Reading.......The Dogs of Bedlam Farm

One of the advantages of no longer being able to sleep at night (racing thoughts, cumbersome bellies that can't get comfortable, and innumerable trips to the bathroom - yes, this baby thinks my bladder is a trampoline!), is being able to indulge in a long overdue book binge. See, there's a silver lining to everything, right?

A few nights ago, I finished up Jon Katz's book, The Dogs of Bedlam Farm, and I loved it. I was thrilled to learn that there is a vast Katz library out there to be savored, page by page. Bring on those night time feedings baby boy! I might pass on the murder thrillers, but the dog books? Yes, please! I've always been a dog lover, but Katz elevates your average dog lover's adoration of our canine companions to a deep, almost spiritual level. The book is a simple memoir, a middle aged suburbanite spending the winter in a farmhouse in Washington County in upstate New York. The writing is clear and to the point, with incidences both bitingly funny and sometimes, deeply sad as well (although as Katz writes in the foreward, no dogs die in this book.....I would have kept reading it anyway, but that claim made me feel much safer in doing so). But the overarching promise of this book is found in the author's insights into how our relationship with dogs reveals so much about our relationship with our fellow humans, the rest of the natural world, and even ourselves. These revelations are so profound and thought provoking that, if you're like me, you'll have an entirely new respect and admiration for the precious pooch you already loved. And, again if you're like me, you'll be trying to convince your husband that it makes perfect sense to get a small herd of sheep and two border collies come spring. Negotiations are pending.

A Homemade Life

I knew Molly Wizenberg and I were kindred spirits when I tallied up 5 separate and distinct recipes for banana bread on her fabulous cooking blog, Orangette. My personal favorite is the chocolate chip banana bread, which actually isn’t on the blog, but in her book, A Homemade Life. I read this book over the summer, not knowing that a “cookbook” would evermore be present in my list of favorite books of all time. Seriously, it’s that good.

First of all, it’s only a cookbook in the sense that it includes some absolutely fabulous recipes. But more importantly, it’s a deeply personal story of Molly and her family, told through memories of food and table. The story is not especially unique (therein lies a big part of the charm), but it is warm, generous, heartfelt, funny, and infinitely moving. Molly’s writing style is what really sets this book apart. Yes, all of our stories could probably be told through food, but few of us could tell them as compellingly as Molly. I could read this book over and over again, and probably will.

I’ve also become an avid reader of Molly’s monthly column in Bon Appetit magazine. These blueberry oat scones are scrumptious and I too, now consider myself an apostle of kale!

Cold Comfort Farm

All signs point to fall: dried leaves fluttering down from the trees, a teensy nip in the evening breeze, goldenrods blooming (six weeks till frost!), and of course, that familiar hankering to pick up a Jane Austen novel. I guess it's partly a holdover from the back to school mentality that us college English majors can never quite get rid of, or maybe it's the fact that fall and winter encourage the return to a focus on home and domesticity. Either way, last fall it was Northanger Abbey, and I'm thinking this fall it will probably be Emma.

But, it's only September, which to me, still qualifies as late summer. Calendar gods aside, I don't really consider it officially fall until October. So, in the interest of saving Emma for October, I've decided to go with a more modern novel of English country manners in the form of Stella Gibbons' Cold Comfort Farm. This 1932 comic novel centers around an orphaned young woman, Flora Poste, who is looking for relatives to live with, and ultimately decides upon some distant cousins who live in the isolated Cold Comfort Farm in Sussex. Upon arrival, she discovers a hodgepodge of extended family with various problems and eccentricities, and makes it her mission to bring civilized order to this chaotic rural existence. Perfect for a rainy September day, no?

Reading.....Flapper

I just finished this book, and WOW! I absolutely loved it. The book centers around the concept of the "flapper," but really is more of a comprehensive social history of modern culture. Before I read this book I mostly associated "flappers" with superficial things like glamorous 20s fashions, bobbed hair, and the Charleston. The ostentatious rebellion present in this new method of dressing and behavior didn't really resonate with me until I read this book. Although I think it's fair to say that every generation feels a tension with their parents' generation, the chasm between Victorian values and the advent of the modern world was much greater than that between, say, me and the baby boomers.

Zeitz structures the book around some of the more prominent individuals of the decade, including:

F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald

Lois Long

Coco Chanel

Louise Brooks

Although I've always been intrigued with the Roaring Twenties (who isn't?), after reading this book, I'm looking at that era of excess and indulgence in a somewhat darker light. Basically, we have the 20s to thank for the pervasive mass consumerism of our culture. It was at this time that Madison Avenue advertising executives transformed the flapper into a caricature and turned from advertising based on objective, factual information to advertising based on the concept of selling a dream or a lifestyle. It was also in the 1920s that the homogenization of American culture began in earnest, as farm girls in the midwest learned to emulate big city styles and mores. Unique regional values and traditions started to slip away thanks to radio, advertising, and the advent of silent films, leaving a culture based on pipe dreams and credit. As with any form of progress, it seems we often merely trade one set of problems for another.

Reading.....Edna St. Vincent Millay

I woke up to a rainy summer morning today, perfect for curling up on the porch swing with a cup of Earl Gray and a volume of poetry. I revisited an old favorite today, Edna St. Vincent Millay. I became obsessed with her in college. I remember once in my bohemian days of staying out late and discussing existential matters with complete strangers, meeting a young man who quoted Edna St. Vincent Millay sonnets to me over a bottle of cabernet. It's a good thing he was only passing through my city, or I might have married him and then Kate would have never been born.

In a lot of ways Edna St. Vincent Millay is a poet of youth and defiance, but even now, not quite as young, flippant, and devil may care as I was then, I'm mesmerized by her wit, independence and keen insights into human fallibilty and both the thrill and isolation of freedom. This poem served as a sort of anthem for her generation (and really any generation of youth, no matter the decade).


"First Fig"
My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends-
It gives a lovely light!

I've long had Nancy Milford's biography of Edna St. Vincent Millay, Savage Beauty, on my reading list, but I'm thinking it may need to be bumped up to the top of the queue after rereading these lovely poems today.

Reading.....Maisie Dobbs

For the past few days, I've been completely immersed in the world of Maisie Dobbs, the heorine of Jacqueline Winspear's historical mystery/romance series. Maisie Dobbs is a private investigator, working in London just following the first world war. The historical details peppered throughout the novels are fascinating, and the heroine herself is hardly your typical PI. Through Maisie, Winspear brings sensivitivity and compassion to a genre that doesn't typically focus on those two human attributes. Although she has razor sharp intelligence and keen insights, Maisie Dobbs doesn't merely solve crimes. She finds solutions to complex problems that affect wide circles of people living in the shadow of one of the most turbulent, destructive eras of human history.

I've just finished the first novel, entitled Maisie Dobbs, and moved on to the second in the series, Birds of a Feather. These books are much more than just cozy mystery novels to curl up with on a rainy afternoon, although if you're anything like me, you will greatly enjoy doing just that.

Reading.....Lulu in Marrakech

A shade darker than my favorite Diane Johnson books (the European novels: Le Divorce, Le Mariage, L'Affaire), this is still an excellent, engaging, and exotic read. Often described as a modern day cross between Jane Austen and Henry James, Johnson has veered outside the expatriate community of Paris, for a similar, but more sinister, circle in Morocco. A perfect beach book for those who shun fluffy chic lit.

Reading.....Girls In Trucks

If you're looking for a great summer read, I highly recommend Girls in Trucks by Katie Crouch. I have to confess that initially, I totally judged this book by it's cover. Thankfully, it didn't disappoint. And it really is such a gorgeous image. The debut novel tells the story of Sarah Walters and her journey from awkward Charleston debutante to jaded New York city girl. Somewhat of a cliche premise, but Crouch rises above stereotypical chic lit with a promising novel of depth, wisdom, and razor sharp humor. Perfect beach read.

Author's website.

Reading.......Harriet the Spy

I've been taking a jaunt down memory lane lately, rereading some of my favorite books from childhood, and Harriet the Spy definitely tops the list. I remember reading this book as a child and immediately vowing to carry around a notebook and write down every single thing I did and saw. This usually lasted about a week, thus the huge box of half filled journals and notebooks in my attic. But seriously, this is one of my all time favorite books. Harriet is such an incredible character. Not always likeable, but always original and very real. Rereading this book as an adult was a bit of a different experience, because I just don't recall the book being as dark as it seems now. There are some scenes that are perfectly Lord of the Flies-esque. But that is part of the brilliance of Louise Fitzhugh who is credited with introducing more realistic, less cookie cutter characters to young adult literature.

While reading up on Louise Fitzhugh's biography, I discovered that she also contributed the illustrations to a popular 1961 children's book, Suzuki Beane, which sounds absolutely delightful. A parody of Kay Thompson's Eloise books, Suzuki Beane is the child of beatnik parents, a downtown kid who becomes friends with an Upper East Side boy, thus exposing her to an entirely new world. Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz bought the rights to the book, planning a sitcom around it, but it never happened. The book is now out of print and hard to find and I'm kicking myself because I found a copy on ebay over the weekend, very reasonably priced and no bidders, but I forgot to bid. Exactly the reason I don't really like ebay. Maybe next time.

Reading......The Mitford Sisters

Having just finished Mary Lovell's Mitford Family biography, I’m finding myself somewhat obsessed with eccentric British aristocrats and the early 20th century. Lovell’s biography was absolutely fascinating and very thorough. This was my first introduction to the infamous Mitford family, the five sisters and one brother who achieved such fame and notoriety during the period spanning the two world wars. How remarkable that such diverse worldviews and personalities could come from the same family!

I suppose Nancy Mitford would be considered the most famous. Her success as an author was built upon The Pursuit of Love, featuring characters largely drawn from her own family. Although Nancy considered herself a Socialist, she was really largely apolitical, especially when compared with her three sisters: Diana, Unity, and Jessica (Decca). Renowned for her beauty, Diana left her first husband, the heir to the Guiness family fortune, to become mistress (and years later, wife) of Sir Oswald Mosely, leader of the British Union of Fascists. She was imprisoned for much of World War II and deemed the most hated woman in England. Unity was perhaps the most extreme in her views. Also a Fascist, she maintained a close relationship with Hitler, which progressed from teen idol worship to a much deeper, rather ambiguous, relationship. She was rumored to be his mistress, but the truth in that has never been confirmed. When England declared war on Germany, she shot herself in the head (oddly enough she didn’t manage to kill herself, but did exhibit notable brain damage for the rest of her life).

Decca, the rebel of the family, moved to America and became a Communist. She would later also write a novel based heavily upon her family and also a stunning expose of the funeral industry in America. Pamela, the second oldest, was probably the least famous. She is described as the most “rural” Mitford, and preferred spending time caring for her farm in the country.

Debo, the youngest, married Andrew, who would become the Duke of Devonshire.

I love reading a good biography, especially one that is well-written and reads more like a novel, which this one does. Not only did I learn so much about this individual family, but I discovered so many things I did not know about that critical time period. Reading this book has also added immensely to my already lengthy reading list. Now I must read The Pursuit of Love and Love in a Cold Climate, and this collection of letters between Nancy and her good friend Evelyn Waugh. While I’m at it, I have a burning desire to reread Brideshead Revisited, as well as Vile Bodies, which I’ve never read, but Waugh later in life admitted to being based upon the lifestyle of Diana Mitford (whom he also confessed to being in love with, although she never returned his affections) and her first husband, Bryan Guiness. I was also so intrigued with Unity, even though her worldview was so despicable, that I want to read her individual biography as well.

Reading....Sylvia Plath

Although I read The Bell Jar in high school, my Sylvia Plath obsession didn't hit hard until my late teens and early twenties. It was around the same time I started wearing a lot of black and had a brief, disgusting fling with smoking cigarettes. Thankfully, it was relatively short lived and I must say that I'm glad those days are over. It's much more pleasant not having to pretend to know everything or to wallow in the throes of post-adolescent angst. Even so, I still have to admit to an enduring admiration for Plath's brilliant poetry and a fascination (albeit a slightly morbid one) with her strange, disturbing, tragic life. A few days ago, I read that Plath's son, Nicholas Hughes, a science professor in Alaska, tragically committed suicide last week, after a long battle with depression. When you think of the horrors that family has had to endure, it's almost unbearable. I hadn't realized that Ted Hughes mistress, Assia Wevill, also killed herself and their daughter, Shura, in a sort of copycat version of Plath's own suicide. Really, very dramatic, depressing stuff. Critics like to point out that Plath's talent was not that great, but that the public has a morbid fascination with her biography. Even though I concede that her tumultuous relationship with Hughes and her ultimate suicide certainly created the cult status she holds with angsty adolescents, I think it's unfair to view her solely in that light, rather than as the brilliant poet that she actually was.

I hadn't read Plath in years. In fact, a few months ago when I was sorting through some old books, I almost sent a volume of poetry and The Complete Journals of Sylvia Plath to the thrift store where I donate my old stuff. For some reason, I held on to them, and I'm glad I did. I've been flipping through these books the past few days and while they are disturbing and frightening (perhaps largely because they can't really be read in isolation, without the taint of knowing the tragic outcome of her life), I still find them very intriguing. Especially her poetry. It is through her poetry that her real, raw talent shines brightest. This was my favorite poem, back in those bohemian days of shunning love and marriage (again, so glad that's over :) !)

I really loved the movie, Sylvia, when it came out, although I haven't seen it in years. Gwyneth Paltrow is one of my favorite modern actresses and I think that with her cool reserve, sophistication, and obvious intelligence, she was ideally suited for this part. Daniel Craig played the part of Ted Hughes. In spite of the sad story, the movie was strangely beautiful. And even though I run the risk of sounding amazingly shallow, I just loved the literary chic costumes in this movie.

Reading......The Virago Book of Love Letters

I don’t think I have ever received (or for that matter written) a real love letter. Now, before you fall to pieces feeling so sorry for me that you just can’t stand it, perhaps I should clarify. Like most school age girls, I received my share of the wildly romantic “check yes or no” notes, scrawled on wide ruled notebook paper and covertly passed when the teacher’s back was turned. But as a young woman who came of age in the digital era, written correspondence was already pretty much obsolete, which is kind of sad. I’m not at all opposed to email. In fact, my sentimental self saved all of those sweet, flirtatious emails sent from my husband early in our relationship and sometimes it’s fun to sit down and read back through them. But still, the romantic in me can’t help but wish that those same words were hand-written on ivory paper, worn thin from being held and read over and over again. Perhaps the ubiquitous tearstain smudging the ink in certain passages. Something I could tie up with a pretty ribbon and put in a chest for some great-great granddaughter to discover in a dusty attic years from now. Ah well…..



At least I can live vicariously through Jill Dawson’s book. The Virago Book of Love Letters is a delightful collection of love letters written by women from the thirteenth century to the present. I’ve been reading it for some time now, just a letter here and there. An eclectic mix of sweetness and scandal, it’s quite a lovely book. Some passages made me cry, some made me blush, but all were beautifully written and utterly captivating.

Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII

Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir

Oddly enough, I couldn’t help but feel the occasional twinge of guilt. By their very nature, love letters are meant to be private, so reading them is almost akin to reading someone’s diary. Most of the writers in this collection have been dead for a long time, but I still can’t help but wonder how they would feel, knowing that those precious secret words were now shared with so many.

William Butler Yeats and Maud Gonne

Ultimately, my voyeurism won out over my respect for individual privacy (as it usually does, if I’m being honest about it). Some of my favorites are pictured here: Simon de Beauvoir to Jean Paul Sartre, Maude Gonne to W.B. Yeats, Anne Boleyn to Henry VIII, George Sand to Lord Byron, Mileva Maric to Albert Einstein, and so many others!

Mileva Maric and Albert Einstein