André Breton, poet, writer, and father of Surrealism, was born on 19 February 1896.
André Breton, 1924.
“Let us not mince words…the marvelous is always beautiful, anything marvelous is beautiful, in fact only the marvelous is beautiful.”-André Breton
When you died on 11 February 1963, my mom was nine years old. My grandmother was your age: thirty. She’s eighty-one now, but to all of the world you still look like this:
Sylvia Plath.
How sad.
“The silence depressed me. It wasn’t the silence of silence. It was my own silence.”-Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
Sir John Suckling, poet and inventor of cribbage, was born on 10 February 1609.
Sir John Suckling by Anthony van Dyck, 17th century.
“I prithee send me back my heart,/Since I cannot have thine;/For if from yours you will not part,/Why, then, shouldst thou have mine?”
Langston Hughes was born on 1 February 1902.
Langston Hughes by Carl Van Vechten, February 1936.
“I have discovered in life that there are ways of getting almost anywhere you want to go, if you really want to go.”-Langston Hughes
Amiri Baraka Dead at 79 [courtesy nj.com]
“A system that warehouses people is not the cure for social ills.”
“Should I kill myself, or have a cup of coffee?”-Albert Camus (died on 4 January 1960)
Albert Camus, 1957
“Genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood.”-T.S. Eliot (died on 4 January 1965)
T.S. Eliot
“Choose love not in the shallows/but in the deep.”-Christina Rossetti (died on 12/29/1894)
Christina Rossetti, portrait by her brother
“Let everything happen to you/Beauty and terror/Just keep going/No feeling is final.”-Rainer Maria Rilke (died on 12/29/1926)
Rainer Maria Rilke by Paula Modersohn-Becker, 1906
“The universe is full of magical things, patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.”-Eden Phillpotts (died on 12/29/1960)
Eden Phillpotts by Frederic Taber Cooper, 1912
Happy Birthday, dearest Emily!
Birthday Girl Emily Dickinson (Born 10 December 1830).
FIVE EVERYDAY FACTS ABOUT EMILY DICKINSON:
EMILY ELIZABETH WAS A MIDDLE CHILD, SANDWICHED BETWEEN OLDER BROTHER (WILLIAM) AUSTIN AND YOUNGER SISTER LAVINIA (NORCROSS).
SHE WAS KNOWN FOR HER SIMPLE WARDROBE OF MOSTLY WHITE CLOTHING.
EMILY HAD A PET NEWFOUNDLAND DOG NAMED CARLO.
SHE WAS A GIFTED BAKER.
EMILY WAS A DEDICATED AND WELL-EDUCATED GARDENER.
“I am out with lanterns, looking for myself.”-Emily Dickinson
Edith Sitwell, a most unusual poet and highly colourful character, died on 9 December 1964. She was 77 years old.
Edith Sitwell by Roger Fry, 1915
“I have often wished I had time to cultivate modesty…But I am too busy thinking about myself.”-Edith Sitwell
Cold weather never travels alone. It packs many well-loved delights in its frosty bag of tricks, including: hot chocolate, gingerbread, nifty patterned gloves and scarves, pumpkin-flavored everything, frozen breath, crackling wood fires, mulled beverages, and fairy lights. Whilst those are wonderful there are other, lesser extolled, pleasures in which to indulge: mint chocolate brownies, hot water bottle cozies, the scent of real pine, watching snow fall at midnight, and seasonal reading. Oh, seasonal reading! How I adore thee.
Yearly I turn to you, as the calendar begins its long hike through winter’s desolate days…
I seek you out to warm my cold soul and chapped heart…
You do things to me that hot drinks and heavy blankets never could…
What a comfort you are, my winter writers!
There is but one solution when faced with the inevitable onslaught of nasty, chilling weather: arm yourself to the teeth with a weighty supply of wonderful books, and dig in for the duration. As soon as temperatures sink, an instinctual survival mode kicks in and I start to ritualize my life-including a long-standing pattern of reading works by the same authors. The books themselves vary, of course, but their progenitors remain fixed. This time of year my preferences tend towards the following qualities of language, attitude, or thought: severity, hardiness, bareness, intellectual passion, bluntness, pluckiness, and mental or emotional resilience.
Do you read in such seasonal ways? If so, please share your favourite cold weather books and/or writers in the comments! Here is my list.
MY TOP SIX COLD WEATHER WRITERS
EMILY BRONTË
Emily Brontë by Branwell Brontë
REASON: Her solitary, willful disposition.
“I’ll walk where my own nature would be leading: It vexes me to choose another guide.”
ANTON CHEKHOV
Anton Chekhov, 1889
REASON: No one speaks to my deepest soul the way nineteenth-century Russian writers do, Chekhov chief amongst them.
“The role of the artist is to ask questions, not answer them.”
EMILY DICKINSON
Emily Dickinson
REASON: The economy of her writing.
“One need not be a chamber to be haunted.” Continue reading
A Small Press Life: Books. Art. Writing. Life. Tea. 