The orangeless childhood of Bertrand Russell
January 18, 2012 | Comments Off
I’m still obsessed with the life and writings of Bertrand Russell, and I keep meaning to post the passage from his autobiography that inspired one of my recent New York Times Magazine microcolumns, on Victorians’ belief that fruit was bad for children. Here it is:
I remember an occasion at lunch when all the plates were changed and everybody except me was given an orange. I was not allowed an orange as there was an unalterable conviction that fruit is bad for children. I knew I must not ask for one as that would be impertinent, but as I had been given a plate I did venture to say, ‘a plate and nothing on it’. Everybody laughed, but I did not get an orange. I had no fruit, practically no sugar, and an excess of carbohydrates. Nevertheless, I never had a day’s illness except a mild attack of measles at the age of eleven. Since I became interested in children, after the birth of my own children, I have never known one nearly as healthy as I was, and yet I am sure that any modern expert on children’s diet would think that I ought to have had various deficiency diseases. Perhaps I was saved by the practice of stealing crabapples, which, if it had been known, would have caused the utmost horror and alarm. A similar instinct for self preservation was the cause of my first lie. My governess left me alone for half an hour with strict instructions to eat no blackberries during her absence. When she returned I was suspiciously near the brambles. ‘You have been eating black-berries,’ she said. ‘I have not,’ I replied. ‘Put out your tongue!’ she said. Shame overwhelmed me, and I felt utterly wicked.I was, in fact, unusually prone to a sense of sin. When asked what was my favorite hymn, I anwered ‘Weary of earth and laden with my sin’. On one occasion when my grandmother read the parable of the Prodigal Son at family prayers, I said to her afterward: ‘I know why you read that — because I broke my jug.’
A little earlier on, Russell establishes that this grandmother, who raised him, “ate only the plainest food, breakfasted at eight, and until she reached the age of eighty never sat in a comfortable chair until after tea.”
The impression Russell leaves of his boyhood self is a lonely, anxious, and searching one. Reading about his long, solitary days, I kept wishing someone would swoop in, give him some candy, and whisk him off on a fishing trip or to the fair or something.
His friend Annabel Huth Jackson recalls him in her A Victorian Childhood (which he quotes) as “a solemn little boy in a blue velvet suit with an equally solemn governess…. [E]ven as a child I realised what an unsuitable place it was for children to be brought up in. Lady Russell always spoke in hushed tones and Lady Agatha always wore a white shawl and looked down-trodden. Rollo Russell never spoke at all. He gave one a handshake that nearly broke all the bones of one’s fingers, but was quite friendly. They all drifted in and out of the rooms like ghosts and no one ever seemed to be hungry.”
The image above is W.C. Rainbow’s watercolor of Pembroke Lodge, Russell’s childhood home, painted in 1883. And below is an 1884 photograph of Russell’s grandmother, the Dowager Countess Russell; you can read an entire book about her, and if this fixation continues I probably will.
Tags: bertrand russell > dowager countess russell > nytmag > oranges > the prodigal son > victorians
At Full Stop: The situation in American writing
January 4, 2012 | Comments Off
Full Stop interviewed me about literature, politics, criticism, and the responsibilities of writers, as part of a series called “The Situation in American Writing.”
Others who’ve answered the same questions: Marilynne Robinson, Alexander Chee, Victor LaValle, Porochista Khakpour, Geoff Dyer, Gary Shteyngart, T.C. Boyle, Roxane Gay, George Saunders, Aimee Bender, Siddhartha Deb, Christopher Bollen, Steve Himmer, Laura van den Berg, John Warner, Dana Spiotta, Philipp Meyer, Kio Spark, Danielle Evans, Lars Iyer, and Darin Strauss.
Muriel Spark + Maggie Smith = a better January
January 4, 2012 | Comments Off
Muriel Spark, Jean Brodie, Maggie Smith, and Downton Abbey feature in my most recent New York Times Magazine micro-column.
Smith is best known now for her role as the Dowager Countess, but she won the Best Actress Oscar for her portrayal of Muriel Spark’s dramatic and overbearing schoolmistress in the 1969 adaptation of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. It’s the perfect apéritif for the second season of Downton Abbey, which airs on PBS this Sunday. And obviously the novel is even better.
Speaking of drinks, if you’re looking for something wintry to cut the sting of January, and if you have good heat and don’t mind juicing a big bag of clementines, I recommend Rosie Schaap’s wondrous Bitter Darling, my last drink of 2011.
Tags: bitter darling > dowager countess > downton abbey > maggie smith > muriel spark > nytmag > the prime of miss jean brodie
William Faulkner’s hot toddy recipe
December 21, 2011 | Comments Off
Twitter was so excited about William Faulkner’s mint julep yesterday that it seemed wrong, especially at the holidays, to withhold his cure for anything from “a bad spill from a horse to a bad cold, from a broken leg to a broken heart.” (So said Dean Faulkner Wells.)
I’ll stick with Kate’s hot toddy, personally. But here, as told to The Great American Writers’ Cookbook by Faulkner’s niece, are directions for making his version.
Pappy alone decided when a Hot Toddy was needed, and he administered it to his patient with the best bedside manner of a country doctor.He prepared it in the kitchen in the following way: Take one heavy glass tumbler. Fill approximately half full with Heaven Hill bourbon (the Jack Daniel’s was reserved for Pappy’s ailments). Add one tablespoon of sugar. Squeeze 1/2 lemon and drop into glass. Stir until sugar dissolves. Fill glass with boiling water. Serve with potholder to protect patient’s hands from the hot glass.
Pappy always made a small ceremony out of serving his Hot Toddy, bringing it upstairs on a silver tray and admonishing his patient to drink it quickly, before it cooled off. It never failed.
See also Rosie Schaap’s glogg and gingersnaps, Eudora Welty’s recipe for “Charles Dickens’ eggnog,” Faulkner’s bourbon trolley, Kate Christensen’s food (and life) blog, Ford Madox Ford’s Provencal chicken, and my winter cold Rx.
Portrait of William Faulkner by Carl Van Vechten, via the Library of Congress.
Better science through sci-fi: Stephenson & NASA
December 21, 2011 | Comments Off
My most recent New York Times Magazine mini-column concerns Neal Stephenson’s — and NASA’s — efforts to encourage scientific and technological innovation through speculative fiction.
See also Stephenson’s “Innovation Starvation” speech, NASA’s partnership with TOR Books, Arthur C. Clarke’s predictions for the future (made in 1964), Isaac Asimov’s Visions of the Future (he starts speaking at 6:45 of part 1, above; here are parts 2, 3, and 4), and Asimov on the Golden Age of Science Fiction.
Tags: arthur c clarke > innovation > isaac asimov > nasa > neal stephenson > nytmag > sci-fi
When the place outlives the preaching
December 12, 2011 | Comments Off
The Crystal Cathedral of “Hour of Power” fame is the subject of my latest New York Times Magazine mini-column. Not so long ago the most lavish symbol of U.S. Protestantism, the building sold in bankruptcy last month to a Catholic diocese.
Although the congregation has agreed under the terms of the deal to vacate the premises after three years, pastor Sheila Schuller Coleman, daughter of founder Robert H. Schuller, assures her flock, “lest you think that it’s too late for a miracle, I want to reassure you and remind you that it is not too late. There is still time for God to step in and rescue Crystal Cathedral Ministries.”
Bonus reading: Joseph Clarke’s “Infrastructure for Souls,” on the “parallel histories of the American megachurch [including the Crystal Cathedral] and the corporate-organizational complex.”
Tags: architecture > catholics > crystal cathedral > evangelicals > hour of power > nytmag > philip johnson > robert schuller
A secret chord that David played
December 12, 2011 | Comments Off
My mini-column for last week’s New York Times Magazine is on poetry and song. King David viewed them as natural companions, but these days they’re seen as distinct, unrelated arts.
Accepting Spain’s Prince of Asturias Award for Letters recently, musician and poet Leonard Cohen implicitly took David’s view. He spoke of learning a progression of six flamenco chords from a mysterious young Spaniard who soon killed himself. “It was those six chords,” Cohen said, “it was that guitar pattern that has been the basis of all my songs and all my music… Everything that you have found favorable in my work comes from this place. Everything. Everything that you have found favorable in my songs, in my poetry [is] inspired by this soil.”
And he expressed unease over the honor. “Poetry comes from a place that no one commands and no one conquers. So I feel somewhat like a charlatan to accept an award for an activity which I do not command. In other words, if I knew where the good songs came from, I’d go there more often.”
Related: Christopher Ricks, Jonathan Lethem, and Lucinda Williams on the case for Dylan as poet; PEN New England’s new prize for excellence in song lyrics, judged by Paul Simon, Elvis Costello, Rosanne Cash, Paul Muldoon, and others; The Village Voice’s jokey list of contenders for the award; and, courtesy of my friend Michael Taeckens, Rimbaud and Jim Morrison. And, just for fun, Roger Miller and Dave Hickey on Hank Williams’ hooked-up verse.
Tags: bob dylan > christopher ricks > elvis costello > leonard cohen > lucinda williams > nytmag > paul muldoon > paul simon > PEN > poetry > rosanne cash
From du Maurier & Hitchcock to grudge-holding crows
November 28, 2011 | Comments Off
Angry birds — and especially smart, angry birds — aren’t just the subject of my latest NYT Mag mini-column. Because my mom collected and bred parrots, they’re something I’ve spent far too much time pondering.
Did you know that crows develop grudges against individual people that they impart to their flocks? Or that African Greys are capable of labeling and counting objects and grasping the concept of zero? Or that birdsong appears to be in some sense grammatical? Often parrots use their powers for good, and not evil, of course. As far as we know.
Daphne du Maurier (above) said the idea for her avian-apocalypse novella, “The Birds,” came to her after she saw a farmer ploughing a field while seagulls dived above him, and she imagined the birds “becoming hostile and attacking.” Evidently she disapproved of Hitchcock’s also-harrowing, more famous adaptation.
Unfortunately, this BBC interview doesn’t seem to be viewable in the States these days. In it she talks about her life and work for almost 50 minutes. The clip opens at her typewriter, “the standard ‘the author at work’ establishing shot except for du Maurier’s super-strong finger-punching technique on the keys.”
Tags: angry birds > du maurier > hitchcock > nytmag
The Grapes of Wrath, the real-life sequel?
November 21, 2011 | Comments Off
My latest New York Times Magazine mini-column looks at a sandstorm — “Steinbeck-ish in its arrival,” according to a city councilman — that rolled through Lubbock, Texas last month, as the harbinger of a likely impending Southwestern Dust-Bowlification.
“I expected at any moment to see a line of Model Ts coming through headed to California,” the councilman said. “It really did look like pictures I had seen of the Dust Bowl of the 1930s.”
Also: The ending of The Grapes of Wrath; retracing the characters’ journey in 2009; Woody Guthrie’s “Talking Dust Bowl Blues” (above); and Even Nobel laureates get the blues.
Tags: drought > dust bowl > great depression > nytmag > sandstorm > steinbeck > texas > the grapes of wrath > woody guthrie
Gaudí day job fantasies
November 14, 2011 | Comments Off
My second New York Times Mag mini-column is on the futuristic skyscraper Antoni Gaudí designed in 1908 for what is now Ground Zero. His Hotel Attraction (pictured) would be a lot more fun to watch going up outside my office window than the new glass towers are.
But see Rowan Moore on the still-in-process Sagrada Familia: Is it really Gaudí?
Tags: antoni gaudi > day job > ground zero > hotel attraction > nytmag > rowan moore > sagrada familia > wtc
Bertrand Russell’s terror of madness
November 9, 2011 | Comments Off
Despite being a relatively committed agnostic, I’ve recently become obsessed with Bertrand Russell. I’m working my way through several of his books at once, and especially enjoying his autobiography. So far, not quite a fifth of the way through, it’s perceptive, precise, and often funny, but also serious — tormented, even — without being pretentious.
“Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong,” he writes, “have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind.”
Before Russell married his first wife, his aristocratic family, having failed in its efforts to prevent the union on grounds of her being a commoner, “found a weapon which very nearly gave them victory”: the idea of madness in the blood. Read more
Outtakes from my talk with Susan Miller
November 9, 2011 | Comments Off
The first installment of my new microcolumn, “The Historical Record,” ran in The New York Times Magazine on Sunday alongside some other quickies, including Lizzie Skurnick’s brilliant (and useful!) “That Should Be A Word.” This one concerns astrology, from Chaucer to Susan Miller.
A friend who, like me, is drawn to the stars, says astrology shouldn’t and possibly doesn’t work at all, that it’s just really easy for those of us who are attracted to and adept with metaphor to stretch the system to fit reality. I don’t disagree with her, exactly — of course I don’t, I’m a Gemini — but it doesn’t take more than a drink or two with friends before I’m pulling out my iPhone to look up their charts and their lovers’ charts and to ponder their synastry…
As I mentioned in the columnlet, Miller and I talked about Occupy Wall Street, which she attributes to a square between Uranus and Pluto that will recur into 2015; she believes the demonstrations will continue at least until then. Read more
Tags: astrology > liz greene > nytmag > occupy wall street > pluto-uranus square > susan miller
Didion’s Blue Nights: stitched in grief
November 3, 2011 | Comments Off
I reviewed Joan Didion’s Blue Nights, which is both gorgeous and terrible (terrible in the King James sense of tremendous and fearsome, like when God appears to Moses).
In 2003′s Where I Was From, Joan Didion tells of a long wagon journey on which her great-great-grandmother buried a child, gave birth to another, contracted mountain fever twice, and sewed a quilt, “a blinding and pointless compaction of stitches,” that she must have finished en route, “somewhere in the wilderness of her own grief and illness, and just kept on stitching.” Throughout the book, Didion ruminates on her female forbears, women “pragmatic and in their deepest instincts clinically radical, given to breaking clean with everyone and everything they knew,” even their own dead babies.It was Didion’s adopted daughter Quintana, at age five or six, who first made all this heredity start to seem remote. And if the author harbored any lingering doubt about whether she shared her ancestors’ breaking-clean tendencies, the shattering effect of Quintana’s death in 2005, at age 39, must have swept it away. In her new memoir, Blue Nights, about life before and after the loss of her daughter, Didion writes, “When we talk about mortality, we are talking about our children.”
This book may be Didion’s harshest, most self-questioning book yet; it’s definitely her most beautiful. Like the stitches on her grandmother’s quilt, it covers the same material again and again, swooping down on its author’s grief with dogged, needle-like precision, from countless angles that don’t lead her anywhere soothing. “What if I fail to love this baby?” Didion worried as she carried the newborn Quintana home from the hospital. By the time of Blue Nights, the questions have changed. What if I didn’t love her right, the author interrogates herself. What if I didn’t love her enough?
You can read the full review at B&N Review, watch Didion reading from the book in a Daily Beast video, and listen to her talk about it at NPR.
Previously: Didion on psychiatric trends and diagnoses; the specter of the unanswered letter; “I didn’t want to be a writer. I wanted to be an actress”; and a short but revealing 1970 TV interview with Tom Brokaw.
Tags: Ancestry > blue nights > Joan Didion > quintana > therapy > where i was from
On the eighteenth birthday of my stepdaughter, A.
October 30, 2011 | Comments Off
My stepdaughter, A., continual bringer of joy, turns eighteen years old today. A few of you have been reading about her since the days of the beautifully and artfully burned pancakes, the puppet Wikipedia, and the giraffe in the wineglass, since The Gashlycrumb Tinies debacle, the Mythic Creatures disappointment, and the Hurricane Charley near-miss.
You’ve suggested books for her and followed our travels and learned of our shared loathing for Amy in Little Women. So I thought you’d like to know.
If I could, I’d show you some of her poetry, but she’s private about that. So here we are descending the stairs in New Orleans last winter. Isn’t her umbrella fabulous?
Local Twitter slang, and all that jawn
October 30, 2011 | Comments Off
At The Awl, I take a look — a completely unscientific but obsessive look — at some of the ways people are talking about and using slang on Twitter.
And, coincidentally, for Sunday’s New York Times, Ben Zimmer considers how linguists, sociologists, and psychologists are mining the medium for clues to real-time language use.
Tags: awl > ben zimmer > jawn > slang > twitter