art and culture

Non-Fiction: Travels with Elly by Larry MacDonald

December 3, 2019 admin 0

Where was Canada’s first settlement? What is the country’s prettiest town? Who was its greatest hero?Inspired by John Steinbeck’s journey across the United States in Travels with Charley, Larry MacDonald and his sweet poodle Elly go on their own 10-month trek across the Great White North seeking answers to all the questions about Canada they didn’t even know to ask. Between discussion of history and culture, the author shares his own reflections on signage, ferries, […]

Life Lessons from Beloved Fairy Tales

October 6, 2019 admin 0

Lovers of fairy tales and even those who don’t, can apply the lessons learned from these stories to their lives. Such is the view of author, course creator and entrepreneur Faithaline Hippolyte. Hippolyte is passionate about encouraging people to be their best selves. One way she does that is by using lessons from fairy tales in her online courses, making learning both fun and transformational.Science has proven that one of the ways human beings learn […]

Oliver Sacks. 9/11. The Power of Music to Ease Pain

September 11, 2019 admin 0

On this important anniversary, it makes sense that the wonderful Maria Popova over at Brain Pickings would select something splendid for us to take to mind and heart. All one has to do is read the headline to be able to breathe better: Oliver Sacks on 9/11 and the Paradoxical Power of Music to Bring Solace by Making Room for Our Pain. From Brain Pickings: A science-storyteller like the late, great, sorely missed Oliver Sacks […]

Complete Collection of Sergei Tretyakov Plays Published

September 10, 2019 admin 0

When Sergei Tretyakov’s groundbreaking play, “I Want a Baby” was banned by Stalin’s censor in 1927, it was a signal that the radical and innovative theatre of the early Soviet years was to be brought to an end. A glittering, unblinking exploration of the realities of post-revolutionary Soviet life, the play “I Want a Baby” marks a high point in modernist experimental drama. Tretyakov’s plays are notable for their formal originality and their revolutionary content. […]

New This Month: Figuring by Maria Popova

February 10, 2019 Linda L. Richards 0

Excited to finally be reading Figuring, out this month from Pantheon. The author is the brilliant Maria Popova who “writes about what she reads” on Brain Pickings, which is more than a blog, but rather like the elegant connections from an admirable mind. (And if you’ve missed Brain Pickings in the past, run don’t walk. It will be worth the trip.) Figuring is an extension of that not-exactly-blog, but now in book form. As the […]

Tolkien in America: Exhibit at the Morgan Opens This Month

January 10, 2019 admin 0

The largest collection of J.R.R. Tolkien and Lord of the Rings memorabilia ever assembled is coming to America later this month. “Tolkien: Maker of Middle-Earth” will run from January 25th to May 12th the Morgan Library and Museum in New York City. It brings together a vast public display of original Tolkien material, drawing from the collections of the Tolkien Archive at the Bodleian Library at Oxford University, the Marquette University Libraries, the Morgan, as […]

Children’s Books: Christmas: from Solstice to Santa by Nikki Tate and Dani Tate-Stratton

December 9, 2018 admin 0

Like everything, it seems, Christmas has gotten to be somewhat controversial. And then there always appear to be people around telling us we’re doing it wrong: that we don’t know the true meaning or that the essence has been lost in a lot of shopping and hoopla or that we didn’t get it right in the first place. If any of this is true, in Christmas: from Solstice to Santa (Orca Origins) then authors Nikki […]

Non-Fiction: A Citizen’s Guide to Impeachment by Barbara A. Radnofsky

July 4, 2018 admin 0

Don’t know how we missed this one, but it seems even more relevant today than it did when it was published last September. A Citizen’s Guide to Impeachment (Melville) is a non-partisan look at what it takes to bring home an impeachment, with a close examination of 19 real world cases of impeachment right out of American history: judges, presidents, and officials from the cabinet and congress. Author Barbara A. Radnofsky is listed in the […]

Non-Fiction: The Handover  by Elaine Dewar

December 17, 2017 Linda L. Richards 1

In 2000, Canadian businessman Avie Bennett engineered a deal to wrest “The Canadian Publisher” McClelland and Stewart, out of the protection of Canadian Heritage and into the arms of a foreign national company in the form of then Random House. Though many Canadians would have thought that would create an outcry, it did not. But journalist Elaine Dewar was paying attention. More: she was there. In her well-reviewed but largely ignored 2017 book, The Handover: […]

Holiday Gift Guide 2017

December 9, 2017 admin 1

There are a hundred thousand interests and there are millions of books, but here are a handful that might make those you love realize just how much you care. [masterslider alias=”ms-159-1″]