UP TO ROCKLAND
After several years of good intentions, we finally made the relatively short drive north to Rockland to visit the Farnsworth Art Museum. Rockland is a charming small town (worth a return visit on a cooler day) and the Farnsworth a gem. Why did we wait so long to explore it?
Focused mainly on American art, current exhibits included a selection from their permanent collection, a special exhibit of stunning gold animal heads by Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei (who attended Penn in 1981), as well as paintings by assorted Wyeths housed in a historic church building. Paintings there are by father N. C. Wyeth, sons Andrew and Jamie, and their sister plus a brother-in-law.
The gallery spaces are all very attractive and flow nicely and the museum includes an equally inviting library open to the public. The small museum store, which also opens directly onto Main Street, contains an attractive inventory of items beyond the usual note cards and scarves.
We broke up our museum tour with lunch across the street at the cozy Brass Compass Café and tucked into the best lobster rolls and French fries we’ve had yet this season. It was really hot, above 90, and not a day to eat outside!
PAIRED HISTORICAL NOVELS
These two recent novels are set mostly in 1883-1885, one in Manhattan and the other in Philadelphia. In each, an unwed mother must deal with the consequences of giving birth without benefit of a spouse at a time when this stigma was life changing and possibly life threatening.
#14 The Address by Fiona Davis
This is the second of Ms. Davis’s three books, a writer whose distinctive shtick is using an historic building as a jumping off point for novels that combine mystery with a heroine in the past and one in the present day. Her first novel, The Dollhouse, was about some of the young women who lived in the Barbizon Hotel. This one focuses on The Dakota, a huge apartment complex on the edge of civilization when it was completed in 1884, and which is still a residence today. It’s a juicy read, perfect for a day at the beach.
In 1985, fresh out of rehab, interior designer Bailey Camden is trying to put her life back in order and has turned to her cousin Melinda Camden for support. Bailey’s grandfather was Theodore Camden, an architect who worked on the Dakota. Bailey is curious about her origins and seeks to learn more about the details surrounding Theodore’s death and the housekeeper, Sara Smythe, who murdered him. In interleaved chapters, we get Sara’s arrival from London to work at The Dakota, her attraction to the married Theodore, and her subsequent downfall, along with Bailey’s rough road to recovery and a renewed career.
The historical details on the building are fascinating, the characters mostly believable, and the mystery one you will probably solve before it’s revealed. The book is fun–a bonbon for a summer’s day! (~JWFarrington)
#15 Lilli de Jong by Janet Benton
This first novel by journalist and teacher Benton is intense and both vivid and compelling. In 1883, observant Quaker and schoolteacher Lilli de Jong surrenders her virginity to Johan, her fiancé, the night before he leaves Philadelphia for a new career in Pittsburgh. When her father marries his cousin soon after the death of her mother and is barred from Quaker Meeting and when Lilli finds herself pregnant with no way to contact Johan, her life unwinds. In disgrace, she leaves home and finds herself a place at a residence for unwed women, the first stop in her journey to survival. Allowed to stay there only until a few weeks after the birth, she must decide how to live her life with or without her baby going forward. Structured as a journal in ten books, the novel is Lilli’s account of her struggles and her descent into poverty and squalor. It is also one of the most poignant and penetrating accounts of motherhood and the love that binds mother and child.
In the author’s notes at the end, Benton describes how this book was conceived when she was pregnant with her own child and how it is also a tribute to Philadelphia, a city she loves. She details the historical underpinnings of the buildings, streets, and institutions that appear in her 19thcentury city. I found the book a moving account of one spirited and determined woman. (~JWFarrington)
All photos by JWFarrington (some rights reserved).
