring Meryl Streep, Alec Baldwin, Steve Martin, and, quite possibly, a Minister planner with a Habana cover?
Well, it now has a name—It’s Complicated—and a scheduled release date of Christmas Day. I didn’t see the planner in the clips they had online, but if you decide to see the movie, keep an eye out for it!
November 29th
I recently saw a news item in the Wall Street Journal about Monica Botkier, founder of the handbag label Botkier. The article described how Botkier understands how hard it can be to deal with all the clutter inside your purse.
The designer believes women carry around too much. “They don’t know how to edit themselves and end up dragging their lives around with them,” she says.
Being a designer, she also carries a tape measure in her bag in case she sees a fabric or home decor item that she likes, “I never know if I’ll see something that inspires me ” and has to be measured.
To help her stay organized, Ms. Botkier picks bags with zippered and outside pockets, which come in handy for things like her phone. “It drove me crazy to have everything in one huge black hole,” she says.
I can empathize with that last statement. For years I carried a leather bag I adored, but it was impossible to find anything in it. Often, after futile searching all through the bag–twice, three times–I would have to dump everything out in order to find my keys, ringing phone, pen, anything.
A few months ago, Myra Eisenberg, the owner of Gallery M in Greenport, NY, told me about a great handbag with plenty of inside pockets for all my “stuff.” She introduced me to Suruchi Handbags, and I have been a fan ever since. The Metro Bag (in black) I purchased is great for walking around New York, and holds up well to the beating I give it commuting in all kinds of weather.
Handbags with pockets solved my “black hole” problem. I still have to search each pocket for my keys(!) but at least I know they’re in one of the pockets!
Read more about Botkier here and here.
Read more about Suruchi here.
November 20th
This lovely little demon comes from a bookmark I picked up years ago while traveling in Spain; he’s from a fifteenth-century painting of the temptation of St. Anthony in the Museum of Fine Arts in Bilbao.
I shoved him in my copy of Beckett’s Murphy, which I had with me at the time, and promptly forgot about him till last week, when I decided to reread the book. Of course, the rereading alone was a pleasure, but it was also nice to reacquaint myself with the bookmark, which I’d always felt was a nice match for the book’s odd, desperate humor (also, Beckett had something of an affinity for medieval sensibilities).
Usually, I keep a collection of old ticket stubs to use as bookmarks — they’re the perfect size and weight, and it’s nice to be reminded of a particular concert or museum as I read. But if a book really speaks to me, I like to choose something that’s especially meaningful and leave it there for future returns. A pretty Japanese bookmark my aunt gave me lives in my copy of Anna Karenina; in Ulysses (which I admittedly haven’t touched since college), it’s a piece of repurposed cardstock with an image of blue sky and clouds. In some books, I simply leave one of my favorite ticket stubs behind — Mrs. Dalloway is home to a stub from Vienna’s Belvedere Gallery, while To The Lighthouse guards a stub from the Frick. It’s basically a way of saying I plan to come back to the book.
What are your bookmark routines?
November 3rd
This Saturday, we got up early and headed out to Sterling Forest for a mist- and fog-filled hike. There was a light rain (it was, as the English would say, “spitting”), and by the end we got quite wet, but a forest in fog is a treat, silent and lovely and full of humid expectation.
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