The greatest gift is a passion for reading.  It is cheap, it consoles, it distracts, it excites, it gives you knowledge of the world and experience of a wide kind.  It is a moral illumination.  Elizabeth Hardwick   

Elizabeth Bruce Hardwick (1916–2007) was an American literary critic, novelist, and short story writer.   She graduated from the University of Kentucky with a BA in 1938 and with an MA in 1939.  She then entered the PhD program at Columbia University, though withdrew from graduate study in 1941 to concentrate on writing.  She was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1947.  In 1959, Hardwick published in Harper's, "The Decline of Book Reviewing", a generally harsh and even scathing critique of book reviews published in American periodicals of the time.  She published four books of criticism:  A View of My Own (1962), Seduction and Betrayal (1974), Bartleby in Manhattan (1983), and Sight-Readings (1998).  In 1961, she edited The Selected Letters of William James.  The 1962 New York City newspaper strike helped inspire Hardwick, Robert Lowell, Jason Epstein, Barbara Epstein, and Robert B. Silvers to found The New York Review of Books, a publication that became as much a habit for many readers as The New York Times Book Review, which Hardwick had eviscerated in her 1959 essay.  In the 1970s and early 1980s, Hardwick taught writing seminars at Barnard College and Columbia University's School of the Arts, Writing Division.  She gave forthright critiques of student writing and was a mentor to students she considered promising.  She was elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1996.  In 2000, she published a short biography, Herman Melville, in Viking Press's Penguin Lives series.  In 2008, the Library of America selected Hardwick's account of Caryl Chessman's crimes for inclusion in its two-century retrospective of American True Crime writing.  A collection of her short fiction, The New York Stories of Elizabeth Hardwick, was published posthumously in 2010, as was The Collected Essays of Elizabeth Hardwick in 2017.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Hardwick_(writer)  

Anaïs Nin was born in Neuilly, France in 1903.  Her mother moved her and her brothers to Barcelona. When Nin was eleven, they moved again, this time to New York City.  It was on this trip, the day before leaving Barcelona for the United States, on July 25, 1914, that Nin made the first entry in the diary that she would keep for the rest of her life—except for one unexplained gap between August 31 and December 1, 1917—and which would cement her legacy as one of the best diarists of all time. 

Mussolini’s government officially bans the use of foreign words (July 23, 1929) • O. Henry is released from prison for good behavior after serving three years for embezzlement (July 24, 1901) •  J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Fellowship of the Ring is published (July 29, 1954).

"The Best Is Yet to Come" is a 1959 song composed by Cy Coleman to lyrics by Carolyn Leigh.  It is associated with Frank Sinatra, who recorded it on his 1964 album It Might as Well Be Swing accompanied by Count Basie under the direction of Quincy Jones.  It was the last song Sinatra sang in public, on February 25, 1995, and the words "The Best is Yet to Come" are etched on Sinatra's tombstone.  Although Sinatra made it popular, the song was written for and introduced by Tony Bennett.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Best_Is_Yet_to_Come  

Tony Bennett, one of the most beloved and recognizable voices in the history of American popular music, died July 21, 2023 at 96, less than two weeks shy of his birthday.  The life and career of Bennett, a World War II veteran and a civil rights activist, could provide fodder for a number of biopics, but his most enduring legacy is likely to be his unique vocal style, which made him a superstar in the 1950s and helped him enjoy a remarkable second act over the last 25 years of his life.  Born Anthony Dominick Benedetto on Aug. 3, 1926, in Astoria in the Queens borough of New York City, he got his start in music after having studied singing at the American Theatre Wing.  He was reported to have been discovered by the legendary African American singer Pearl Bailey, who hired him to open for her in 1949.  A year later, Bennett began to make his own mark, signing with Columbia Records and crooning hits such as “Rags to Riches” and “Because of You.”  His signature hit, “I Left My Heart in San Francisco,” arrived in 1962 as a B-side that launched him to the A-list.  Between the recording sessions and concerts, Bennett proved that he had a talent for the visual arts, as well.  His paintings, brushed under his birth name, have been exhibited in the Smithsonian and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  He and his wife also founded the nonprofit group, Exploring the Arts, to support and fund arts education in public high schools.  In that endeavor, the New York City public high school, Frank Sinatra School of the Arts, was founded in Astoria.  Ethan Sacks and Marlene Lenthang  https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/tony-bennett-iconic-standards-singer-dies-96-rcna42450

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2700  July 24, 2023