Brian Patrick Friel (1929-2015) was an Irish dramatist, short story writer and founder of the Field Day Theatre Company.   He has been likened to an "Irish Chekhov" and described as "the universally accented voice of Ireland".  His plays have been compared favourably to those of contemporaries such as Samuel Beckett, Arthur Miller, Harold Pinter and Tennessee Williams.  Recognised for early works such as Philadelphia, Here I Come! and Faith Healer, Friel had 24 plays published in a career of more than a half-century.  He was elected to the honorary position of Saoi of Aosdána.  His plays were commonly produced on Broadway in New York City throughout this time, as well as in Ireland and the UK.  In 1980 Friel co-founded Field Day Theatre Company and his play Translations was the company's first production.  With Field Day, Friel collaborated with Seamus Heaney, 1995 recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature.  Heaney and Friel first became friends after Friel sent the young poet a letter following publication of his book Death of a Naturalist.  Friel was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the British Royal Society of Literature and the Irish Academy of Letters.  He was appointed to Seanad Éireann in 1987 and served until 1989.  In later years, Dancing at Lughnasa reinvigorated Friel's oeuvre, bringing him Tony Awards (including Best Play), the Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Play and the New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play.  It was also adapted into a film, starring Meryl Streep, directed by Pat O'Connor, script by Frank McGuinness.   His exact birth date and name are ambiguous.  The parish register lists a birth name of Brian Patrick Ó'Friel and a birth date of 9 January.  Elsewhere his birth name is given as Bernard Patrick Friel and his birth date as 10 January.  In life he was known simply as Brian Friel and celebrated his birthday on 9 January. F riel himself remarked in a letter to Richard Pine:  "Perhaps I'm twins."  The Brian Friel papers donated to the state in 2000 are in the National Library of Ireland Manuscript Collection, List No. 73 [MSS 37,041–37,806]  The Brian Friel papers donated to the state in 2011 are in the National Library of Ireland Manuscript Collection, List No. 180 [MSS 42,091 – 42,093 and MSS 49,209 – 49,350]  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Friel 

“He was beaming.  I have noticed this about human beings:  secret knowledge makes them smile.  It is the smile of power.”   Restoration, a Novel of Seventeenth-Century England by Rose Tremain 

"When I Consider How My Light is Spent" (Also known as "On His Blindness") is one of the best known of the sonnets of John Milton (1608–1674).  The last three lines are particularly well known; they conclude with "They also serve who only stand and wait", which is much quoted though rarely in context.  Variants of it have been used as mottos in a number of contexts, for example the Dickin Medal for service animals bears the motto "We also serve", and the Navy Wives Clubs of America uses the motto "They Also Serve, Who Stay and Wait".  In U.S. popular culture it is perhaps best known for Hall of Fame baseball broadcaster Vin Scully, who would quote it when showing a player not in the game.  The sonnet was first published in Milton's 1673 Poems in his autograph notebook, known as the "Trinity Manuscript" from its location in the Wren Library of Trinity College, Cambridge.  He gave it the number 19, but in the published book it was numbered 16, so both numbers are used for it.  It is popularly given the title On His Blindness, but there is no evidence that Milton used this title; it was assigned a century later by Thomas Newton in his 1761 edition of Milton's poetry, as was commonly done at the time by editors of posthumous collections.  See text at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_I_Consider_How_My_Light_is_Spent 

The concept of a "medical–industrial complex" was first advanced by Barbara and John Ehrenreich in the November 1969 issue of the Bulletin of the Health Policy Advisory Center in an article entitled "The Medical Industrial Complex" and in a subsequent book (with Health-PAC), The American Health Empire:  Power, Profits, and Politics (Random House, 1970).  The concept was widely discussed throughout the 1970s, including reviews in the New England Journal of Medicine (November 4, 1971, 285:1095).  It was further popularized in 1980, Arnold S. Relman while he served as editor of The New England Journal of Medicine. in a paper titled "The New Medical-Industrial Complex."  Relman commented, "The past decade has seen the rise of another kind of private "industrial complex" with an equally great potential for influence on public policy—this time in health care . . . "  Oddly, Relman added, "In searching for information on this subject, I have found no standard literature and have had to draw on a variety of unconventional sources . . . "  Subsequently, this paper and the concept have been discussed continually.  An updated history and analysis can be found in John Ehrenreich, "Third Wave Capitalism:  How Money, Power, and the Pursuit of Self-Interest have Imperiled the American Dream" (Cornell University Press, May 2016). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical%E2%80%93industrial_complex 

sui generis  definition from Nolo’s Plain-English Law Dictionary  (soo-ee jen-ris)  Latin for of its own kind, and used to describe a form of legal protection that exists outside typical legal protections--that is, something that is unique or different.  In intellectual property law, for example, ship hull designs have achieved a unique category of protection and are "sui generis" within copyright law.  https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/sui_generis 

Tania León, the Cuban-born composer, won the Pulitzer Prize in Music on June 11, 2021 for her orchestral work Stride.  The Pulitzer jury described the 15-minute piece as a "musical journey full of surprise, with powerful brass and rhythmic motifs that incorporate Black music traditions from the U.S. and the Caribbean into a Western orchestral fabric."  The two other finalists were Place, by Ted Hearne and Data Lords by Maria Schneider, both recordings.  Stride received its world premiere by the New York Philharmonic at Lincoln Center Feb. 13, 2020.  The music was born out of Project 19, an ambitious commissioning program where 19 women composers were chosen to write music to mark the centennial of the ratification of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote. León's inspiration was Susan B. Anthony, the women's rights activist and a prominent leader in the suffrage movement.  Tom Huizenga  https://www.npr.org/sections/deceptivecadence/2021/06/11/1005649919/tania-leon-wins-music-pulitzer-for-stride-a-celebration-of-womens-suffrage

Darnella Frazier, who was 17 when she recorded George Floyd's murder in Minneapolis last year, was awarded a special citation by the Pulitzer Board on June 11, 2021.  The video played a major role in igniting a global protest movement against police violence, and was used as evidence in the trial of Floyd's killer.  Joe Hernandez  https://www.npr.org/2021/06/11/1005601724/darnella-frazier-teen-who-filmed-george-floyds-murder-wins-pulitzer-prize-citati 

On June 14, 1777, the Continental Congress approved the design of a national flag.  Since 1916, when President Woodrow Wilson issued a presidential proclamation establishing a national Flag Day on June 14, Americans have commemorated the adoption of the Stars and Stripes in many ways–displaying the flag in the front of their homes, parades, and other patriotic observances.  Prior to 1916, many localities and a few states had been celebrating the day for years.  Congressional legislation designating that date as the national Flag Day was signed into law by President Harry Truman in 1949; the legislation also called upon the president to issue a flag day proclamation every year.  See pictures at https://www.loc.gov/item/today-in-history/june-14/ 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2377  June 14, 2021

Calico (in British usage since 1505) is a plain-woven textile made from unbleached, and often not fully processed, cotton.  It may also contain unseparated husk parts. The fabric is far coarser than muslin, but less coarse and thick than canvas or denim.  However, it is still very cheap owing to its unfinished and undyed appearance.  The fabric was originally from the city of Calicut in southwestern India.  It was made by the traditional weavers called cāliyans.  The raw fabric was dyed and printed in bright hues, and calico prints became popular in Europe.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calico 

For a cat to be labeled calico, her coat must contain three colors—black, white, and orange.  These three colors appear on the coat in patches, often with white in the highest concentration.  Calico cats are named for their coat color that resembles calico cloth, which was once imported from England to India.  Calico cats are often mistaken for tortoiseshell cats, and the terms can be used interchangeably in some regions. Tortoiseshells differ from calicos in that the colors are mixed or blended, with no white, while calicos have distinct patches with a large amount of white.  Calicos can also have dilute coats, with fawn, cream, chocolate, and gray patches, rather than the traditional bright white, orange, and black.   https://www.thesprucepets.com/are-calico-cats-always-female-3384568 

Just like a calico cat with so many colors, “calico” just refers to the hodge-podge of beans used in the recipe:  pork and beans, kidney beans, and butter beans. The beans are all cooked with bacon and ground beef in a tangy, sweet sauce.  See recipe at https://www.culinaryhill.com/slow-cooker-calico-beans/

No-yeast pizza (uses baking powder instead of yeast)  Find recipe and pictures at  https://houseofyumm.com/no-yeast-pizza-dough/ 

The nightingale, a small brown bird of the UK that fills their nights with mellifluous song during spring, was a favourite of their renaissance poets.  When the founding fathers of Indian ornithology, the British, noticed that the koel sang also by night, they nostalgically referred to the bird as "the Indian Nightingale".  See pictures at https://www.tribuneindia.com/2009/20090614/spectrum/nature.htm

Bulbul bird is called the Indian Nightingale.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRtpLTZeUL0  3:34 

Sarojini Naidu (née Chattopadhyay; 1879–1949) was an Indian political activist and poet.  A proponent of civil rights, women's emancipation, and anti-imperialistic ideas, she was an important figure in India's struggle for independence from colonial rule.  Naidu's work as a poetess earned her the sobriquet 'the Nightingale of India', or 'Bharat Kokila' by Mahatma Gandhi because of colour, imagery and lyrical quality of her poetry.  Born in a Bengali family in Hyderabad, Naidu was educated in Madras, London and Cambridge.  Following her time in England, where she worked as a suffragist, she was drawn to Indian National Congress' movement for India's independence from British rule.  She became a part of the Indian nationalist movement and became a follower of Mahatma Gandhi and his idea of swaraj.  She was appointed the President of the Indian National Congress in 1925 and later became the Governor of the United Provinces in 1947, becoming the first woman to hold the office of Governor in the Dominion of India.  Naidu's poetry includes both children's poems and others written on more serious themes including patriotism, romance, and tragedy.  Published in 1912, "In the Bazaars of Hyderabad" remains one of her most popular poems.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarojini_Naidu

Imagine retreating back in time to enjoy live jazz in an intimate, restored 19th-century Victorian brownstone in the historical district of Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood.  Brownstone Jazz presents jazz concerts complete with a piano, bass, drum set and other acoustic instruments as well.  A Southern fish-fry buffet and open mic sessions add to the experience.  Find more information at https://www.nycgo.com/nightlife/brownstone-jazz/ 

June 8, 2001  Unless you have been living under a rock, you’ve probably heard that the cicadas are here.  So many cicadas.  After living underground for 17 years, billions of cicadas are ready for their closeup.  They are emerging as we speak in 15 states, including Indiana, which is expected to have one of the largest concentrations of Brood X cicadas this year.  Believe it or not, cicadas are edible.  And who could be a better resource for a fancy cicada dinner menu than chef Greg Hardesty, he of multiple James Beard nominations and restaurants that defy traditional expectations and categorization.  As we wait to see what delicious things Greg comes up with in his forthcoming partnership with BreadWorks at Broad Ripple in the former home of Locally Grown Gardens, we can ponder the possibilities of a night around the table with friends, dining on the insect of the moment.  If cicadas aren’t your thing, don’t worry.  Hardesty has a plan B.  “For a serious dish, a farinette with chopped chicken, mushrooms, and Parmesan is out of this world,” he says.  Suzanne Krowiak  See recipe at https://www.indianapolismonthly.com/food-and-drinks/recipes/bug-appetit-a-buzzy-recipe-from-greg-hardesty 

The farinette or pascade is a thick crepe that was originally eaten with a sprinkling of salt.  Around 25 cm diameter, it is yellow-brown in colour, and its batter consists of eggs, wheat flour, milk and salt.  It is then cooked like a non-runny omelette.  https://www.fondazioneslowfood.com/en/ark-of-taste-slow-food/farinette/ 

June 10, 2021  HIGH POINT, N.C. — It was a moment worth celebrating as seniors graduated from T. Wingate Andrews High School.  They were shocked by what their principal, Dr. Marcus Gause, did on stage that left them cheering for more.  Gause took the stage singing, in a very moving performance (1:16) “I Will Always Love You" - Dolly Parton's classic love ballad made famous by Whitney Houston.  Carrie Hodgin  Thank you, Muse reader!  

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2376  June 11, 2021

 

Oliver Twist; or, the Parish Boy's Progress is Charles Dickens's second novel, and was published as a serial from 1837 to 1839 and released as a three-volume book in 1838, before the serialisation ended.   The story centres on orphan Oliver Twist, born in a workhouse and sold into apprenticeship with an undertaker.  After escaping, Oliver travels to London, where he meets the "Artful Dodger", a member of a gang of juvenile pickpockets led by the elderly criminal Fagin.  Oliver Twist contains an unromantic portrayal of criminals and their sordid lives, and exposes the cruel treatment of the many orphans in London in the mid-19th century.  The alternative title, The Parish Boy's Progress, alludes to Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress, as well as the 18th-century caricature series by William Hogarth, A Rake's Progress and A Harlot's Progress.  In this early example of the social novel, Dickens satirises the hypocrisies of his time, including child labour, domestic violence, the recruitment of children as criminals, and the presence of street children.  The novel may have been inspired by the story of Robert Blincoe, an orphan whose account of working as a child labourer in a cotton mill was widely read in the 1830s.  It is likely that Dickens's own experiences as a youth contributed as well.  Oliver Twist has been the subject of numerous adaptations, including a highly successful musical play, Oliver!, and the multiple Academy Award-winning 1968 motion picture.  Disney also put its spin on the novel with the animated film called Oliver & Company in 1988.  Read much more, see graphics and a list of adaptations at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_Twist 

The war in California between Mexico and the United States ended with a treaty signed (in 1847) in a small adobe mission known as Campo de Cahuenga.  The mission was preserved, but it now stood invisible and unnoticed, hidden in plain sight by freeway ramps, parking lots and two strange towers marking the entrance to a subway station.  The Watchman (Elvis Cole, #11; Joe Pike, #1), a novel by Robert Crais  See https://waterandpower.org/museum/Early_Views_of_Cahuenga_Pass.html and https://www.laparks.org/historic/campo-de-cahuenga and http://www.militarymuseum.org/Cahuenga.html

John Milton coined the phrase 'silver lining' in his poem Comus:  A Mask Presented at Ludlow Castle, 1634.   'Clouds' and 'silver linings' were referred to often in literature from then onward, usually citing Milton and frequently referring to them as Milton's clouds.  It isn't until the days of the uplifting language of Victoria's England that we begin to hear the proverbial form that we are now familiar with--'every cloud has a silver lining'.  The first occurrence that unequivocally expresses that notion comes in The Dublin Magazine, Volume 1, 1840, in a review of the novel Marian; or, a Young Maid's Fortunes, by Mrs S. Hall, which was published in 1840.  The currently used 'every cloud has a silver lining' first appeared, in another literary review, in 1849.  The New Monthly Belle Assemblée, Volume 31, included what purported to be a quotation from Mrs. Hall's book.  In fact the text they printed, "Every cloud has a silver lining", was actually a misprint.  It didn't appear in Marian, which merely reproduced Milton's original text.  Despite being printed in error, the New Monthly Belle Assemblée entry does appear to be the first use of the proverb as we now use it.  The proverb very quickly gained public acceptance.  It appears very frequently in newspapers, on both sides of the Atlantic, from 1853 onward.  This was undoubtedly due to the work of the American writer Sarah Payson Parton.  She had been commissioned by the editor of the Home Journal magazine to write a weekly motivational essay on various topics, under the pen-name of Fanny Fern.  These became very popular and Parton soon became the highest paid writer in the USA.  One of her best-known essays was a piece of purple prose entitled Nil desperandum, which included "Every cloud has a silver lining" in the first line and which was published in 1853.  https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/every-cloud-has-a-silver-lining.html  See Nil desperandum by “Fanny Fern” at http://utc.iath.virginia.edu/sentimnt/snesffa8t.html

Fanny Fern (born Sara Payson Willis; 1811–1872), was an American novelist, children's writer, humorist, and newspaper columnist in the 1850s to 1870s.  Fern's popularity has been attributed to her conversational style and sense of what mattered to her mostly middle-class female readers.  By 1855, Fern was the highest-paid columnist in the United States, commanding $100 per week for her New York Ledger column.   A collection of her columns published in 1853 sold 70,000 copies in its first year.  Her best-known work, the fictional autobiography Ruth Hall (1854), has become a popular subject among feminist literary scholars.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fanny_Fern 

A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg

canary  (kuh-NAYR-ee)  noun  1.  A small finch, native to the Canary Islands, having greenish to yellow color, and known for its melodious song.  2.  A bright yellow color.  3.  A singer.  4.  An informer.  From French canari (canary), from Spanish canario (canary; of the Canary Islands), from Latin canis (dog).   Ultimately from the Indo-European root kwon- (dog), which also gave us canine, chenille (from French chenille:  caterpillar, literally, little dog), kennel, canary, hound, dachshund, corgi, cynic, cynosure, canaille, canicular, and cynophobia.  Earliest documented use:  1568. 

The New York Ledger was a weekly story paper published in Manhattan.  It was established in 1855 by Robert E. Bonner, by transforming the weekly financial journal called The Merchant's Ledger that he had purchased in 1851.  Bonner turned the paper over to three sons to operate in 1887.  The date of last issue was 1898, when it was changed to The Ledger Monthly, which disappeared by 1903.   Notable contributors included Ethel Lynn Beers, Sylvanus Cobb, Jr. (The Gunmaker of Moscow), Fanny Fern (whose first column appeared in 1855), William H. Peck, and E. D. E. N. Southworth (The Hidden Hand, among many others).  The Ledger's principles were denoted to be "devoted", "choice literature", "romance", "the news", and "commerce".  The Ledger also regularly published some of the most popular mid-century women poets including Sarah M. B. Piatt, Lydia Sigourney, and the Cary sisters, Alice and Phoebe.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Ledger

Dox Thrash (1893–1965) was an African-American artist who was famed as a skilled draftsman, printmaker, and painter of African American life and as the co-inventor of the Carborundum printmaking process.  The artist spent much of his career living and working in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  After having served in the war, Thrash qualified as a war veteran and enrolled in the Art Institute of Chicago with the support of federal funding.  After finishing his education, he traveled intermittently from Georgia to Chicago, Boston, New York, and finally Philadelphia, working odd jobs--experiences that provided him with subject matter to later paint.  Settling in Philadelphia by 1925, he took a job working as a janitor.  In his free time, he continued his art career and used his talent to create emblems, like for the North Philadelphia Businessmen's Association, and posters in exhibitions and festivals, including the 2nd Annual National Negro Music Festival and the Tra Club of Philadelphia.  This gained him local recognition and opened doors for new artistic endeavors.  By 1929, Thrash found himself attending nightly classes within these clubs, namely with Earl Horter of the Graphic Sketch Club, now known as the Samuel S. Fleisher Art Memorial.  In 1937 Thrash joined the government-sponsored Works Progress Administration (WPA)'s Federal Art Project.  Through the WPA, Thrash began working at the Fine Print Workshop of Philadelphia.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dox_Thrash  See also https://philamuseum.org/doc_downloads/education/ex_resources/doxThrash.pdf

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2375  June 9, 2021

A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg  rostrum  (ROS-truhm, RO-struhm)  noun  1.  A platform, stage, dais, etc., for public speaking.  2.  A beaklike projection on a warship, used for ramming another ship.  3.  A snout, beak, or bill of an animal.  In ancient Rome, a speaking platform was decorated with the beaks of captured ships.  Hence the use of the term for a speaking platform.  From Latin rostrum (snout, bill, beak), from rodere (to gnaw).  Earliest documented use:  1542. 

Today from the endless vault that is the internet:  your favorite pop songs, rewritten as sonnets.  These sonnets were written by software engineer Erik Didriksen, who has also published a book of his work, entitled Pop Sonnets:  Shakespearean Spins on Your Favorite Songs.  (‘Twould make an excellent gifte.)   Emily Temple  Find a few of the best sonnets in the bunch at https://lithub.com/all-your-favorite-pop-songs-reimagined-as-sonnets/  

“Let the kettle boil slowly . . .  for stew boiled in haste is of no use to anyone.”― Marsha Mehran, Rosewater and Soda Bread  “Sometimes you can save time by waiting and finding out all there is to learn about a situation.” ― Abhijit Naskar  “Time is the best teacher; patience is the best lesson” ―Ernest Agyemang Yeboah  https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/patience-and-timing  See also https://wisdomquotes.com/patience-quotes/ 

How Amy Tan “inspired me and so many others who followed to write the stories that only we could tell” by Vanessa Hua  April 28, 2021  As I began middle school, I paged through the latest issue of Seventeen Magazine, the arbiter of taste for American teens and tweens.  To my shock, in between the usual glossy fashion and makeup spreads, I discovered Amy Tan’s “Fish Cheeks.”  In her 1987 story, the narrator’s crush—a white minister’s son—comes over for Christmas dinner with his family.  She’s mortified when her parents reach across the table to dip into platters, instead of passing them.  Then her father burps to signify his approval of the meal.  Only later does she realize that her parents served all her favorites, squid with the look of bicycle tires and a whole rock cod whose head disgusts the squeamish guests.  It was the first time I’d read a short story about a Chinese American teenager.  Later, I would learn that Tan is roughly a generation older than me.  Even though the details of our lives differed in significant ways, certain contours were familiar, those of shame and pride and love.  “Fish Cheeks” is now widely taught in classrooms.  Within two years of its publication, Tan would debut “The Joy Luck Club,” landmark, interlinked stories about four mothers and four daughters struggling to bridge cultural, language and generational gaps.  With the premier of Amy Tan: Unintended Memoir, I’ve been reflecting upon the impact of her work on my life and many others in the decades since.  Tan inspired me and so many others who followed to write the stories that only we could tell.  Eventually, I became a writer, publishing “Deceit and Other Possibilities,” a short story collection, and a novel, “A River of Stars.”  My next book, “Forbidden City,” is forthcoming.  A couple years ago, I met Tan at the Community of Writers, a conference where we both got our start as aspiring novelists, decades apart.  I still had that battered copy of “The Joy Luck Club,” that I’d carried with me on several cross country and career moves.  Heart pounding, I approached her one night, not wanting to bother her, but she graciously signed it, as she has signed countless copies of her novels, children’s books, and memoirs for fans who felt made visible, made whole by her work, whether or not they shared a similar background.  https://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/how-amy-tan-inspired-me-and-so-many-others-who-followed-to-write-the-stories-that-only-we-could-tell/17842/ 

In 1849, after retiring from medicine and science, 70-year-old Peter Mark Roget turned to words, a passion that harked back to his childhood, when he had filled a notebook with English translations of Latin vocabulary and then classified them into subject areas.  Roget’s early passion never dissipated:  In his mid-20s, during off hours, the young doctor compiled a list of some 15,000 words—a “little collection,” he later called it, that, although “scanty and imperfect,” had helped him in his writing over the years.  Now a man of leisure, Roget unearthed his earlier compilation.  One of Roget’s greatest gifts, his biographer D.L. Emblen writes, was a determination “to bring about order in that which lacked it.”  Over the next three years in his Bloomsbury home, just steps from leafy Russell Square, Roget assembled his words into six overarching categories, including “matter,” “intellect” and “volition.”  Roget’s work echoed the organizational principles of Carl Linnaeus, the pioneering 18th-century taxonomist.  Neither a dictionary nor simply a collection of similar words, Roget had sorted and classified “all human knowledge,” Emblen notes emphatically.  Although prior books of synonyms existed, none offered the depth or scope of the thesaurus that Roget published in 1853, and for which he would become a household word—a synonym for the source of all synonyms.  Over the next 16 years, Roget oversaw more than two dozen additional editions and printings—so many that the stereotype plates created for the third volume in 1855 eventually wore out.  After his death on September 12, 1869, at the age of 90, Roget’s son John took up editorship of the thesaurus.  In an introduction to the 1879 edition, John reported that his father had been working on an expanded edition in the last years of his life, scribbling words and phrases in the margins of an earlier version.  Claudia Kalb  https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/roget-gets-last-word-180977459/  

May 1, 2021   After years of legal wrangling and failed attempts to seal a deal, Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Seminole Tribe of Florida have nailed down a gambling agreement to bring sports betting to the state and rake at least $2.5 billion into state coffers within five years.  But the complicated 30-year pact faces significant hurdles before Florida residents and visitors legally could whip out their phones and place bets on their favorite sports teams.  State lawmakers would have to sign off on the agreement, which is known as a “compact.”  The U.S. Department of the Interior also has to authorize the deal.  In addition, experts are divided about whether the Florida Constitution requires statewide voter approval to legalize sports betting.  Other lawyers believe that the proposed compact with the Seminoles could run afoul of federal law.  “Florida is a legal landmine,” Hallandale Beach lawyer Daniel Wallach, who specializes in sports betting, said in an interview.  Wallach warned that the compact could result in a legal quagmire because of the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act which governs what activities tribes can engage in.  Dara Kam  https://www.clickorlando.com/news/2021/05/01/florida-gambling-deal-with-seminole-tribe-faces-legal-questions/

To some, they resemble “Peanuts” characters—if Charlie Brown and the gang had ever grown up.  They are the seven black-and-white works of comic art from the mid-’50s collectively called the “Hagemeyer” strips.  Four of them have appeared in books. The three other “lost” strips were found and purchased at auction in May 2020—but have never been widely published, according to the Charles M. Schulz Museum and Research Center.  The seven “Hagemeyer” originals will go on public display for the first time June 17, 2021 at the museum’s gallery space in Santa Rosa, Calif., as the centerpiece of an exhibition titled “Adults by Schulz.”  The seven samples were created several years after the 1950 debut of “Peanuts”; the museum believes Schulz pitched “Hagemeyer” as a potential feature to his distributor, United Feature Syndicate, which apparently passed on launching it.  Schulz started several comic features during that decade, including the sports-and-games panel “It’s Only a Game” and the religiously themed gag panel “Young Pillars,” which centered on adolescence.  After the museum acquired the three rediscovered “Hagemeyer” originals last year—the seller remained anonymous—Schulz officials were able to glean a bit more about the strip’s concept, including who the title character was.  (The museum now owns all seven pen-and-ink works, each about 29 by 7 inches, which still show the cartoonist’s underlying pencil lines.)  Michael Cavna   See the seven strips at https://www.washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/2021/05/31/charles-schulz-hagemeyer/  See also https://schulzmuseum.org/ 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2373  June 4, 2021

Pandesal, a plush and pillowy yeast roll coated in breadcrumbs, is an everyday staple in the Philippines, humble and iconic.  The word pandesal means salt bread in Spanish, but it’s really more sweet than salty.  Many enjoy it for breakfast, dunking it into black coffee, warm milk or tsokolate (a thick and grainy hot chocolate).  It’s complete on its own, but frequently enhanced with butter, coconut jam, chocolate spread, peanut butter or sweetened condensed milk.  Every bite collapses softly in your mouth and sends crumbs sprinkling onto your lap.  Arlyn Osborne  Find recipe at https://www.washingtonpost.com/food/2021/04/27/pandesal-recipe-philippine-bread/ 

“Small talk functions as a crucial social ritual,” says Jessica Methot, a behavioural scientist at Rutgers University who studies social networks.  “It’s a way to grease the wheels.”  Methot has co-authored a number of papers that have found several benefits for small talk in work settings—work being one of the most common venues for chit-chat.  In one study, she and her team found that, on days employees had more small talk with coworkers or supervisors, their mood improved, they had more energy, and there was a decrease in burnout.  Gillian Sandstrom, a psychologist at the University of Essex, conducted one study that found that, when people engaged more with a barista—smiling, making eye contact, conversing—they felt a greater sense of community belonging.  In another, her data showed that, the more people mingled with acquaintances or strangers in a day, the better their mood and sense of connection.  Sandstrom observed that, in a normal prepandemic day, people interacted with an average of eleven acquaintances; university students interacted with sixteen.  But, now, talking with more than two or three people a day seems inconceivable.  Small talk is also an equalizer.  Andrew Guydish, a PhD student of psychology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, found in his research that, without space for off-task communication, people in “directing” roles at work spoke much more than those in “following” roles.  In our pandemic world, casual conversation has been all but eliminated.  And it’s not just work small talk that we’re missing out on.  Chatting with strangers out in public can also prove valuable—though it’s now increasingly rare.  Hannah Seo  https://thewalrus.ca/blah-blah-blah-the-lack-of-small-talk-is-breaking-our-brains/  

An “incredibly rare” handwritten manuscript of Emily Brontë’s poems, with pencil corrections by her sister Charlotte, is going up for auction as part of a “lost library” that has been out of public view for nearly a century.  The collection was put together by Arthur Bell Nicholls, the widower of Charlotte, who of the six Brontë children lived the longest, dying in 1855 at the age of 38.  Nicholls sold the majority of the surviving Brontë manuscripts in 1895 to the notorious bibliophile and literary forger Thomas James Wise.  The collectors and brothers Alfred and William Law, who grew up 20 miles from the Brontë family home in Haworth, then acquired some of the family’s heirlooms from Wise, including the manuscript of Emily’s poems, and the family’s much-annotated copy of A History of British Birds, a book immortalised in Jane Eyre.  The Law brothers’ library at Honresfield House disappeared from public view when their nephew and heir Alfred Law died in 1939, and was inaccessible even to academics.  Alison Flood  https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/may/25/emily-brontes-handwritten-poems-are-highlight-of-lost-library-auction 

May 4, 2021  Stacey Abrams, who solidified herself this past election season as one of the most powerful women in American politics, has another job:  She’s a writer.  And not just about politics.  She’s a master of fiction, with eight romance and suspense novels written under the name Selena Montgomery.  Now she’s back to Stacey Abrams, with While Justice Sleeps, which is both her first novel written under her real name and her first legal thriller.  Abrams hopped on Zoom with veteran thriller writer Michael Connelly, author of The Lincoln Lawyer and the Harry Bosch series, to talk shop.  MC:  You mentioned that writing is a part of your core.  What was your experience?  How did storytelling and reading inspire you?  SA:  Until I was 15, my mom was a librarian.  When we moved from Mississippi to Georgia, my father complained that with six kids and two adults, we had more boxes of books than boxes of clothes.  We would later throw out a box of clothes, but books were sacrosanct—you could not touch them.  We grew up with my mom just always encouraging us to read and literally having the run of a library to find the works that we wanted to read.  Read extensive interview at https://www.elle.com/culture/a36318872/stacey-abrams-michael-connelly-conversation/ 

The Peanuts comic strip character Snoopy, in his imagined persona as the World Famous Author, sometimes begins his novels with the phrase "It was a dark and stormy night."  Cartoonist Charles Schulz made Snoopy use this phrase because "it was a cliché, and had been one for a very long time".  A book by Schulz, titled It Was a Dark and Stormy Night, Snoopy, and credited to Snoopy as author, was published by Holt, Rinehart, and Winston in 1971.  Janet and Allan Ahlberg wrote a book titled It Was A Dark and Stormy Night in which a kidnapped boy must keep his captors entertained with his storytelling.  It is the opening line in the popular 1962 novel A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle:  It was a dark and stormy night.  L'Engle biographer Leonard Marcus notes that "With a wink to the reader, she chose for the opening line of A Wrinkle in Time, her most audaciously original work of fiction, that hoariest of clichés . . . L'Engle herself was certainly aware of old warhorse's literary provenance as . . . Edward Bulwer-Lytton's much maligned much parodied repository of Victorian purple prose, Paul Clifford."  While discussing the importance of establishing the tone of voice at the beginning of fiction, Judy Morris notes that L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time opens with "Snoopy's signature phrase".  MUSIC:  Kerry Turner:  Twas a Dark and Stormy Night, Op. 12 (1987, rev. 2019), different versions.  Joni Mitchell's song "Crazy Cries of Love" on her album Taming the Tiger opens with "It was a dark and stormy night".  In the December 1998 issue of Musician, Mitchell discusses her idea of using several cliche lines in the lyrics of multiple songs on the album, such as "the old man is snoring" in the title song Taming the Tiger.  Her co-lyricist, Don Fried, had read of a competition in The New Yorker to write a story opening with "It was a dark and stormy night" and was inspired to put it in the song lyrics.  Christian rock/ska band Five Iron Frenzy announced their reunion in 2011 by releasing the song "It Was a Dark and Stormy Night," which opens with the line.  The song was included on their 2013 album, Engine of a Million Plots.  Board game.  In the board game titled It Was a Dark and Stormy Night, contestants are given first lines of various famous novels and must guess their origin.  Originally sold independently in bookstores in the Chicago area, it was later picked up by the online book reading club Goodreads.com.  The annual Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest was formed in 1982.  The contest, sponsored by the English Department at San Jose State University, recognizes the worst examples of "dark and stormy night" writing.  It challenges entrants to compose "the opening sentence to the worst of all possible novels."  The "best" of the resulting entries have been published in a series of paperback books, starting with It Was a Dark and Stormy Night in 1984.  SOFTWARE:  Version 3.6.2 of the statistical programming language, R, has the codename "Dark and Stormy Night."  R release names appear to be Peanuts references, in this instance to the character Snoopy's abortive attempts to write a novel and his hackneyed opening sentence of choice.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It_was_a_dark_and_stormy_night  See also 100 best first lines from novels at http://americanbookreview.org/100bestlines.asp                                       

Chamomile (American English) or camomile (British English; see spelling differences) is the common name for several daisy-like plants of the family Asteraceae.  Two of the species, Matricaria recutita and Anthemis nobilis, are commonly used to make herbal infusions for traditional medicine.  There is insufficient scientific evidence that consuming chamomile in foods or beverages has any effect on health.  The spelling "camomile" is a British derivation from the French.  In The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter (1902), Peter is given chamomile tea after being chased by Mr. McGregor.  Mary Wesley's 1984 novel The Camomile Lawn features a house in Cornwall with a lawn planted with chamomile rather than grass.  See pictures at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chamomile  See also How to Grow Chamomile by Marie Iannotti at https://www.thespruce.com/how-to-grow-chamomile-1402627 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2372  June 2, 2021