As nuanced as a dry martini and as evocative as Proust’s madeleine, Joseph Goodrich’s The Paris Manuscript explores the intersection of art, passion, and deception with perceptive elegance. Ned is an old man, who has reluctantly agreed to move in with his daughter’s family. As he begins to clean out his own home, he discovers […]
What I’m Reading at Byrdcliffe: The Paris Manuscript
Fables and Folk Stories is one of the myriad textbooks produced by Horace E. Scudder in a lengthy and varied literary career. The books is a conventional collection of well-known fairy tales, in keeping with Scudder’s stated pedagogical claim that “As soon as a child has learned to make out simple sentences, the wise teacher
What They Read at Byrdcliffe:Fables and Folk Stories
Jessie L. Weston is now best known for her seminal study From Ritual to Romance, in which she argues that the entire mythos of the Holy Grail is in fact a coded memory of Celtic pagan rituals. Her theory, although largely discredited by academic Arthurian scholars, remains influential to this day. The Byrdcliffe Library contains
What They Read at Byrdcliffe: Jessie L. Weston’s Legends of the Wagner Dramas and Tristan and Iseult
Hervey White is not a man you’d be inclined to trust as a children’s book author. Instead, he was a true maverick, long before founding a colony that bore that name. Although White was one of the original founders of Byrdcliffe, his Maverick Colony broke free almost immediately, in 1905. The name Maverick was derived
What They Read at Byrdcliffe: Noll and the Fairies by Hervey White
I took a brief detour from transcribing the Byrdcliffe Library’s card catalogue entries to search the Colony’s Guest Register for the names of writers visiting Byrdclffe, in support of an upcoming exhibition sponsored by the Woodstock Byrdcliffe Guild. As is so often the case when researching old libraries and old archives, I stumbled into a
What They May Have Read at Byrdcliffe — Mystery Edition
In Our Lady of the Serpents, Petrie Harbouri weaves acutely observed characters, a profound understanding of ancient myth, and a perfect ear for the rhythms of nature into a masterful meditation on life, death, and human passion. Just as the mountains and sacred springs of the Greek landscape embody Greek myth, Harbouri’s tale takes the
What I’m Reading at Byrdcliffe
So very excited to see my article, “What They Read at Byrdcliffe,” published by the University College of London Press in #PaperTrails. You can check it out for free at https://www.uclpress.co.uk/products/169046 And then do come back to check out my blog for updates about the treasures I’ve discovered on Byrdcliffe’s (virtual) shelves.
The paired surrealist novellas in the aptly-titled Voyages to Nowhere masterfully explore the lacunae that divide being and experience. Tom Newton’s vivid prose and striking imagery chart the brutal intersections between reality and imagination (or is it madness and sanity?) on a psychological, political and artistic level. The stories are a diptych, at once united
What I’m Reading at Byrdcliffe — Voyages to Nowhere by Tom Newton
Very privileged to offer the following review of Winter Witness by Tina DeBellegarde — one of the very talented alumni of the MWA-NY Mentor Program. Beautifully written and evocative, Winter Witness explores the comforts and quirky charms of small-town life that have drawn so many urban dwellers to the slower rhythms of the Hudson Valley.
What I’ve Been Reading at Byrdcliffe
Now and then, the coolest things show up in your inbox. Like the email from Lauren Dolman of the Balliol College Library at Oxford, who had kindly replied to my query about a bookplate last year. (Here I go citing myself again, but if you’re interested in finding out about that, look here.) Lauren was
What They Read at Byrdcliffe: There and Back Again