Feeling Groovy

Posted on November 17, 2019 by Art for Housewives

Feeling Groovy

Do you want to feel groovy? Then take the advice of Simon and Garfunkel and “Slow down, you move too fast, you got to make the morning last.” In the age of consumption where we’re all hyped up to consume and be consumed, our biorhythms are easily syncopated. That’s why French philosopher Pierre Sansot wrote an entire book about la lenteur, slowness. He said that a good way to slow down is by walking at such a pace that you synchronize yourself with yourself.

Walking also presents a means of creating intimacy with our own being. The rhythmical movement of a walk can have a hypnotic effect on self-perception facilitating a dialogue between “me & I”.

More than a walk, we’re talking about a stroll. A stroll takes its time and doesn’t rush. It gives us the chance to look at the world around us and see the details. Without those details, our life becomes little more than a big blur.

In “Wanderlust”, Rebecca Solnit says that walking not only provides physical exercise but also “allows us to be in our bodies and in the world without being made busy by them.” She writes about famous walkers such as Henry Thoreau, John Muir, Aristotle, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and Charles Baudelaire who saw walking as a form of contemplation. And there are those like Saint Jerome who saw walking as a spiritual practice (as do those who walk the Camino de Santiago and other pilgrimage trails).

When walking, you will always be somewhere, somewhere specific. That makes it easier to find yourself.

You can read Rebecca Solnit’s WANDERLUST on Archive (for free).

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Martha & Ernie

Posted on November 15, 2019 by Art for Housewives

Martha & Ernie

One of the things I enjoy about using Archive.org is that I can have access to a book for free. And, after several pages, if I find that I don’t like the book, I just stop reading it and go on to another book as my list is very long and it’s pointless to spend time on something that doesn’t interest me. Or, as Marie Kondo would say, doesn’t spark joy. One such book was that of Travels with Myself and Another by Martha Gellhorn. I read about Martha several years ago and was intrigued by her personality. However, she was primarily a war correspondent and reading about war makes me uncomfortable. But there were some sparks of joy in what little I read. For example, she referred to Ernest Hemingway (at the time her husband) as U.C.—Unwilling Companion. Although U.C. enjoyed lighting firecrackers in the bedroom, apparently that was the only kind of joy he could spark there. Martha said that her “whole memory of sex with Ernest is the invention of excuses, and failing that, the hope that it would soon be over.” Moral of the story: being a successful writer doesn’t mean you’re good in bed. (And, most of all, drinking too much booze makes you a lousy lover.)

Martha was born in St. Louis, a town she wanted to escape from. And, as for many other travellers, it’s probably that need to leave a place that inspired her to travel.

Three things I learned from Martha: (1) Experience is useless without memory. (2) Endurance is the secret Chinese weapon. (3) No matter how successful a woman is, she will always be in the shadow of a man. Martha resented the fact that, after her involvement with Hemingway, she was often treated as “a footnote in someone else’s life” despite the fact that she was an avant-garde war correspondent way before meeting Ernie.

At the age of 89 and in bad health, Martha committed suicide by swallowing a cyanide capsule.

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My Favorite Place

Posted on November 12, 2019 by Art for Housewives

My Favorite Place

La Sussurrata Terrace, Paros

More than a Room of One’s Own, it’s magical to have a terrace of one’s own. Because here you can have contact with nature while staying at home. Our terrace on Paros is where I am happiest.

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Villa Albani

Posted on November 10, 2019 by Art for Housewives

Villa Albani

Situated in between via Salaria and viale Regina Margherita is Villa Albani. It’s not visible from these streets save for a brief flash from Regina Margherita.

Villa Albani was built in the 1700s and was the home for many prestigious antiquities. And for this reason was of special interest to the art historian Johann Winckelmann, expert in Neoclassicism, who spent much time here.

Also of interest, it was at Villa Albani that, in 1870, the treaty with the Vatican following the Capture of Rome was signed here. The event marked the beginning of the unification of Italy, a process that took many years and many lives.

When I walk to my studio, I often pass this peek-a-boo sighting of Villa Albani. Walking around is the best way to make such discoveries.

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Change the World by Reading

Posted on November 9, 2019 by Art for Housewives

learning is activism

The list of books below is quite long. However, I’m using this page as a “bookmark” for myself. To avoid buying books and to avoid using Amazon, I took the books listed on my Amazon Wishlist  and searched for them on Archive.Org. And those I found on Archive are listed below. Considering that the books are provided free of charge, it is quite a savings. My Kobo died and instead of buying a new one, I invested in a tablet that costs basically the same so I can easily read the books listed below.

“…the realignment of the synapses that occurs every time we pick up a good book and start reading.” Andy Miller

FICTION:

the october horse by colleen mccullough

An admirable woman by Cohen, Arthur A

the roman spring of mrs. jones by tennesse williams

beyond black by hillary manntel

THE HANDMAID’S TALE by margaret Atwood

Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell

Adrienne Hope by matilda hays

Stefan Zweig – Il viaggio nel passato

the hummingbird’s daughter luis urrea

THE END OF THE AFFAIR by Graham Greene

THE SEA THE SEA by Iris Murdoch

The future of nostalgia byBoym, Svetlana

THE GOLDEN NOTEBOOK by doris lessing

THE LITTLE STRANGER by sarah waters

a memory of violets by hazel gaynor

The Fountain of St. James Court; or, Portrait of the Artist as an Old Woman: A Novel by Sena Jeter Naslund

Mrs. Hemingway, a novel by Naomi Wood

THE HEART IS A LONEY HUNTER by Carson McCullers

MY MAN JEEVES by p g wodehouse
THE WICKED DAY by Mary Stewart
madame will you talk? by mary stewart
THE POWER OF THE DOG, Thomas Savage
Evan S. Connell’s Mrs Bridge
SHORT STORIES:
the collected stories of katherine anne porter
the novellas of martha gellhorn

BIOGRAPHY:

Dawn Powell Biography by Marcelle Smith Rice

Colette biography by Robert Cottrell

Katherine Mansfield bio A Secret Life by Claire Tomalin

mother of detection fiction (anna katherine green) by patricia maida

10 women of mystery by  Earl F. Bargainnier

Flannery by Brad Gooch (Flannery O’Connor)
Evita (peron) by  Nicholas Fraser

Waiting for Robert Capa by Susanna Fortes

Mistress to an Age, the life of Madame De Stael by J. Christopher Herold

The passionate exiles; Madame de Staël and Madame Récamier by Levaillant, Maurice

Eleanor Roosevelt, a biography by cynthia harris

Talluah Bankhead autobiography

Baroness Elsa : gender, dada, and everyday modernity : a cultural biography

by Gammel, Irene, 

Liszt: the artist as romantic hero

Love in the Promised Land : the story of Anzia Yezierska and John Dewey by Dearborn, Mary V

Mary Cassatt by Mathews, Nancy Mowll

BLACK ELK SPEAKS by Sergel, Christopher; Neihardt, John Gneisenau
The Norton book of women’s lives by Rose, Phyllis, 

Had She but Known: A Biography of Mary Roberts Rinehart by Charlotte MacLeod

Suzanne Valadon: The Mistress of Montmartre di June Rose

kay boyle, author of herself by joan mellen

Alice : Princess Andrew of Greece by Vickers, Hugo

lola montez by jane seymour

Désirée, Napoleon’s first love by Selinko, Annemarie

Jessie White Mario: Risorgimento revolutionary by Daniels, Elizabeth A. (Elizabeth Adams)
The Occult World of Madame Blavatsky byDaniel H. Caldwell
Rosamond Bernier ‘s Matisse, Picasso, Miró : as I knew them
opal whiteley by katherine beck

Living at the edge : a biography of D.H. Lawrence and Frieda von Richthofen / Michael Squires and Lynn K. Talbot bySquires, Michael; Talbot, Lynn K. (Lynn Kiefer)

biography of laura ingalls wilder

margaret mitchell biography

margaret mead, a life by jane howard

Christina Rossetti : a writer’s life by Marsh, Jan

Katherine Anne Porter : the life of an artist by Unrue, Darlene Harbour

katherine anne porter by harold bloom

the truth about lou (Andreas-Salome) by angela von de lipper

the lady in gold (Klimt’s mistress) anna marie o’connor

 

Everybody was so young : Gerald and Sara Murphy, a lost generation love story
by Vaill, Amanda
Covarrubias by Williams, Adriana

Misia: The Life of Misia Sert

THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ALICE B TOKLAS by gertrude stein

HENRY JAMES by Harold Bloom

Gellhorn by Caroline Moorehead

Edward Hopper : an intimate biography byLevin, Gail,

The Hemingway Women, Bernice Kert 
ROSA LUXEMBuRG BY tONY cLIFF
THE WILD PRINCESS by mary hart perry
Maeve Brennan: Homesick at The New Yorker by angela bourke
Constance Fenimore Woolson : the grief of artistry by Torsney, Cheryl B
TONI MORRISON by Harold Bloom
Carson McCullers byBloom, Harold
WODEHOUSE, A LIFE by Robert McCrum
Mary Stewart byFriedman, Lenemaja
DESERT QUEEN, gERTRUE bELL, jANET wALLACH

Gertrude Bell : queen of the desert, shaper of nations
by Howell, Georgina, 

Vol 2: Living my life by Goldman, Emma, 1869-1940;

Marx’s daughters: Eleanor Marx, Rosa Luxemburg, Angelica Balabanoff
by Florence, Ronald

Eye of dawn : the rise and fall of Mata Hari by Ostrovsky, Erika
WOMANHOOD:
The 100 most influential women of all time : a ranking past and present by Felder, Deborah G
ON WRITING:

Inventing the truth : the art and craft of memoir by Baker, Russell

WRITING DOWN THE BONES  Natalie Goldberg

BIRD BY BIRD  anne lamott

ZEN IN THE ART OF WRITING  ray bradbury

OFF THE PAGE by carole burns

EXPLORING LITERATURE by frank madden

The writing life by Dillard, Annie

On writing : a memoir of the craft by King, Stephen,
Your life as story : writing the new autobiography by Rainer, Tristine
THE CAREER NOVELIST donald maass

Bobbie Ann Mason : a study of the short fiction by albert wilheim

 

MYSTERY WRITERS AND THEIR NOVELS:

AGATHA CHRISTIE by Harold Bloom
(so many books both by and about Agatha Christie can be found on Archive)

TRAVEL:

The most beautiful walk in the world : a pedestrian in Paris by Baxter, John

Perseus in the Wind by Freya Stark

(about Paris) Hemingway’s A MOVEABLE FEAST

 

ROME RELATED:

Stendhal – Promenades in Rome by Stendhal MP3

ITALIAN HOURS by henry james

Dorothy, and Other Italian Stories by constance fenimore woolson

 

ART RELATED:

Art that heals : the image as medicine in Ethiopia by Mercier, Jacques

The Art Instinct by Denis Dutton

george santayana art and aesthetics

Vision and Art: The Biology of Seeing by Margaret Livingstone,

THE FAILING DISTANCE, THE AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL IMPULSE IN JOHN RUSKIN, Jay Fellow

Effie : the passionate lives of Effie Gray, John Ruskin and John Everett Millais
by Cooper, Suzanne Fagence
Millais and the Ruskins by Lutyens, Mary
John Ruskin and Effie Gray: The story of John Ruskin, Effie Gray and John Everett Millais, told for the first time in their unpublished letters

tO BE CATEGORIZED:

from the beast to the blonde, about fairy tales and their tellers by marina warner

Creative Visualization by Shakti Gawain

Dancing in the Dark by Caryl Phillips

The Ziegfeld Follies by marjorie farnsworth

a fire in the mind, life of joseph campbell by stephen and robin larsen

myths to live by by joseph campbell

a companion to the victoria novel by brantlinger and thesing

books by  Francine du Plessix Gray:

hidden lives by margaret forster

The seduction of Mrs.Pendlebury  by Margaret Forster

Across an untried sea : discovering lives hidden in the shadow of convention and time (includes charlotte cushman) by Markus, Julia

Time and narrative in Stendhal byAmoss, Benjamin McRae
Memorie sull’ Egitto e specialmente sui costumi delle donne orientali e gli … by Amalia Nizzoli

Inventing herself : claiming a feminist intellectual heritage by Showalter, Elaine

The work of Colin Wilson : an annotated bibliography & guide byStanley, Colin
colin wilson autobiography
 colin wilson beyond the cult
colin wilson access to inner worlds
A darkness that murmured : essays on Malcolm Lowry and the twentieth century by Asals, Frederick; Tiessen, Paul

best in children’s books

one hundred names for love by diane ackermann

green thoughts, a writer in the garden by eleanor perenyi

The poet and the murderer : a true story of literary crime and the art of forgery

by Worrall, Simon
The long-winded lady; notes from the New Yorker by Brennan, Maeve

A secret symmetry: Sabina Spielrein between Jung and Freud by aldo carotenuto

freud’s  mistress by karen mack

fair and tender ladies by lee smith

a time to be born by dawn powell

French Riviera : living well was the best revenge by Girard, Xavier

goddess

jesus the magician, morton smith
tear this heart out by angela mastretta
THE DIARY OF A NOBODY by the Grossmith brother
 ABSoLUTE BEGINNERS by Colin MacInnes
Turgenev byTroyat, Henri
FATHERS AND SONS by ivan turgenev

The Ode Less Travelled by Stephen Fry

ON BEAUTY by zadie smith
JUST AS I THOUGHT BY gRACE pALEY
WOMEN AND WAR:

All quiet on the western frontby Remarque, Erich Maria

Erich Maria Remarque: the last romantic by Tims, Hilton
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