Here's an astonishing fact:  Half of America's mushrooms are grown in one tiny corner of southeastern Pennsylvania, near the town of Kennett Square.  But why?  It's not as though this place has some special advantage of climate or soil, the kind of thing that led to strawberry fields in Watsonville, Calif., or peach orchards in Georgia.  Mushrooms can grow indoors.  They could come from anywhere.  No, what turned Kennett Square into the Mushroom Capital of the World was nothing more than historical accident, combined with the presence of some very industrious Quakers, Italians and Mexicans.  Sometime around 1885, according to local lore, two Quaker flower growers from Kennett Square were bothered by wasted space under the carnation beds in their greenhouses, and they thought of growing mushrooms there.  So they steamed off to Europe, where people were already farming mushrooms, and brought back some spores.  They were Kennett Square's original mushroom farmers.  A few Quakers—or their descendants—are still in the business today.  They hired some Italians—laid-off workers from nearby stone quarries—to handle some of the hard physical labor.  And then the Italians started their own farms.  So did their sons and cousins.  By the 1950s, there were hundreds of mushroom farmers in Chester County, and most were Italians.  Fungus farming is completely different from growing plants, like wheat or potatoes.  There's something weird and magical about it.  It starts with the most basic thing:  the compost that feeds the fungi.  Mushrooms are finicky.  They don't like just any kind of manure.  "We've tried others, pig and cow [manure], and that just does not seem to work," says Chris Alonzo.  "But with horses, it works very well."  Loads of this compost will refill long beds inside those climate-controlled cinder-block buildings across Chester County.  Spores will get mixed in.  Dan Charles  https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2012/10/12/162719130/how-a-sleepy-pennsylvania-town-grew-into-americas-mushroom-capital  

Mushroom Festival  September 10 & 11, 2022  https://mushroomfestival.org/history-of-festival 

Fearless Girl is a bronze sculpture by Kristen Visbal, on Broad Street across from the New York Stock Exchange Building in the Financial District of Manhattan in New York City.  The statue was installed on March 7, 2017, in anticipation of International Women's Day the following day.  It depicts a 4-foot high (1.2 m) girl promoting female empowerment.  Fearless Girl was commissioned by State Street Global Advisors (SSGA), a large asset management company, to advertise for an index fund that comprises gender-diverse companies that have a relatively high percentage of women among their senior leadership.  A plaque originally placed below the statue stated:  "Know the power of women in leadership. SHE makes a difference," with "SHE" being both a descriptive pronoun and the fund's NASDAQ ticker symbol.  The statue was first installed at the northern tip of Bowling Green on Broadway, facing down the Charging Bull statue.  Following complaints from that statue's sculptor, Arturo Di Modica, it was removed in November 2018 and relocated to its current location the following month.  A plaque with footprints was placed on the original site of Fearless Girl.  The commission by State Street Global Advisors specified that the statue should depict a girl with hands on her hips and chin up, with a height of 36 inches, which Kristen Visbal and her collaborators then increased to 50 inches, to better match the size of Charging Bull.  She modeled the sculpture on two children from Delaware "so everyone could relate to the Fearless Girl."   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fearless_Girl   

A laconic phrase or laconism is a concise or terse statement, especially a blunt and elliptical rejoinder.  It is named after Laconia, the region of Greece including the city of Sparta, whose ancient inhabitants had a reputation for verbal austerity and were famous for their blunt and often pithy remarks.  A prominent example involves Philip II of Macedon.  After invading southern Greece and receiving the submission of other key city-states, he turned his attention to Sparta and asked menacingly whether he should come as friend or foe.  The reply was "Neither."  Losing patience, he sent the message:  If I invade Laconia, I shall turn you out.  The Spartan ephors again replied with a single word:  If.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laconic_phrase     

Founded in June, 2011, Street Books is a bicycle-powered mobile library, serving people who live outside in Portland, Oregon.  Street Books librarians set up shifts around the city of Portland at the same time and place each week.  Patrons are issued an official Street Books library card without being required to show proof of address or identification.  We use an old-school library pocket and a card that patrons sign and leave with us.  There are no fees and no fines and if we don’t cross paths again, we encourage folks to pass the books on to people who will enjoy them.  Link to more information at http://streetbooks.org/what-we-do-1 

Published in 1921, Memoirs of a Midget is a surrealistic novel, told in the first person, by English poet, anthologist, and short story writer Walter de la Mare, best known for his tales of the uncanny and poetry for children.  We never learn her name, but the protagonist and principle narrator "Miss M." is playfully referred to as "Midgetina" by her faithless friend, Fanny.  Hers is the story of a person who, though at home in nature and literature, is physically, spiritually, and intellectually out of place in the world.  Her exact size is never made clear and seems to shift throughout the story.  At times she is described as being of Thumbellina-like smallness.  She recounts that she remembers as a child her father lifting her up in the palm of his hand to see herself in a small mirror. At the age of five or six, while sitting on a pomade jar watching her father shaving, she remembers being frightened when a jackdaw, attracted by her colorful red clothing, starts pecking at the window pane to get at her.  She says she jumped up in alarm and ran away, tripping over a hairbrush, and falling sprawling beside a watch on his dressing table.  She reads books that are taller than she is; and even at age twenty is carried on a tray and walks across the dining table.  Yet she becomes a skilled horsewoman—riding sidesaddle on a pony—and at one point, we are told, can pass for a ten-year-old child.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memoirs_of_a_Midget 

The Etruscan language was spoken by the Etruscans in Etruria (Tuscany and Umbria) until about the 1st century AD.  After which it continued to be studied by priests and scholars, and it was used in religious ceremonies until the early 5th century AD.  The emperor Claudius (10 BC-54 AD) wrote a history of the Etruscans in 20 volumes, however none of these volumes survive.  Etruscan was related to Raetic, a language once spoken in the Alps, and also to Lemnian, once spoken on the island of Lemnos.  It was also possibly related to Camunic, a language once spoken in the northwest of Italy.  The Etruscan alphabet developed from a Western variety of the Greek alphabet brought to Italy by Euboean Greeks.  The earliest known inscription dates from the middle of the 6th century BC.  Most Etruscan inscriptions are written in horizontal lines from right to left, but some are boustrophedon (running alternately left to right then right to left).  https://omniglot.com/writing/etruscan.htm 

There are more than 15 million photographic images in the Library of Congress’s holdings, so the chance of encountering anything familiar in an exhibition of a mere 400 of them is statistically slight.  But “Not an Ostrich:  And Other Images from America’s Library” begins with the reassuringly familiar.  The first section, titled “Icons,” displays reproductions of the library’s most requested photos, which include pictures of Abraham Lincoln and the Wright brothers, as well as Dorothea Lange’s “Migrant Mother” and Gordon Parks’s “American Gothic.”  People may not know those last two photos by their titles but will probably recognize the stark images of, respectively, a Dust Bowl-era refugee in California in 1936 and a Black cleaning woman in D.C. in 1942.  Also featured in this section is an 1839 photo that has become renowned as the first selfie:  Philadelphian Robert Cornelius’s self-portrait, made just months after Louis Daguerre announced his daguerreotype photographic process—and more than 150 years before the debut of the iPhone.  Not an Ostrich:  And Other Images From America’s Library  Library of Congress, Thomas Jefferson Building, 10 First St. SE. 202-707-9779. loc.gov.  Dates:  Through fall 2024.  Admission:  Free; timed-entry passes required.  Mark Jenkins  https://www.washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/2022/04/28/library-of-congress-not-an-ostrich/   

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2527   April 29, 2022 

Scottish actor Sean Connery, born Thomas Connery in Fountainbridge, Edinburgh, began as a milkman and a bodybuilder before getting work in the theatre.  This eventually led to small television parts and a major role in Another Time, Another Place.  Soon after, Connery was cast in his most popular role, as the superspy James Bond, which he played for six films.  He later had success with In the Name of the Rose, Highlander and The Untouchables, which gained him an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.  He also played the titular character's father in the Indiana Jones series and was ultimately knighted for his services to acting.  In 2006 he retired from acting, though continued to give voice performances.  Connery's baritone was called upon in several films, though never as major parts of the performances.  Firstly in the children's film Darby O'Gill and the Little People, which got him spotted by Dana Broccoli, who encouraged his casting in Dr. No, leading him to superstardom.  In the film The Man Who Would Be King, Connery played co-lead Daniel Dravot and sang "The Son of God Goes Forth to War" to the tune of "The Minstrel Boy".  https://goldenthroats.fandom.com/wiki/Sean_Connery   

An embarrassment of riches is an idiom that means an overabundance of something, or too much of a good thing, that originated in 1738 as John Ozell's translation of a French play, L'Embarras des richesses (1726), by Léonor Jean Christine Soulas d'Allainval.  The idiom has inspired other works and been included in their titles.  This includes:  The Embarrassment of Riches (1906), a play by Louis K. Anspacher, and a 1918 drama film of the same name based on the Anspacher play; a 2006 music album of this name by Elephant Micah; the history book The Embarrassment of Riches:  An Interpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age by Simon Schama; and An Embarrassment of Riches, a 2000 novel written by Filipino author Charlson Ong.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embarrassment_of_riches 

https://bookstr.com/article/21-hilarious-limericks-for-national-limerick-day/  May 12 is National Limerick Day

A limerick is a humorous poem consisting of five lines.  The first, second, and fifth lines must have seven to ten syllables while rhyming and having the same verbal rhythm.  The third and fourth lines should only have five to seven syllables; they too must rhyme with each other and have the same rhythm.  https://examples.yourdictionary.com/limerick-examples.html 

Louis Kaufmann Anspacher (1878-1947) was an American poet, playwright and script writer.  He was the author of Challenge of the Unknown:  Exploring the Psychic World, with an introduction by Waldemar Kaempffert, which was published by Allen and Unwin, in the USA in 1947 by Current Books, and in Great Britain in 1952 by Henderson and Spalding.  Anspacher's poem "Ocean Ode" served as the basis of a tone poem, The Ocean, by Henry Kimball Hadley, composed between 1920 and 1921. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_K._Anspacher 

Larry Bell is an American sculptor who currently lives and works in Taos, New Mexico.  He also maintains a secondary studio location in Venice, CA.  Larry Bell was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1939.  He attended Chouinard Art Institute (now the California Institute of the Arts) in Los Angeles.  Receiving acclaim at an early phase of his career, by 1961 Bell became known as one of the War Babies, a group of four Los Angeles artists that included, along with Bell, Ron Miyashiro, Ed Bereal, and Joe Goode.  He had his first solo exhibition only three years out of art school; four decades later, his work continues to be included in innumerable exhibitions and is in private and public collections throughout the world.  https://www.groundsforsculpture.org/artists/larry-bell/ 

The Museum of Everyday Life (a self-service museum, open 8 a.m.-8 p.m. daily, turn on the lights when you enter, and don’t forget to turn off the lights when you depart!  Donations are accepted at the door, and the space is not heated, so wear a coat if it is cold!)  The museum is an ongoing revolutionary experiment based in Glover, Vermont.  Its mission is a heroic, slow-motion cataloguing of the quotidian--a detailed, theatrical expression of gratitude and love for the miniscule and unglamorous experience of daily life in all its forms.  We celebrate mundanity, and the mysterious delight embedded in the banal but beloved objects we touch every day.  In addition to a robust and ever-expanding permanent collection, our special featured exhibits have explored ordinary objects such as the pencil, the safety pin, the mirror, the toothbrush, the match, locks and keys, scissors, and dust.  These exhibits look at the objects in-depth, tracing their origins, and additionally examining their life throughout history in relation to all kinds of human experience.  The creation of these special featured exhibits involves the input of many people, from neighbors to college students, from fanatical collectors to local artists and performers, all of whom donate their time helping to construct exhibits, maintain and improve the buildings and grounds, give guided tours, and perform at openings and events.  The Museum has three components:  1) The Museum of Everyday Life Philosophy Department, involving the production and publication of theoretical writing about people and their relationship to objects, curatorial methodologies, and encylcopedism, 2) The Museum of Everyday Life Performance Company, which creates puppet shows and performances in an ongoing effort to examine and everyday life via the life of objects, and lastly, but most important 3) The Museum of Everyday Life Exhibitions and Collections, comprised of actual exhibits which make the theoretical work tangible and concrete.  The Museum of Everyday Life is also a collaborative partner in the BANNERS & CRANKS festival, an itinerant, yearly festival of cantastoria and cranky performance.  https://museumofeverydaylife.org/sample-page/about-us

Cantastoria is an Italian word for the ancient performance form of picture-story recitation, which involves sung narration accompanied by reference to painted banners, scrolls, or placards. https://museumofeverydaylife.org/performance-department/cantastoria   

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2526  April 27, 2022

Iraqi Salad  Beets, cucumbers and chickpeas are in this refreshing, easy dish.  Link to other recipes by Candice at http://www.boushala.com/2018/08/19/iraqi-salad/

bobo  noun  Blend of bourgeois +‎ bohemian, popularized by David Brooks to describe the 1990s equivalent of the yuppie.  A materialistic person who affects an anti-materialistic persona.  quotations ▼  A self-styled bodyguard or groupie of the nouveau riche (such as a professional athlete or musician)  An imitation of something, particularly a well known product, usually lower in quality than the original.  https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/bobo

American artist Hilary Pecis (b. 1979) creates vibrant still lifes, landscape paintings, tranquil domestic settings, and textural floral arrangements.  With a soft, naturalistic palette, Pecis fills her tableaux with crowded tables, house plants, and hefty art books.  She is the co-founder of the Binder of Women, a collective of female artists based in the Los Angeles area.  See illustrations at https://www.artsy.net/artist/hilary-pecis

hackneyed  adjective : lacking in freshness or originality  Hackney entered the English language in the 14th century as a noun.  Some think perhaps it came from "Hakeneye" (now "Hackney"), the name of a town (now a borough) in England.  Others dispute this explanation, pointing to similar forms in other European languages. The noun "hackney," in any case, refers to a horse suitable for ordinary riding or driving-as opposed to one used as a draft animal or a war charger.  When "hackney" was first used as a verb in the late 16th century, it often meant "to make common or frequent use of."  Later, it meant "to make trite, vulgar, or commonplace."  The adjective "hackneyed" began to be used in the 18th century and now is a common synonym for "trite."  https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hackneyed  Thank you, Muse reader!

Kimchi Adds a Tasty Twist to These Mouth-Watering Caramelized Baked Potatoes by Alison Ashton   Kimchi lends a tangy punch to these loaded baked potatoes from Korean American by Eric Kim.  Adding a pinch of sugar is a trick Kim learned from his Korean-born mom.  “It adds balance, especially with caramelized kimchi and nutty sesame oil,” he says.  Kimchi—salted, fermented vegetables—is “a staple of the Korean pantry,” says Kim.  It’s a gut-friendly probiotic powerhouse that can be served as a side dish or condiment and used as an ingredient in other recipes.  There are many varieties, but spicy, tangy kimchi made with napa cabbage and gochugaru (Korean red-pepper flakes) is a classic.  You can find it in Asian markets, as well as many supermarkets (or make your own—Kim shares several recipes in the cookbook).  Other fun ways to use it:  Stir minced kimchi into mayonnaise to garnish burgers and hot dogs.  Tuck it into quesadillas.  Add it to scrambled eggs.  Reprinted from Korean American  Copyright © 2022 Eric Kim  Find recipe at https://parade.com/1350956/alison-ashton/caramelized-kimchi-baked-potatoes-recipe/   

Foggy Bottom is one of the oldest late 18th- and 19th-century neighborhoods in Washington, D.C., located west of the White House and downtown Washington, in the Northwest quadrant.  It is bounded roughly by 17th Street NW to the east, Rock Creek Parkway to the west, Constitution Avenue NW to the south, and Pennsylvania Avenue NW to the north.  Foggy Bottom is thought to have received its name due to an atmospheric quirk of its low lying, marshy riverside location, which made it susceptible to concentrations of fog, and later, industrial smoke.  The United States Department of State gained the metonym "Foggy Bottom" when it moved its headquarters to the nearby Harry S Truman Building, originally planned and constructed to be the new United States Department of War headquarters building, from the State, War, and Navy Building (now known as the Eisenhower Executive Office Building) near the White House in 1947.  Foggy Bottom includes the main campus of the George Washington University (GWU), and residents have convenient access to the nearby historic Georgetown area.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foggy_Bottom 

Hatchards claims to be the oldest bookshop in the United Kingdom, founded on Piccadilly in 1797 by John Hatchard.  After one move, it has been at the same location on Piccadilly next to Fortnum & Mason since 1801, and the two stores are also neighbours in St. Pancras railway station as of 2014.  It has a reputation for attracting high-profile authors and holds three Royal Warrants granted by the Queen, the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Edinburgh respectively.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hatchards 

La Rinconada is a town in the Peruvian Andes near a gold mine.  At up to 5,100 m (16,700 ft; 3.2 mi) above sea level, it is the highest permanent settlement in the world.  Between 2001 and 2009, the population was estimated by National Geographic to have increased to 30,000 people from just a small gold prospector camp because the price of gold rose 235% over that period, although this number has not been reflected by the 2007 census or 2017 census.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Rinconada,_Peru 

Politeness is the art of choosing among your thoughts. - Madame de Stael, writer (22 Apr 1766-1817) 

With Neil Simon’s papers, Library of Congress just got a lot funnier.  Some 7,700 items, including manuscripts and correspondence with Bob Hope and August Wilson, go into the archives by Peter Marks  After the library’s senior music specialist, Mark Eden Horowitz, finishes the task of cataloguing the Simon trove, researchers will have available a collection detailing a remarkable theatrical portfolio.  The prolific Simon is considered one of the most successful writers Broadway ever produced, with more than 30 plays and musicals to his credit—not to mention his voluminous Hollywood output—over a career spanning decades. “Barefoot in the Park,” “The Odd Couple,” “Brighton Beach Memoirs,” “The Sunshine Boys” all are considered American classics, and “Lost in Yonkers,” the touching 1991 family drama that earned him a Pulitzer Prize, added a prestigious dimension to his shelves of Tonys, his Kennedy Center Honors and other awards.  The bonanza the library has reaped includes multiple drafts and script rewrites of all of these, both typed and handwritten, and hundreds more.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/theater-dance/2022/04/25/neil-simon-library-congress/

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2525  April 25, 2022

The cranberry bean is a creamy, meaty bean with a tender skin and rich nutty flavor.  It’s a little bigger than a pinto bean, less “beany” in flavor, and yields a dark beefy broth.  Also known as a borlotti bean, it is popular in Italian and Portuguese cuisines, tossed into pasta dishes, salads, and stews.  This bean can also be used in chilis, baked beans, soups or just served as a hearty bowl of beans with a few toppings.  Because of their creamy texture, they make great refried beans.  Find recipe at https://mjskitchen.com/2019/04/cranberry-beans-healthy-protein/ 

“dull as dishwater” means boring, tedious.  The original simile, dull as ditchwater, dating from the 1700s, alluded to the muddy water in roadside ditches.  In the first half of the 1900s, perhaps through mispronunciation, it became dishwater, that is, the dingy, grayish water in which dirty dishes had soaked.  https://www.dictionary.com/browse/dull--as--dishwater 

Pairing wine and Chinese food can seem difficult with so many flavors to deal with.  Spicy, sweet, tangy, salty, bitter, and umami can all be present in one dish.  Good news:  German Kabinett Riesling can handle it!  Chinese takeout is often quite salty and fried, which calls for high acidity.  And dishes that have a sweet and sour element pair with fruit forward wines.  However, if you’re ordering something with heavier flavors (dark sauces, duck, or pork), consider going for a sweeter Spätlese for balance.  Got your heart set on red wine?  Gamay-based wines like Beaujolais are a great choice.  They’ve got low tannins, good acidity, and light body, which is ideal.  Plus, the fruity, earthy, and floral flavors can stand up to a wide range of dishes.  A Gamay will also be lovely with mushroom or beef-based dishes that aren’t too spicy.  Read about seven popular Chinese dishes and the wines that love them at https://winefolly.com/wine-pairing/wine-and-chinese-food-7-delicious-pairings/  Thank you, Muse reader! 

In the 1920s, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) produced the first phonetic alphabet to be recognized internationally.  It featured names of cities across the globe.  Amsterdam, Baltimore, Casablanca, Denmark, Edison, Florida, Gallipoli, Havana, Italia, Jerusalem, Kilogramme, Liverpool, Madagascar, New York, Oslo, Paris, Quebec, Roma, Santiago, Tripoli, Uppsala, Valencia, Washington, Xanthippe, Yokohama, Zurich.  On the military side, the United States adopted a Joint Army/Navy Phonetic Alphabet, called the Able Baker alphabet after the first two code words, across all of its military branches in 1941.  Two years later, the British Royal Air Force decided to use the Able Baker alphabet as well:  Able, Baker, Charlie, Dog, Easy, Fox, George, How, Item, Jig, King, Love, Mike, Nan, Oboe, Peter, Queen, Roger, Sugar, Tare, Uncle, Victor, William, X-ray, Yoke, Zebra.  Allies hesitated to adopt the alphabet for national use until the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) ruled on the proposal thus creating a rather odd situation in which NATO Military Commands would be the sole users of the proposed phonetic alphabet.  Luckily this situation did not last for long as the ICAO approved the alphabet, with November as the code word for the letter N.  On 21 February 1956, Member States were advised “that the new Phonetic Alphabet is to be made effective in NATO 1 March 1956” (see declassified document from the NATO Archives:  SGM-0156-56).  The ITU formally adopted it a few years later making it the established universal phonetic alphabet governing all military, civilian and amateur radio communications.  As it was NATO Allies who had spearheaded the final revision, it became known from that point on as the NATO Alphabet.  ALFA, BRAVO, CHARLIE, DELTA, ECHO, FOXTROT, GOLF, HOTEL, INDIA, JULIETT, KILO, LIMA, MIKE, NOVEMBER, OSCAR, PAPA, QUEBEC, ROMEO, SIERRA, TANGO, UNIFORM, VICTOR, WHISKEY, X-RAY, YANKEE, ZULU  https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/declassified_136216.htm 

The 50 Best Sci-Fi Books of All Time by Adrienne Westenfeld   Choosing the fifty best science fiction books of all time wasn’t easy, so to get the job done, we had to establish some guardrails.  Though we assessed single installments as representatives of their series, we limited the list to one book per author. We also emphasized books that brought something new and innovative to the genre; to borrow a great sci-fi turn of phrase, books that “boldly go where no one has gone before.”  Titles and descriptions range from #1, Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley to #50, The Echo Wife by Sarah Gailey.  https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/books/g39385874/best-fantasy-books/ 

The presence of a Jimmy Buffett's Margaritaville in Jurassic World can't help but raise a smile.  During the sequence where the Pterosaur's break free and start swarming the guests, a brave bartender at the park's Margaritaville can be seen saving two margaritas from a table during the attack.  Jimmy Buffett (in orange shirt) is playing the bartender.  Buffett's big moment can be spotted at the 0.20 mark here.  https://screenrant.com/jurassic-world-movie-jimmy-buffett-cameo-location/ 

Relief is an emotion that’s hard to hide.  *  A day during which we have all kinds of things to do “flies by,” as they say.  A day you spend waiting slows down.  * 
Summer House with Swimming Pool, a novel by Herman Koch 

The Earth Day 2022 Theme is Invest In Our Planet.  What Will You Do?  Find information on Earth Day events, activities, and what individuals and organizations can do to make a difference at https://www.earthday.org/earth-day-2022/ April 22 is Earth Day, a day for observing the need to protect the Earth. 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2524  April 22, 2022

Thomas Stearns Eliot OM (1888–1965) was a poet, essayist, publisher, playwright, literary critic and editor.  Considered one of the 20th century's major poets, he is a central figure in English-language Modernist poetry.  Born in St. Louis, Missouri, to a prominent Boston Brahmin family, he moved to England in 1914 at the age of 25 and went on to settle, work, and marry there.  He became a British citizen in 1927 at the age of 39, subsequently renouncing his American citizenship.  Eliot first attracted widespread attention for his poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" in 1915, which, at the time of its publication, was considered outlandish.  It was followed by "The Waste Land" (1922), "The Hollow Men" (1925), "Ash Wednesday" (1930), and Four Quartets (1943).  He was also known for seven plays, particularly Murder in the Cathedral (1935) and The Cocktail Party (1949).  He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948, "for his outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry".  In 1939, Eliot published a book of light verse, Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats.  ("Old Possum" was Ezra Pound's friendly nickname for Eliot.)  The first edition had an illustration of the author on the cover.  In 1954, the composer Alan Rawsthorne set six of the poems for speaker and orchestra in a work titled Practical Cats.  After Eliot's death, the book was the basis of the musical Cats by Andrew Lloyd Webber, first produced in London's West End in 1981 and opening on Broadway the following year.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T._S._Eliot   

outlandish  adjective  From Middle English londish, londiss, from Old English *lendisċ (attested in inlendisċ, ūtlendisċ, uplendisċ, etc.) equivalent to land +‎ -ish.  landish (comparative more landish, superlative most landish)  Of, pertaining to, or characteristic of the land quotations ▼ Related terms:  inlandish, outlandish, uplandish  https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/landish 

The spiral is one of the oldest symbols of human spirituality, carved or painted into rocks from thousands of years ago, on every continent of the world.  Symbol of movement and progressive development, growth, expansion, cosmic energy, symbol of the sun . . . symbol that represents the continuous cycle of birth, life, death and regeneration.  Spirals have been found in burial sites, in vases, in jewelry, clothing, weapons and many other objects.  They can be seen in every aspect in nature, like the tides in the oceans, the winds, the plants, the shells.  The spiral phenomenon has been explained through mathematics from the time of Archimedes, the great Greek mathematician.  Various meanings depending on the culture in which the symbol is used, it has been and continues to be, century by century, an everlasting symbol of the eternal forces of nature that touches our subconscious.  https://culturetaste.com/blog/51_spiral-symbol-history-meaning.html 

Brave New World is a dystopian social science fiction novel by English author Aldous Huxley, written in 1931 and published in 1932.  Largely set in a futuristic World State, whose citizens are environmentally engineered into an intelligence-based social hierarchy, the novel anticipates huge scientific advancements in reproductive technology, sleep-learning, psychological manipulation and classical conditioning that are combined to make a dystopian society which is challenged by only a single individual:  the story's protagonist.  Huxley followed this book with a reassessment in essay form, Brave New World Revisited (1958), and with his final novel, Island (1962), the utopian counterpart.  The novel is often compared to George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four (published 1949).  In 1999, the Modern Library ranked Brave New World at number 5 on its list of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_New_World 

Suspended from the ceiling of the 31st Street mid-block entrance of Moynihan Train Hall, The Hive is a 1:100 scaled architectural model that offers a surreal and fantastical vision of a global metropolis.  Dozens of illuminated high-rise buildings descend toward visitors, their downturned orientation inviting new and varied perspectives as visitors move around the space.  Artist duo Elmgreen & Dragset has combined miniaturized skyscrapers of their own invention with iconic high-rise buildings from megacities around the world, distilling these towers into their most essential forms.  This fictional city combines landmarks from Chicago, Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, London, and Paris as well as iconic New York City silhouettes.  The Hive is the artists’ first permanent public sculpture in New York.  See picture at https://moynihantrainhall.nyc/elmgreen-dragset/  Thank you, Muse reader! 

BOOK ADDICTS by Martha Esbin

Book addicts fear having no books,

take extra books on trips in case

they run out, store books on the floor,

have books in each room of the house,

make up reading lists for themselves.

(a cinquain with five eight-syllable lines) 

April 15, 2022  Rachel Massman scanned her library card in the reader, punched in a four-digit code and opened the door of the Express Library West Arvada, Colo.—entering into a first-of-its-kind standalone “ghost library,” where there is no staff on hand and cameras watch your every move.  Jefferson County Public Library is touting its new express library as a novel and convenient approach to providing library services to a society that is increasingly accustomed to automation and self-service.  John Aguilar  https://www.governing.com/community/jefferson-county-colo-opens-first-self-service-library  Thank you, Muse reader! 

Born in Gloucester, England, poet, editor, and critic William Ernest Henley (1849–1903) was educated at Crypt Grammar School, where he studied with the poet T.E. Brown, and the University of St. Andrews.  His father was a struggling bookseller who died when Henley was a teenager.  At age 12 Henley was diagnosed with tubercular arthritis that necessitated the amputation of one of his legs just below the knee; the other foot was saved only through a radical surgery performed by Joseph Lister.  As he healed in the infirmary, Henley began to write poems, including “Invictus,” which concludes with the oft-referenced lines “I am the master of my fate; / I am the captain of my soul.”  Henley’s poems often engage themes of inner strength and perseverance.  His numerous collections of poetry include A Book of Verses (1888), London Voluntaries (1893), and Hawthorn and Lavender (1899).  Henley edited the Scots Observer (which later became the National Observer), through which he befriended writer Rudyard Kipling, and the Magazine of Art, in which he lauded the work of emerging artists James McNeill Whistler and Auguste Rodin.  Henley was a close friend of Robert Louis Stevenson, who reportedly based his Long John Silver character in Treasure Island in part on Henley.  Link to the poem Invictus at https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/william-ernest-henley   

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2523  April 20, 2022