Category: Books

Tidy Tidbits: Winter Pastimes

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MOVIES—MEN AT WORK, PHYSICS & MUSIC

Oppenheimer ($5.99 on Amazon Prime, Apple TV, et al)

Einstein & Oppenheimer (Digital Spy)

Oppenheimer, one of the big films of 2023, is an almost mesmerizing portrayal of one individual’s huge impact on history.  Physicist Oppenheimer was a complex man and an intriguing one.  Brilliance, coupled with ego and drive, propelled him in overseeing the development of the atomic bomb.  This invention led directly to the end of World War II and, initially, accolades for Oppenheimer.  To what extent, Oppenheimer carefully considered the level of destruction use of the bomb would wreak is a question one can debate.  

Several years after the war, he was accused of being a Communist and a security threat. Based on the biography, American Prometheus,the film is multi-layered and nuanced in its depiction of Oppenheimer and those involved in the Manhattan Project.  And the special effects are stunning.  Highly recommended!

American Symphony (Netflix)

Suleika & Jon (Variety)

Until I read reviews of American Symphony, I had not heard of Jon Batiste.  He’s a composer, pianist, pop performer, and winner of numerous awards.  In this film, produced jointly with Higher Ground Productions (the Obamas’ company), the viewer experiences the creation of the musical piece of the title. Simultaneously, it follows the travails of Batiste’s wife Suleika Jaouad as she copes with a recurrence of leukemia.  Batiste is a dedicated and hard-working composer, but he is also tender and supportive of Suleika.  

I enjoyed parts of Jon’s creative process and admired her for her bravery and her willingness to share the raw as well as the joyful moments of her treatment.  Overall, I’d give the film a mixed review.  I thought it was unnecessarily long and would have edited out some of the composition scenes.  

As a side note, Suleika’s memoir Between Two Kingdoms about her earlier cancer journey was published in 2021.   I read it when it was released and included it in a blog post in Sept. 2021.

READING—GRIEF & LOVE

Lost and Found: A Memoir by Kathryn Schulz

Memoirs are one of my preferred genres, so I approached Lost and Found expectantly.  It is both emotional and scholarly in tone.  Schulz focuses on grief and love.  Besides detailing how and why we lose or misplace objects and citing a range of research articles about loss, she delves into her grief over her father’s death and describes his long physical and mental decline.  Anyone who has lost a parent or other loved one can relate to this section.  

Her other main topic is love and how one goes about finding one’s true love or life partner: what makes two people click and how does one arrange to have the right circumstances at hand for this to happen.  Schulz had a long search, sometimes fraught with self-doubt, before meeting her right person and then settling down together.

I confess to skimming some; I was more interested in her personal experiences than I was in the scientific explanations for loss and love.  My response may be colored by being older than the author with several decades more life experience.  Overall, I give it a qualified recommendation.  

LOCAL CULTURE—GREAT MUSIC

The Sarasota Orchestra was in fine form on Friday night for their first concert of the season at Neel Performing Arts Center in Bradenton.  Their playing was spirited with all sections performing strongly.  This concert, under the baton of guest conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya, included a recent work by composer Clarice Assad, an impressive rendition of Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini by pianist Stephen Hough, and Elgar’s Enigma Variations.  All fourteen of them, each variation clearly delineated one from the other.  It was truly a great night for our local musicians.  Bravo!

Note: Header photo is of ducks over a pond in California in Jan. 2014 ©JWFarrington (some rights reserved.)

Tidy Tidbits: End of Year Reading & Watching

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RECENT NOVEL: LARGER THAN LIFE

An American Beauty by Shana Abe

Arabella (Huntington Library)

An American Beauty, Abe’s recent “novel of the Gilded Age” is fascinating historical fiction. Belle Yarrington was a child of poverty. Left a widow, her mother Catherine struggled to feed and clothe her five children. When Belle was fifteen, she arranged for Belle to work at Johnny Worsham’s club. Beautiful Belle played the piano, charmed the male clients, and attracted the attention of wealthy railroad man, Collis Huntington.

Several years later, Belle became Collis’ mistress. He supported both her and her family over many years.  The part he played in Belle’s life, her role as a shadow wife, and how she came in her later years to have two husbands are what one might expect to find only in the tabloids. From poverty to show girl to wealthy woman philanthropist in her own right, Belle’s story is an engaging one.

Collis Potter Huntington (1821-1900) was one of the Big Four in San Francisco (others were Leland Stanford, Mark Hopkins, and Charles Crocker) and instrumental in the building of the Central Pacific Railroad.  Collis’ nephew, Henry Huntington (1850-1927), is perhaps better known.  He was also a railroad magnate and the founder of the Huntington Library and gardens in San Marino.  Both men have roles to play in this novel.

NEW FILMS: COMPLICATED LOVE STORIES

This is the time of year when the Chief Penguin and I get serious about trying to see as many films as possible that are Oscar contenders.  Fortunately, several of them are already available on Netflix or Apple TV. 

Maestro (Netflix)

Lenny & Felicia (Digital Spy)

While charting Leonard Bernstein’s trajectory from wunderkind filling in for Bruno Walter to widely acclaimed conductor and composer, Maestro is primarily the story of the complex and sometimes tortured 30-year love affair between Lenny and his wife Felicia.  These two smart individuals come together, produce several children, and pursue their successful careers.  Felicia organizes his life, and he supports her acting, while continuing to indulge his attraction to men.  It’s a bittersweet tale of much joy alongside moments of pain and anguish.  

This is Bradley Cooper’s film: he is producer, director, and star.  He becomes Lenny Bernstein, and he is superb!  Equally excellent is Carey Mulligan as the vivacious Felicia.  And the score—it’s all music composed by Bernstein.  It’s music that wraps itself around the viewer and deserves to be heard in the theater or at least on a good home sound system.  Recommended!

Past Lives (Apple TV+ $)

Nora & Hae Sung (Vox)

Past Lives, rendered partly in Korean, is tender and poignant.  It explores the connections to place or persons we develop in childhood and carry into our adult lives.  As a child in Seoul, Nora, an aspiring writer, becomes close friends with Hae Sung, a boy in her class.  At age 12, they depend on and support each other.  But she and her parents move to Toronto, and then she emigrates from Canada to New York. 

They have little contact for a time and then 12 years later, they talk online regularly.  There is then another long break before Hae Sung goes to New York to see her again.  She is now married.  Interwoven with the affection Nora and Hae Sung have for each other are cultural gaps, wildly different lifestyles, and quite different career paths.  Yet each, even the more successful and sophisticated Nora, has retained a strong bond to the other.  

The film unfolds gently. The scenes with Nora, Hae Sung, and her husband Arthur are especially moving.  Recommended! 

Tidy Tidbits: Favorite Books & A Play

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PURE ESCAPISM 

Crazy for You at the Asolo Theatre

(Sarasota Magazine)

With music and lyrics by the Gershwin brothers, this classic of American musical theater was an afternoon of romance, some hijinks, and lots and lots of dancing!  In 1930 in a dead-end town in Nevada, earnest Bobby Child tries to revive the theater he’s been sent to shut down.  Captivated by Polly Baker, the town’s postmistress, and indulging in some theatrics of his own, he and the cast tap dance their way to a successful finale. Along the way are some all-time favorite songs such as “Someone to Watch over Me” and “Embraceable You.”

(Sarasota Herald-Tribune)

It isn’t profound drama, the plot is simple and predictable, but overall, it’s uplifting and a great respite from the politics of today.  If you’re local, see it before it closes in early January!  

SOME FAVORITE BOOKS OF 2023

(courtesy Basmo)

I liked many of the books I read this year, so it’s hard to choose, but here are a few that have stayed with me. Happy reading to you!

NOVEL ABOUT A HOT BUTTON ISSUE

Mad Honey by Jodi Picoult & Jennifer. F. Boylan

NOVEL BY A FAVORITE AUTHOR

Tom Lake by Ann Patchett

NOVEL BY A NEW AUTHOR

Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus

NOVEL THAT READS LIKE A MEMOIR

Hang the Moon by Jeannette Walls

MYSTERY

Exiles by Jane Harper

Runners up: Small Mercies by Dennis Lehane

And White Lady by Jacqueline Winspear

HISTORICAL NOVEL

Horse by Gwendoline Brooks

Runner up: Bookbinder by Pip Williams

NOVELLAS

Foster by Claire Keegan

And Small Things Like These, also by Keegan

NONFICTION/MEMOIR

Enough by Cassidy Hutchinson

Runner up: Giving up the Ghost by Hilary Mantel

To all my readers, best wishes for a most happy, healthy holiday season!

Note: Header photo of open book courtesy of Unsplash.

Tidy Tidbits: Lost, Missing, Unforgotten

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READING—SIOUX REVOLT IN THE WEST

The Lost Wife by Susanna Moore

Author Moore (The Guardian)

This spare historical novel focuses on events leading up to the Sioux Uprising of 1862.  It is loosely based on a memoir by Sarah Wakefield who with her children was held captive for six weeks by the Sioux Indians.  In The Lost Wife, Sarah Butts, later Brinton, leaves an abusive husband in Rhode Island and travels the long distance to the Minnesota Territory to make a new life with her good friend Maddie.  Maddie has died and Sarah marries the local doctor who is physician to tribe members at the Indian agency.  

How Sarah adapts to life among the Sioux, learns their language, and works with the women, will affect her reception later by both the white women and the tribe.  Told from Sarah’s perspective, the novel is full of details of the physical landscape and both mundane and grisly aspects of her daily life, but short on emotion.  The one exception to this is Sarah’s relationship with Chaska, one of her captors.  This relationship colors how she is treated upon release by her former neighbors and her husband.  

The novel is short, but not a fast read.  It highlights a shameful incident in the settling of the American West. (~JWFarrington)

VIEWING—UNSOLVED MURDER CASES

Unforgotten, Season 5 (PBS Masterpiece)

Jessie & Sunny (PBS)

I miss Nicola Walker.  Her role as DCI Cassie Stuart in the first four seasons was central.  She has been replaced by prickly Jessie James, played by Sinead Keenan.  DI Sunny Khan is grieving Cassie’s death and has personal issues at home.  Newbie Jessie’s dismissive approach to her team is harming morale, but she has a personal crisis of her own.  

The case of a body part found in the chimney of an empty house is complex and many layered, and some of the varied cast of suspects have complicated pasts and questionable issues.  This season has six episodes, all focused on this one case.  Despite the tension between them, Sunny, Jessie, and the team eventually solve it.  I like this series but didn’t love this season as much as previous ones.

NOVEMBER REFLECTIONS 

In the Northeast especially, November brings dark nights and cold days.  Around Election Day each year, I reflect on my father’s short but impactful life.  This year was the 50th anniversary of his death, more years gone than he lived.  And yet, he remains vivid in my memories.

November is also a time to celebrate.  Thanksgiving Day provides us with an opportunity to be mindful of and thankful for all that we have.  This year, I am especially grateful for my extended family:  son, daughter-in-law, granddaughters, siblings and their spouses, nieces and their families, and especially my Chief Penguin. 

This week we unexpectedly lost a sibling, the Chief Penguin’s brother, a doting uncle.   Siblings share experiences from their past lives; when one is gone, the puzzle is missing a piece, and a space remains unfilled.  I wish you a Happy Thanksgiving with family and friends filled with joy and love!

(Wildgoose)

Note: Header photo of November dawn ©JWFarrington (some rights reserved.)