The Inner Things

"In a way winter is the real spring, the time when the inner things happen, the resurgence of nature."

--  Edna O'Brien, Irish writer

Livaria Lello Bookstore in Porto, Portugal

This is the time of the year when we tend to stay inside or go to indoor spaces that nurture the "inner things."  Recently I have spotted some beautiful places and writing that take us there.

 Bookstores

Shakespeare and Company in Paris

All of the book lovers out there (and I know you are one) can enjoy this inspiring article about the twenty most beautiful bookstores in the world. These spaces are truly stunning.  The only one I have been to is Shakespeare and Company in Paris where I fell in love with its bohemian beauty.  Wouldn't it be wonderful to visit the others?  Go here to see them all.  While many of us have been lamenting the closure of independent bookstores, an article like this gives us hope that at some point bookstores will be back.   And it is inspiring to know that these bookstores are valued and cherished. 

Museums

A visit to the museum is always enriching; it is one of those experiences that feeds the soul.  Right now the Los Angeles County Museum of Art has an exquisite exhibition of paintings by the 17th-century artist Caravaggio -- "Bodies and Shadows: Caravaggio and His Legacy" -- along with paintings by other European artists who were influenced by him.  I did a little research and discovered that Caravaggio was kind of a rock star; he had a big impact on an entire generation of painters throughout Europe in the seventeenth-century.  This exhibition includes more than fifty paintings, including many by Caravaggio, which have never been shown in California.  I feel good when I make the effort to see some art and am really looking forward to seeing this show.  

Dance

This scene from the ballet "Serenade" as performed by the New York City Ballet caught my eye the other day.  There is so much beauty and grace in this image;  I am always in awe of the beauty of ballet.  Go here to read more about "Serenade."  However, if we can't make it to New York, we can try to see a ballet performance in our own city.  Check your local paper to see what is playing nearby.  Many of the big ballet companies such as the Joffrey and the American Ballet travel around the country and perform.  Right now the Joffrey Ballet is touring with their spectacular production of Stravinsky's "The Rite of Spring" -- it premiered in Paris in 1913 to a shocked public --  and I was lucky enough to see it this weekend!    

A favorite writer

One of the most rewarding and challenging writing projects (it requires discipline!) is keeping a diary.    Virginia Woolf used hers as a creative outlet -- "The habit of writing thus for my own eyes only is good practice.  It loosens the ligaments." -- as well as a journal for documenting her activities.  At the same time she was experimenting with a new form for the novel.  Books and words were her passion.  Here she writes about the kind of diary she would like hers to be:

"What sort of diary should I like mine to be?  Something loose knit and yet not slovenly, so elastic that it will embrace anything, solemn, slight or beautiful that comes into my mind.  I should like it to resemble some deep old desk, or capacious hold-all, in which one flings a mass of odds and ends without looking them through.  I should like to come back, after a year or two, and find that the collection had sorted itself and refined itself and coalesced, as such deposits so mysteriously do, into a mould, transparent enough to reflect the light of our life, and yet steady, tranquil compounds with the aloofness of a work of art.  The main requisite, I think on re-reading my old volumes, is not to play the part of censor, but to write as the mood comes or of anything whatever; since I was curious to find how I went for things put in haphazard, and found the significance to lie where I never saw it at the time."

It is not too late to start a diary for the new year!

   

 Inspiring Blogs

Some of the best bloggers open our eyes to what is going on in other parts of the world.  These bloggers (below) are taking us to some beautiful places.

Ben Pentreath shows us how beautiful London looks in the snow.  Go here .

Designtripper takes us to some special and rustic "cave" hotels which are located in the small, medieval hilltop villages of Italy.  The owner is attempting to save the dying hill towns in southern Italy and has worked with historians to revive them, adding these fascinating small hotels.  The interiors are decorated with an emphasis on traditional crafts such as textiles.  The coverlets and other linens are all produced locally by women who use ancient techniques.  These hotels are amazing!  Go here.

Sous Style gives us a peak into into the beautiful world of carnations.  We learn that even though carnations do not have a great reputation, they are actually one of the most respected and oldest cultivated flowers in the world.  And the most beautiful!  As long as you stay away from the typical colors of pink and red, they make stunning floral arrangements.  Go here.

  Food 52,  Amanda Hesser's exquisitely beautiful food blog, creates a "Downton Abbey"- inspired menu that starts with a creamy mushroom soup.  There are sage scones involved as well.  Go here.

And here is a terrific interview with Lesley Nicol, the actress who plays Mrs. Patmore on "Downton Abbey."  I would love to spend some time in her kitchen cooking the menu from Food 52!  As you read the questions and answers, be sure to click on the two videos that spoof "Downton Abbey."  They are very funny.

Put on the kettle, have a cup of tea, and enjoy.  There are so many places to go on a February day!

Flowers for February

Yesterday the weather was so warm and beautiful in Los Angeles, that it felt as if it was spring.  More cold weather and rain are on the horizon, but for now everyone is basking in the lovely weather.  I wanted to share with you this charming image from Botany Flowers, my favorite neighborhood florist.  I was walking by their delightful Paris-inspired shop yesterday and snapped these photos.  The weather was warm and gorgeous and Botany was filled with some enchanting arrangements.  The heart is made entirely of of red roses and hangs in their front window.

When the the two young women who work there saw me taking the picture of the rose heart, they invited me inside to see the giant bouquet they had made.  They were understandably proud!  After I took this shot, they told me to be sure to see the side view.

Isn't this fabulous!  Flowers, valentines, and bouquets...February is a very sweet month indeed!

"The simple flowers
 of our spring are what I
want to see again."
-- John Keats

Wishing you a lovely weekend!

Snow, Movies, and One Really Good Book

Park City, Utah

The magical setting for the Sundance Film Festival

This past weekend my dream of visiting a winter wonderland (read here) came true.  We spent a long weekend staying with friends in Deer Valley, Utah and were able to see five of the films that were shown at the Sundance Film Festival. Snow, movies, a magical setting, and one great book.  It was the perfect winter weekend.  

The Movies --

Ashton Kutcher in "Jobs," a biopic about Steve Jobs

The stars Ashton Kutcher and Josh Gad and the director Joshua Michael Stern (center)

"Before Midnight" with Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy

The third movie in Richard Linklater's trilogy

All of the films we saw were enjoyable; these were my favorites:

"Jobs" -- Ashton Kutcher gives an excellent performance as Steve Jobs.  The film take us back to the beginning of Jobs' career when he was a student at Reed College.  The time period of the seventies and eighties is vividly brought to life through sets, costumes, and some really great music.  We watch Steve Jobs as he goes from a young man who dropped out of college and created Apple computers in his parents' garage to the moment in his career when he is about to release the IPhone.  It is a fascinating story and a terrific film. 

"Before Midnight" --  This is the third film in the trilogy directed by Richard Linklater.  It continues the love story between two characters, an American man Jesse (Ethan Hawke) and a French woman Celine (Julie Delpy).  The characters initially met on a train bound for Vienna in the 1995 film "Before Sunrise." They are reunited nine years later in the 2004 film "Before Sunset."  In "Before Midnight"  the characters are married, have children and are vacationing in Greece. They are in their forties, still in love, but dealing with the complications of their lives.  The witty and smart banter is one of the joys of the movie.  If you like great writing and dialogue, you will love this film.

We also saw and enjoyed "Don Jon's Addiction," "Afternoon Delight," and "The Way, Way Back."

The Setting -- 

 Beautiful Deer Valley
I loved having dinner one night at the Stein Erikson Lodge

The Snow --

There was plenty!
Here are skiers enjoying the snow as seen from our window in the morning

The snow continued to fall all weekend

The Book --

With all that snow, there were delays getting out of Salt Lake City.  Fortunately, I had a really good book to help me get through the long hours of waiting.  The Imperfectionists by Tom Rachman fit the bill perfectly.  It follows the private lives of the reporters and editors who work for an English-language newspaper in Rome.  From the moment I began reading it, I was enchanted.  This novel is funny and poignant and includes a cast of characters that you will never forget.  Each chapter is about a particular journalist at the paper, from the editor in chief to the copy editor.  Although each chapter could stand on its own as a great short story, they are all connected and add up to a vivid portrait of this eccentric and nostalgic world, that of the newsroom.   This book is so good that it has me wondering, will someone turn it into a film?

I hope you have a chance to see these films -- they were all purchased and should be released in 2013  -- and to read this enchanting book by Tom Rachman.

Photo one via here, photo two via here, photo three via here, photo four via here, photo five via here 

Miss Potter

Beatrix Potter's Hill Top Farm in the Lake District of England

The Morgan Library and Museum is one of my favorite spots in New York City.  It is truly one of the city's treasures. Whenever I am in NYC, I make a point to visit it and I am never disappointed.  There is always something special to see.  Quiet and serene, it is filled with illuminated, historical and literary manuscripts, early printed books, and old master paintings and prints.  The Morgan began as the private library of financier Pierpont Morgan and was built between 1902 and 1906 adjacent to his New York residence at Madison Avenue and 36th Street.  After his death, his son J.P. Morgan transformed the library into a pubic institution, making its treasures available to the public.  It is a place to celebrate imagination and creativity.  Once you enter the doors, you are immersed in the words of great writers throughout the centuries.  It is almost as if they are speaking to us.

The Morgan is well-known for its fantastic exhibitions.  A couple of years ago I saw an excellent one on Jane Austen which I wrote about here.   The exhibitions are often of letters and hand-written manuscripts by famous authors.  Looking at these original creations in the author's own handwriting gives the viewer a physical sense of the writer.   If I were there this month, I would make a point of seeing the exhibition, "Beatrix Potter: The Picture Letters."  It looks fabulous.

  Letter written by Beatrix Potter to five-year-old Noel Moore, 1895

This exhibition shows how Beatrix Potter, the Edwardian artist and children's book writer, used a series of private letters to develop some of the most famous animal characters in all of children's literature.  Her former governess Annie Moore was one of her best friends and for years Potter wrote charming picture letters to Annie's children about the many pets that she kept.  This exhibition brings together for the first time twenty-two of her picture letters to children of family and friends which contain the beginnings of her celebrated books.  The most famous example is "The Tale of Peter Rabbit," which began as an eight-page letter (see above) to Noel Moore, the five-year-old son of Annie Moore.  Annie Moore persuaded Potter to take back the letter, copy it out, and revise it for publication.  At least six publishers rejected the book, but Frederick Warne & Company finally took it on.  And it was a huge success when the first trade edition finally appeared in 1902.  More than 40 million copies of "The Tale of Peter Rabbit" have been sold since it was published 110 years ago.

Renee Zellweger in the film "Miss Potter" of 2007

You probably remember the movie Miss Potter of a few years ago.  It showed Beatrix Potter as a young woman who loved nature and the English countryside.  I remember being inspired by the story of how she developed as an artist and her skill at capturing and memorializing so many creatures in nature.  It was her playful imagination that gave them a fictional identity.  After earning enough money from her books to buy Hill Top Farm in the English Lake District, she went on to purchase acres of unspoiled land and estates.  She became a conservationist and was dedicated to preserving the natural world.  When she died in 1943, she left 4,000 acres to the National Trust in Britain.

By the way, do you remember the television mini-series The Tale of Beatrix Potter that aired on Masterpiece Theatre in 1984?  It starred a young Penelope Wilton (she plays Matthew Crawley's mother on Downton Abbey) as Beatrix Potter.

This exhibition will make you think about the golden age of letter writing when writers took the time each day to write leisurely letters to family and friends.  Beatrix Potter's letters to her young friends were playful and charming.  They were unique because they included art work to illustrate whatever tale she was writing about.  It was as if she were sitting down and telling her young friends a story.  As it turns out, the stories and their illustrations were the genesis of the famous Peter Rabbit books which include the tales of Peter Rabbit, Squirrel Nutkin, Benjamin Bunny and others. Her books retained the simple joy and playful tone of her impromptu letters and this was the secret of her success. She was also a talented artist of the natural world and this exhibition highlights her art work and her career as a naturalist.  Aren't we lucky to be able to see the beginning of her amazing career?

If you miss the exhibition, you can view it online.

What Would Jane Think?

Keira Knightley and Rosamund Pike in the 2005 film "Pride and Prejudice"

It is interesting to think about Jane Austen and what she would have thought about her fame today. Could she ever have imagined the extent of it?   It is amazing to think of all the movies, television series and books that have been based on her novels and her life.  She is one of the most beloved and well-known writers in the world and her future fame was surely beyond her imagination.  She would certainly have been astonished and delighted by all the attention the 200th anniversary (on January 28) of "Pride and Prejudice" is getting.  She called this book her "darling child." There are lectures, newspaper and magazine articles, radio programs, exhibitions, and even a BBC television special which recreates the Netherfield Ball as described in "Pride and Prejudice." (Read more here.)   It was shot on location at Chawton house in Hampshire, England, the home of Jane Austen.  All of these programs and articles are examining the reasons for and celebrating the enduring popularity of this novel.

Take a look at this short film about Jane Austen called The Divine Jane.  It was part of an exhibition I saw at the Morgan Library in New York two years ago, A Woman's Wit: Jane Austen's Life and Legacy.   In this excellent film, actors, writers and scholars talk about Jane Austen and what she has meant to them.      

Part one of "The Divine Jane"

Part two of "The Divine Jane"

I hope you enjoy it!

Cold Comforts

Stein Eriksen Lodge Deer Valley in Park City, Utah

Do you remember the scene in the film "White Christmas" when Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney and Vera-Ellen dream about going to Vermont and all that snow?  Well, I have been doing a little dreaming of my own. Right now, roaring fires and hot chocolate in a snowy environment sound awfully good to me.

Maybe romantic snowy scenes have been on my mind precisely because there is no snow where I live.  It has, however, been unseasonably cold here in Los Angeles.  Some people are not very happy about the weather, but I love it.  Taking a walk on a brisk morning is invigorating and inspiring.  There is a sense of feeling alive that comes from being outside in the cold weather.  (My apologies to those of you who live in a frigid climate and are sick of it by now!)   Lighting the fireplace in the early afternoon and snuggling in with a cup of tea and a good book is also my idea of happiness.  The crisp and brisk weather has me feeling nostalgic about snowy scenes from my youth in New England and craving a cozy hotel set in a winter environment.

I did a little research and came up with some inviting places to stay in the cold winter months.  These are not hotels that take you away from the cold, but put you right in it and provide all the cozy comforts to keep you warm.  You can be active outdoors by day, and snuggle fireside by night.  And you could also stay inside all day and find plenty to do. But no matter how you decide to spend your time, you would find yourself ensconced in the most comfortable surroundings.  These cold winter days are a great time to engage in some armchair traveling and wanderlust.  If you are dreaming of a scene right out of Currier and Ives that comes with lots of old-fashioned comfort to keep you warm and snug, these places are for you.  They would be perfect for an idyllic winter escape.  We can dream, can't we?

The Pitcher Inn in Warren, Vermont
I have stayed here and it is truly magical!

  Matakauri Lodge in Queenstown, New Zealand

Rusty Parrot Lodge & Spa in Jackson Hole, Wyoming

Hotel Madeline and New Sheridan Hotel in Telluride, Colorado

Winvian Resort in Litchfield, Conn.

Twin Farms in Barnard, Vermont

Hotel Jerome in Aspen, Colorado

Triple Creek Ranch in Darby, Montana

Stowe Mountain Lodge and Trapp Family Lodge in Stowe, Vermont

Fire-lit Cove at Lake Placid Lodge in Lake Placid, New York

These magical spots are the stuff of fantasy.  They conjure up images of sitting by the fire, thawing out and staying warm with a glass of wine and cheese fondue.  I can imagine being fireside for hours and catching up with some great books, working on jigsaw puzzles, making S'mores, and drinking hot toddies.  (I have never been sure exactly what those are, but they sound delicious!)   Jane Austen wrote, "Ah there is nothing like staying at home, for real comfort." Yes, that is true and and these warm and welcoming places promise a "home away from home" and some old-fashioned comforts to help you appreciate the beauty of winter.   I'm ready, when do we leave?


Photos three and eight via here, photos one, six, seven and nine via here, photos four, five and ten via here, photo two via here, photo eleven via here

Downton Abbey, Season Three

Wasn't it wonderful?

There were so many poignant moments.  Here are three that made me choke up:

 

When Matthew asked Tom Branson to be his best man.

When Carson and Lord Grantham watched Lady Mary walk down the stairs in her wedding gown.  The look on Carson's face...

And when Matthew visited Lady Mary's bedroom the night before the wedding to apologize (quoting Branson's romantic line that as long as she walks the earth he will never find anyone else) and she made him close his eyes before entering the room and kissing her.

Did you know that Sunday night's episode had a record-breaking audience?  The producers of "Masterpiece" had predicted that the audience for the first episode of Season Three would be bigger than last time, but apparently no one was prepared for the actual number.  Read here to find out more.

This chilly January weekend should be a great one to catch up on a few of the Oscar nominated films, watch the Golden Globes, and enjoy the second episode of "Downton Abbey."

Wishing you a lovely weekend!

Photo via here