Sonoma Country Life

Happy Birthday, Boz - Charles Dickens Turns 200

"My sister and I first realized Mr Dickens himself.....as a sort of brilliance in the room, mysteriously dominant and formless. I remember how everybody lighted up when he entered," Annie Thackeray, 1913

Author Claire Tomalin's newly published, superbly epic biography, Charles Dickens, A Life was nicely timed in order to commemorate the world's most beloved author's 200th Birthday, February 7th, 2012.

And I couldn't resist investing in a sturdy new hardback copy of my own in which to immerse myself during this most auspicious of literary bicentenaries. Here it is, pictured above, a large addition to my big red bookshelf of British treasures, including many of Dickens' own classics.

I'm officially off to the races, about a third of the way in, which I figured for a 417 page heavyweight is probably about the right point in his own compelling story in which to stick my bookmark on the 7th.

Poet's Corner, Westminster Abbey is by all accounts the place to be for the most ardent of Dickensian followers this week, as members of the Royal Family, aforementioned biographer Claire Tomalin, actor Ralph Fiennes and apparently,  200 or so of Dickens' descendants  are set to lay a wreath during rousing readings from his most famous of works.

Dickens is buried in the south transept of Westminster Abbey, despite protestations that he would likely have considered this, his eternal resting place, a tad too much on the side of grandeur.

For this was the man who made his mark on the world illuminating the power of personal strength and virtue of everyday sorts such as Oliver Twist, David Copperfield, Little Nell, whilst decrying the greed, squalor and horrors of Victorian life.

Still, when Dickens died of a stroke, aged 58 on the 9th June, 1870, he was immensely famous and revered, worldwide. 

The man who crafted Christmas as we know it (yes, it was the Cratchit's of A Christmas Carol who launched the tradition of roast turkey as standard British festive spread on the 25th - lots more to follow here & elsewhere, later in the year) and gifted us with many of fiction's most memorable characters was so adored that it was the venerable Times of London campaigned for his internment in the Abbey.

Not bad for a minimally educated, self-made court and newspaper reporter whose shrewd eye for detail, natural, theatrical flair and sheer fascination with all sorts of people gave life to an immortal cast of characters that includes the likes of Fagin and Scrooge, the Artful Dodger, Miss Haversham, Pip and launch pad Pickwick Papers' Sam Weller.

The fact that I am captivated to hand drawn maps may have something to do with the fact that I grew up in a tiny and quite rural, English market town. Long before the advent of such modernities as Google Maps and GPS systems, crude directions, scrawled on a piece of scrap paper, were the way to go when it came to finding my way somewhere previously unvisited, in the wilds of East Anglian Fenland countryside. Tomalin's book opens with a series of compelling, hand illustrated maps, of Gad's Hill and Rochester, central and north London of Dickens' day.  

The book includes historic photographs and illustrations of several of Dickens' many childhood homes, his family, haunting portraits and key influencers of his time.

Though many have chronicled the life and times of Charles Dickens, I can't imagine a more thorough compendium for the student or modern day admirer. And I find it astonishing, the allure of this most charismatic of 19th Century literary leaders has not merely held its ground, but magnified. 

Of course, long before the Kindle and online reading resources emerged on the scene, Dickens' classics have enjoyed the glow of stage and screen. It remains to be seen what future generations will make of his legacy and how Dickens' great works will be depicted in emerging multi-media.

In the meantime, events and celebrations are taking place around the world to celebrate Dickens' Bicentenary, this year, including our own Bay Area treasure, The Great Dickens Christmas Fair, as featured HERE on the official Dickens 2012 Website.

Oh, and by the way, if you're wondering how Charles Dickens came upon his pen name, Boz... according to Tomalin in 'A Life', the author, who suffered frequent head colds had employed a nickname for his much younger brother, Augustus. 'Moses', named for a character in one of his favorite books, morphed into 'Bozes' more often than not, and 'Boz', the abbreviation - stuck as a family favorite.

 

Madmen Attire for Straight UP! A Vodka Cocktail Competition and Tasting Fundraiser for Literacyworks

Don't Miss Straight Up - a Vodka Cocktail Competition & Tasting, a Fundraiser for Petaluma-based Literacyworks

Thursday, MARCH 8th, 2012
6:00 – 9:00 PM

Petaluma Sheraton’s Ball Room

“Madmen” costume optional– cocktail attire

Literacyworks, a nationally recognized leader for literacy, has established a fund to “keep the lights on” for North Bay organizations dedicated to literacy. Library programs, literacy focused non-profits, and educational programs will directly benefit from this fun competition. Let’s turn this evening into a successful fundraiser for important programs we all care about!

The $20.00 guest ticket price includes admission, appetizers, live entertainment, and two drink tasting tickets. You will be asked to cast you ballot for your two favorite cocktails.

Additional drink tasting tickets are $5 & full size drink tickets are $10.

Sponsors: Petaluma Sonoma County Sheraton, Charbay Winery And Distillery, North Bay Bohemian

RSVP to: Elizabeth Howland,
Proprietor Clementine Eco Events
Elizabeth@clementineecoevents.com
707.364.4567

Big Stack of Books on the Bedside Table for Winter Reading 2012

Towards the end of this past year the bedside table book pile was utterly depleted, demolished even, desolate.

After 2011's great reads that geared more towards biographies, autobiographies and other non-fiction, I took a week or two's hiatus from my usual heavy reading pattern, crashing out contentedly most holiday party season nights with a half read newspaper or a tired-eyed peruse of a few pages of Vanity Fair, The English Home, Newsweek, Elle Decor.

Christmas came and the big guy in red, courtesy of those lovely & clever people in my life who know just what to gift me in book form, magically replenished the pile of brand new reading material that resides next to my pillow, enough to last at least 'til Spring.

A mix of novels and non-fiction. First pick for a post holiday, earlier-nights, January read has been Jeffrey Eugenides The Marriage Plot. I've never read any of the Pulitzer-prize (Middlesex) author's books before this, though, at roughly half way through his third, I am now more inclined to work backwards, some time after, to his Virgin Suicides.

Given mixed reviews for an indulgent, if not satirical take on a typical love triangle between super-privileged college students of 1980s American academia, deftly  interwoven with the marriage plot of Victorian literature, mental illness, science, religion, genetics and a minefield of gender role configuration, I wouldn't have bet money on relishing the read. Fluid prose, strong protagonists and a trip back to the 80's sucked me into Eudenides' Plot on page 1. I'm a fan.

Not sure what's up next, Nigel Farndale's The Blasphemer, from the  trenches of the First World War to the "terrorist besieged streets of London" came all the way across country on the personal recommendation of an NPR independent bookseller reviewer, as a top contender to follow on the heels of my last year's favorite read, Rules of Civility.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez' classic Of Love and Other Demons is a tempting next read for 2012, short, sweet and gently worn -  thoughtful, thrifty used-book gifting from the bookish student in my life.

Hedy's Folly: The Life and Breakthrough Inventions of Hedy Lamarr, the Most Beautiful Woman in the World, by another Pulitzer prize winning author, Richard Rhodes. The fascinating and completely true story of how a silver screen bombshell who had fled Vienna prior to WWII and an avant-garde composer invented the technology that makes wireless phone networking and GP devices possible. Science, music, cinema and military - riveting stuff.

Winner of the Man Brooker Prize, Irish author Anne Enright's new novel, The Forgotten Waltz. Touted as a novel of 'intelligence, passion and distinction', The Forgotten Waltz follows its 'flawed and unforgettable' heroine on a journey of the heart through a momentous drama of everyday life in modern day Dublin. 

Next in the pile, but not necessarily in the order I'll read, is The Night Circus, by Erin Morgenstern, promising a back stage expose beyond the smoke and mirrors of feats of theatrical magic as the black and white striped tents of fictional Le Cirque des Reves travels the world. Described in the inside dust cover as 'both playul and seductive', The Night Circus 'is a mesmerizing love story for the ages'.

Last, but not least, is best known film critic of our time, Roger Ebert's memoir Life Itself. Ebert has me with his own refreshingly profound, singular back cover quote: "I believe that if, at the end, according to our abilities, we have done something to make others a little happier, and something to make ourselves a little happier, that is about the best we can do. To make others less happy is a crime. To make ourselves unhappy is where all crime starts. We must try to contribute joy in the world. That is true no matter what our problems, our health, our circumstances. We must try, I didn't always know this and am happy I lived long enough to find it out."

Words to live by.

 

 

San Francisco's Crown and Crumpet Tea Room Hosts Book Signing with Sonoma County's Stars of Kiki & Coco in Paris

San Francisco's stylish and super-modern tea room Crown & Crumpet is hosting a “Kiki & Coco in Paris” book signing tea party on December 9th, 2011 from 4 to 6 PM for Bay Area moms and daughters - and anyone who'd love a signed copy of this gorgeous new book by Southern Sonoma County-based photographer Stephanie Rausser and writer Nina Gruener !

Coco the doll's designer Jess Brown, of Petaluma's chic store Maude will also be attending this special tea, selling her exquisite signature dolls and signing. Tickets to this event are $48 for adults (includes a copy of the book) and $10 for kiddies.

Tickets go on sale on Gilt City Thursday, December 1st, after 11am and as space is limited to 60 people, it's a buy now not later idea!

The Bryson Factor - Why We Can't Read Enough from Bill

Fellow aficionado Lesley and I headed south on a backed-up 101 earlier this week in pursuit of one of today's most beloved literary luminaries, the bearded, bespectacled, corduroy-jacketed most affable, Anglophiled of Americans, Bill Bryson.   

The last time Lesley and I were in an audience of Bryson fans was at Book Passage for his Short History of Nearly Everything release tour, back in 2003. It was standing room only at the back of the Book Passage, but that substantial crowd probably equated to no more than a couple hundred readerly folk.

I'd first heard Bryson read in person at Copperfields in Montgomery Village up in Santa Rosa, around 10 or 11 years ago, on my birthday. I recall that quite clearly, as, unless I had spun him a yarn, I had him sign my copy of his In a Sunburned Country "Happy Birthday".

Although popular here in the states, the type of middle-aged intellectual-cult following that turned out to hear him by the hundreds at a Dominican College Public Lecture, in well-heeled Marin County this week was way beyond the type of dedicated rank and file of Bryson's early readership.

Seated on the upper balcony at Domincan's classy, wood-paneled Angelico Concert Hall amidst a crowd of cashmere-clad lawyers and well-traveled types periodically checking muted iphones for updates from the childminders (so fascinating watching people try to pay undivided attention these days), we might have been at worship at the hearth of Dickens himself, so rapt we were with Bryson's fast-paced accounts of the background to his chosen passages from his various best selling books.

Notes from a Small Island served as my introduction to the author who, reportedly, despite not having actually succumbed to having become a British Citizen,  has a better understanding than anyone I've ever read of being a dual national British American or American Brit, or whatever way around one considers oneself according to country of birth and which side of the pond is currently home.

Born in Des Moines, Iowa in 1951, the son of newspaper people (his Mom wrote home decor articles and his dad was a sports writer), Bryson fortuitously dropped out of university and backpacked around Europe for the first time in 1972. The following year he went back across the pond for more travels, landed a job in the UK, married a nice English nurse and brought his new bride back with him to the States to finish his degree.

Two years later, the Brysons were back in the north of Britain, where he began working as a journalist, later as chief copy editor of the business section of The Times and deputy national news editor of the business section of The Independent. 

Three kids later, and before the couple's fourth child was born, Bryson bravely ditched the newspapers in pursuit of his own, now considerably brilliant career as a maverick non-fiction author.

Claiming before his adoring audience at Dominican this week that he couldn't ever consider writing a novel due to his 'lack of imagination', it's important to note here, that the boy who was 'a hopeless case' in grade school science class was awarded the Royal Society's Aventis Prize in 2004 for A Short History of Nearly Everything, as the year's best science book. Not only is he one of the world's most exuberant and smartly entertaining educator on the sorts of travel, cultural, linguistic, scientific and historical facts no one else would ever dream of writing books about, the honorary OBE (Order of the British Empire holder) for Literature has found time in his best-selling writer's schedule to become Chancellor at Durham University in the North of England, a Commissioner for English Heritage and President of the Campaign to Protect Rural England. 

All this despite the fact that the Bryson's decamped back to New England in 1995 for a few years of the 'quintessential American home town' experience for their family. It was during this time that he wrote Notes from a Big Country. Missing the pubs and great, British television broadcasting, the Bryson's packed up their house and headed back over the Atlantic once more, in 2005, this time, settling in East Anglia, in a Victorian rectory in Norfolk where he most recently wrote the excellent, award winning At Home.

Prefixing her shot with the microphone with a statement that she wasn't 'a stalker', one woman in the audience at Dominican this week caused a sea of bushy eyebrows (excluding the botoxed) to raise in unison throughout the auditorium as she went on to confess that she and her friend had tried to track down the rectory on a recent visit to England, to: "Ask a few questions". Massively admired though he is, it's somehow hard to picture even Bryson's most ardent readers fanatically rapping at his country door.

I'm still waiting for Bryson's 1998 A Walk in The Woods to be made into a film. Whatever happened to talk of a bearded Russell Crowe in corduroy? Hands down favorite of many a fan. 

Tracking back to the Bryson factor, he's the sort of sensible, sane, intelligent, articulate stand-out, internationally-conscious individual that we'd all really rather like to see run the country, or even, in a pinch, the world.

Yet, when asked what he thought of the 'pickings' for upcoming political campaigns here in the U.S. he most politely refrained from comment, except to say that he's sad to see Americans in general stoop to such blatant nastiness in national politics.

Similarly, when asked if he'd consider writing his next book on the subject of the economy and how we got to where we are, he simply replied: "Goodness, no, I would never write a book about that, I wouldn't know where to start." Too bad - the movers and shakers in Marin on an October Monday evening would have voted for Bryson in a hot second.

For a list & outline of Bryson's books click here.

 

 

 

October Book Pick - Rules of Civity, by Amor Towles

By far the best book I have read all year, I absolutely whipped through Rules of Civility by a phenomenally good first time author - Manhattan investment firm principal, Amor Towles.

A Yale grad with an MA in English from Stanford, Towles was clearly born to write, though his city slicker day-job's razor-sharp insight and sophisticated knowledge of old school, East Coast society's timeless code of social conduct (based on the young George Washington's Rules of Civility & Decent Behaviour in Company and Conversation) undoubtedly served him splendidly in the research for this remarkable first novel.

Written with crystal clear, sparkling wit and charm in the style of its New York 1938 setting, Rules of Civility's smart and super-poised heroine Katey Kontent never fails to disappoint in an unforgettable, whirlwind year of opportune meetings and fast-paced life-altering developments involving a vibrant cast of support characters.

Not unlike an American version of the wealth, station and relationships populating Evelyn Waugh Brideshead Revisited, the rich scenic backdrop for Katey Kontent's rememberings transport the reader to a time and place resplendent of an oppulent and thrilling era for the bright young things and the survivors of the great depression, while the rest of the world was bracing for war.

Published this year by Viking Penguin and already to much acclaim, Rules of Civility will hopefully be the first of an outstanding literary career for Towles, whose voice I'd wager we'll hear much more from in the future.

Hugely entertaining, illuminating and riveting, I particularly enjoyed the referenced influence of a full, classic English and American literary passion amongst its main characters, helping shape their aspirations and ultimately their choices, some bold, some ambitious, some heartbreakingly regrettable. Despite some things not necessarily turning out as I'd hoped for the extremely likeable Katey Kontent, there's a positive message in her story that keeps the reader on his toes until the very last page.    

Happiness is a Cup of Coffee (or Tea) and a Really Good Book

I'm finally getting round to reading rural West Marin County raised Logan and Noah Miller's compelling book 'Either You're In or You're In The Way'.

Twins who took 12 months and a monumental, movie-making hell ride on rust bucket wheels to keep a promise to their late dad, the Miller's book is an absolute page turner and a terrific inspiration for anyone who has a dream in this struggling economy.

I found the book on the happily overstuffed shelves of the English Major (a gift from Lesley!) after he decamped to a loftier seat of learning, allowing me access to whip the man cave of books and music of his formative years into a slightly more organized form.

Somehow, amidst all the media hype in the North Bay, I never did see the extraordinary movie 'Touching Home', that this book's about. Now that I'm half way through the book, I've put the Miller's film on my Netflix queue and am looking forward to seeing it.

'Either You're In or You're In The Way' is the incredible story of how, without a penny to their name, the identical twin brothers wrote, produced, directed and acted in a feature-length film alongside Academy Award nominated Ed Harris, Brad Dourif and Robert Forster. 

Fighting against all odds to keep a vow they'd made to their father, the Miller's remarkable story serves as living proof that circumstances do not have to define the course of a life (or two). I Googled their current activity to no avail, but hope that the brothers have continued to be the creative force they set out to be in 'Touching Home' and that we'll hear more from them soon.

 

 

 

 

Fantasy Lit Lovers' Pick - "Horse Stalker" - A New Novel by Sonoma County Author and Journalist

The Petaluma Educational Foundation and local author/journalist Robert Digitale are teaming up for a PEF WEEK booking signing and benefit Sept. 17, 2011 at Copperfield's Books in Petaluma.

Digitale, a longtime newspaper reporter in Santa Rosa, is releasing a new fantasy novel, "Horse Stalker." The foundation will receive $1 from every copy of the book sold at the store in September and October.

"School foundations make a huge difference in keeping alive art, music and other great programs for our children," Digitale said. "I am delighted to join with the Petaluma Educational Foundation and to spread the word about the important work of helping our schools."

The book signing will be held from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. at the store, 140 Kentucky St., Petaluma.

The Sept. 17 event is one of four book signings at Copperfield's locations around Sonoma County. Each is a benefit for local school groups.

Santa Rosa newspaper columnist Chris Smith wrote of "Horse Stalker": “From Robert Digitale’s imagination and heart springs an odyssey that beckons the reader with alliances both dark and enlightened, landscapes enchanting and perilous, first love and treachery. The fantastic journey plummets and ascends along the full trajectory of human potential, from the sinister to the holy. Saddle up!”

"Horse Stalker," the first book in a series titled "The Root of Glory," has been published through Digitale's own company, Franklin Park Press. The book's price is $13.99.

Sample chapters are available for reading at DigitaleStories, a blog hosted by the Santa Rosa Press Democrat, at www.digitalestories.com.

More information about the book, including a video with original music from "Horse Stalker," can be found here.

Immerse Yourself in the Wild West for an Authentic Gin and Gun Slinging Summer Read

Though I'm an ardent non-fiction nut, there's nothing better than a slice of bona fide history, artfully and effusively blended with a top-notch, reputable author's fine tuned, imaginative touch to bring to life the most colorful characters of a country's storied past.

If I hadn't read and been blown away by Mary Doria Russell's  phenomenal, previous science fiction works, it's likely that I might not have paused to pick up her fictional offering on the infamous dentist, card-shark, gun-slinging Doc Holliday of America's legendary Wild West. Hollywood's had its way with Holliday's legacy, after all. But the fact that this particular master author took him on, made Doc Holliday's story all the more irresistible for a summer read.

To keep me focused and turning the pages on fabled Dodge City shenanigans, I knew that Mary Doria Russell's "Doc" would have to be more revealing in her lead characters than Hollywood versions. And she didn't disappoint.

Known for his friendship with lawman Wyatt Earpp, his feisty common law marriage to high-strung, Hungarian-born prostitute Maria Katarina Harony (whom he called Kate and considered his intellectual equal) and his involvement in the Gunfight at the O.K Coral, Doc Holliday, born John Henry Holliday in Georgia, 1851, was the quintessential, well dressed, refined southern gent who'd found his way to Dodge City while suffering from consumption in his twenties.

Having soon figured out that he could make a year's worth of dentistry money on the frontier in one night of gambling, Doc unfolds in a perilously haphazard balance of his growing dental practice (including the fitting of false teeth oft salvaged in those days from the dead) with nights of high stakes, booze-fueled poker.

Mary Doria Russell brings the dusty, dangerous past of the American West to life in such a way that it's not too much of a stretch to imagine similar scenarios having played out in the early days saloons here in Southern Sonoma County. 

Today's memorial in neighboring Marin County for a recently slain, greatly respected sheriff from Petaluma echoes the timeless peril of the type of lawless gunmen Earpp and Holliday faced, who in one episode of madness, wipe out lives with little pause. The setting of Doc might be long past, but the potential for the unruliness of his time certainly does still play out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tales of the City - A New Musical World Premiers At Home at The American Conservatory Theater, San Francisco

San Francisco's American Conservatory Theater's world premier of Armistead Maupin's Tales of the City, new musical was described by the New York Times as: "an extended love letter to a magical San Francisco."

From a vantage point in seats just across the aisle from the A.C.T production team, madly scribbling notes to themselves for later discussion on sound, light, timing, delivery sort of stuff,  people-watching in the audience and crew was every bit as compelling as keeping an eye on the show itself.

For Tales of the City is San Francisco, or more accurately perhaps, was San Francisco in its halcyon days of bohemian debauchery before the onset of AIDS, before the dot-com bubble, way ahead of Twitter's new digs in the Tenderloin District, back in the days when supermarket aisles were the Craig's List of singles sleuthing.

And the crowds that filled the theater to capacity in this preview show were every bit as fabulously San Francisco as the content. Captivating, flamboyant characters swanned through the lobby to claim their pews as in reverence to what has for a long time been considered the essence of American popular literature, particularly that which encapsulated the swinging West Coast urban communities of the now legendary 1970s.

I first read Maupin's Tales of the City (the first of his eight novel series that went on to be televised) in my late teens, back in the UK. I'm not sure what I made of it all at the time, but having a soft spot for eclectic community life, it must have made sufficient an impression to have subliminally bolstered an initial trial move to the Bay Area from Britain.

Armistead Maupin was the first to serialize the interwoven stories of a fictional 'family' of such sexually diverse, by gifting the world the inhabitants of 28 Barbary Lane. Though Anna Madrigal was not a stranger to me. As a junior reporter on a small town newspaper off the beaten track in the English East Anglian Fens, I'd been voted 'most likely to succeed' in a newsroom of likely lads who'd rather cover the Monday night council meeting than attempt an interview with the town's apparently first and only transsexual. She'd been a farm hand as a lad, married, fathered kids and, unlike Anna, had faced the tortuous humiliation of a sex change transition from a rented room in the nearest market town to home. Her family had disowned her, sons refused to acknowledge the woman he'd become.

The most poignant memory I have of that afternoon, is of a washing line strung over the kitchen sink with nylon stockings hung to drip dry. It was a dingy, sad place, but the woman who had emerged had hung on bravely in familiar territory, desperately hoping for some semblance of acceptance. I still have the article I wrote from the meeting she was so gracious to accept when I'd appeared on her doorstep. I won a feature writing award that year amongst reporters from the family-run newspaper group that spanned several East Anglian market town communities. It really wasn't mine to win, I'd simply shared her story. I hope now, in retrospect of maturity, that it did help her to live more openly and comfortably in such a rough and ready, though conservative, country town.

Maupin himself was born into a conservative Christian family in Washington D.C. A journalist and Vietnam Vet, he wrote the first of his Tales of the City as a serial for the San Francisco edition of the Pacific Sun and later the Chronicle.

A terrific, multi-generational musical cast and seamless set breaths delightful life to the magical, fictional house overlooking the Bay.

As the A.C.T website states: "Please be advised: This production contains brief nudity, drug use, adult situations, and disco lights. Parental guidance is suggested."

The world premier runs through July 10th.