Hippie Hippie Shake-Style

Hippie Hippie Shake by amisslis on Polyvore.com

Hippie Hippie Shake: Scott McKenzie

Hippie Hippie Shake: Canned Heat

Hippie Hippie Shake: Jefferson Airplane

Hippie Hippie Shake

My hippie pedigree is pretty solid. My mother never went to the extreme of running off to a commune. She was, as she will freely admit, a flower child of the "love" variety, if you know what I mean. Her environmental and political awakening came later, as her daughter was growing older. Yet, very few children can have been named after a chick with the nonconformist moniker of "Alley Cat."
I had a fairly free-and-easy boho dream of a childhood--the kind that, in nostalgic moments, I would love to craft for my own (quite imaginary) kidlets. A lot of things were more organic those days (without attempting to be so) and childhood was one of them. The cool, barefoot hippie-aesthetic that informed so many of my younger days is usually not readily apparent in my grown-girl attire.
How we opt to dress ourselves is a lot more complex than mere convenience and colour-preference would suggest. Factors that we are not even aware of on the surface play into the image that we present to the world. Fashion, history and sociology are three of my favourite things. These pastimes, coupled with a love of pretty or interesting pieces, means that I have a ridiculous amount of influences to draw from. The result is that the hippie aesthetic is usually lost in the mix. There are simply eras that hold stronger visual appeal to me: the 1920'S, 1940'S, a bit of the 1950'S, silver screen looks of the 1930'S, a smidgen of late-Victorian and Edwardian.
There is, however, a time in my life--and wardrobe--for everything. As the seasonal cycle spins into summer, I become antsy to let loose my inner folk-freak. This is a yearly occurrence: as soon as the weather turns warm, truly warm, I want to break out the flow-y paisley fabric and put a daisy or two in my hair. 9 months out of the calendar, I prefer to look like a classic pinup or a sexy flapper or a crazy combination of the two. I am definitely more Clara Bow than Janis Joplin. During normal times,I would never be pegged , by a stranger, for a tree-hugging patchouli-lover.
With the above-mentioned complexity perpetually in full-fruit, my hippie-punk ideals are seldom written across my physicality: but they are there just the same. They exist where they count, not in the ultimately superficial manifestations of clothing or shoe or hair choice. Yet, the sultry Ohio summer is all the excuse that I need to temporarily let my hair down,get my feet dirty, and deliberately mismatch my free-and-easy clothes. My looks are ever-evolving.By October, pencil skirts and stilettos will likely come calling, singing their sexy siren's song, as I move into the next stage of my endless fashion-game. Each season presents a different dynamic, and new chances to play dress-up. By this time next year, I will again be prepared to visually claim my hippie-inheritance.

"Develop your eccentricities while you are young. That way, when you get old, people won't think you're going gaga."-David Ogilvy

AT SEA! AT SEA! (TEMPORARILY)

Anticipation has been my dearest pastime since I was a child: Christmas Eve is my favourite day of the year for a reason. The wind-up before a pitch, the curtain rising before a show, the ball before it drops on New Year's Eve are often more enjoyable to me than the action itself. Everything in life is made up of a trio of stages: anticipation, action/occurrence, and remembrance. As fun and adventurous as the middle part can be, it stands on the precipice of disappointment. One stage is woven into the next in too infinite of a way for them to be untangled: it is impossible to savour one without partaking equally of the others. I guess that this is one of life's great levelers.
Perhaps this is nothing but a highly personal quirk that few others share, or maybe it is more widespread: of this I am uncertain. What I do know, strongly, is my own personal back-and-forth when it comes to special days. It is a concentrated bit of manic-depression that otherwise never visits me. The giddiness of anticipation turns to black despair once it is all over, and the confetti has been turned to dust.As long as there is something else in the queue, my recovery time is quick.
My mom visited over the weekend. It was not a long-planned event so my anticipation-time was limited, although highly concentrated. I always enjoy myself immensely when I am with my mom. What we do never matters; spending time with my life-long best friend is key. We always have such a great time that it is one of the exceptions to my anticipation-is-always-better rule. When it comes to mom-time, anticipation and enjoyment remain equal. What changes is how sad I become once we have parted.It is relatively brief--a day or two at best--but intense. This has been a life-long pattern for me, in regard to time spent with my family: get-togethers always lay me low after the fact.
I gave myself a pass yesterday. I slept, ate my home-made pie, wrote very little. It was responsible for my relative silence. I have finally expelled it from my system, as I usually do by this time. In accepting it for what it is--a manifestation of what is of greatest personal importance--it has ceased to fret me. I have come to terms with the roller-coaster ride of the above-mentioned trio. Although I always strive for a better balance, as long as I taste of life's enjoyment, it matters little what part of the beast it comes from.

Montreal-Monday, September 18, 2006

I came to Montreal to write things for you. I am not yet precisely sure what manner of things: my plane only landed twelve hours ago. The contract that I have with this publication is not that specific, has not tied my hands to anything in particular. It simply states that I must turn in 3 columns a week, of approximately 750 words, for the space of 6 months. For this, I am to be paid with handsome accommodations, a per diem allowance, $300 dollars a week, and the satisfaction of seeing my name in print. All that you will get in return for the time invested in my words is the enjoyment of whatever emotions I am savvy enough to evoke in you.

I will begin this first installment by telling you exactly what I am doing this morning, and who I feel like. It is 8:15 and I am in bed for the second time. I have been sitting still and upright long enough that I feel the heat of the laptop on my stiff legs. There are pastry flakes on my fingers that I have not bothered to suck off, and a trail of grease on the keys that are typing these words. I have polished off 3 croissants in the narrow space of 45 minutes: fortunately there is no limit to how much you can eat at breakfast. It is the only meal served here, and they do it exceptionally well--well enough to merit a small mention in 'Food & Wine'. The proprietors are entirely too graceful to flaunt that fact. The framed article does not hang on a wall, nor is it pinned conspicuously on a bulletin board behind the check-in desk. I know this fact simply because I was bored enough to do a cursory amount of research before coming here. (The 'Here' in question, if you are interested, is mentioned at the bottom of the article.)
Until roughly 44 minutes ago, my distaste for croissants was equal to that of eating with complete strangers across a communal dining table at first dawn. One buttery bite gave lie to the complete idiocy of the first notion; five minutes of conversation with a family of tourists from Oregon made me realize that perhaps I am not the world's greatest people person. I hope that my anti-social confession does not predispose you to hate me, yet it may be useful to weed out those of you who are expecting a conventional travelogue: I am not that writer.
However you feel on the matter, you must kindly grant me the following concession, namely: that it is nearly impossible to enjoy the most singular culinary experience of your life when surrounded by people hell bent on nattering on and on and on about what is the best time to tour the cathedral. That first croissant was my own holy experience, writ small and powerful. It tasted of butter somehow different from regular butter, fresher: as if there was a churn in the kitchen, and a cow tied up out back. I did not smear it with preserves or wash it down with hurried gulps of hot tea, in a preliminary strike against its imagined objectionable taste.
I was forced to flee 5 bites later, with 2 more flaky, little delicacies in hand. That is how I ended up in this room, in this bed, staring at a stain on the coverlet, trying to harness my utter lack of adventure to the demands of this column. I have yet to experience Montreal beyond the confines of a taxi and 2 rooms of this hotel. I have been enchanted by a from-scratch breakfast (one of the partners rises daily before light breaks to bake)and annoyed by harmless and adequately nice travelers. I have stepped into the bathroom to wash stale and sticky make-up off of my tired skin; I have poked my head between the curtain panels to glimpse a barely-stirring street possessed of cobbled beauty. I do not even know what this column is to be called. You will doubtless read this before I do, as the paper will be delivered to me in real-time, from a country that is now next-door.
Coming to Montreal, which is as close as one can get to Europe without leaving North American soil, I was hoping to feel utterly different from how I felt at home, from who I was at home. It is too early to determine the accuracy or fallacy of this notion, but I will share the thought with you anyway. I have always been beset by fanciful ideas. This is, I suppose, why I became a writer. If I am to deal with honesty here, and I am unsure whether or not that is my intention, then I must admit that my entire adult life has been constructed on following one fancy after another. The fancy that brought me to Montreal?
Edna St. Vincent Millay. Perhaps I will tell you about that on Wednesday. Right now, it is time to close the laptop, kick the covers off, wash my hands and hit the street in search of something new.

Margaret Millet
Vieux-Montreal

IN THIS ARTICLE:

Auberge Les Passants du Sans Soucy
171 rue St-Paul ouest
514-842-2634
http://www.lesanssoucy.com/

Reading Wish List:Week of 22 June

My reading fast ended on 31 March, for what little good that has done me. I have been so busy writing--articles,blogs,zines,serials and a novel--that reading has been demoted to the role of second-class citizen. Suddenly, something that has been deeply integral to my identity since, it seems, the moment of my advent, has dwindled to the occasional, nostalgic pastime of a too-busy woman. From a creative stand-point, this is ultimately a very good thing.

I am in an exceptionally ripe stage of creativity: a manic fire of artistry was lit some months ago, and continues to blaze unabated. To spend too much of my precious time reading would be to invite stasis to return. As a writer, I simply cannot take that chance. This means that I have been taking time to really savour everything that I read, instead of rushing through 5 books at once in order to make way for the next one in the queue.I have not been reading a dozen books a month, as is my custom. My input of others' words is currently about a third of that; the output of my own writing has been phenomenally increased.

This means, of course, that my reading wish-list is growing at a rate far too fast for me to catch at present. When the muse has mellowed a bit, I hope to sit down and kick back with some of the following volumes!

1. Dictionary of Modern English Usage by H.W. Fowler (WORDSWORTH) and Oxford American Writers' Thesaurus David Auburn, Michael Dirda, et al., eds. (OXFORD) The contents of these 2 tomes are self-explanatory, as is my obsession with words. I am a reference-book geek of the highest order. I could easily get lost in either of these volumes for hours.


2. Randall Jarrell on W.H. Auden by Randall Jarrell, Stephen Burt, ed. Adam Gopnik, foreword (COLUMBIA UNIV. PRESS) Wystan Hugh Auden has long been one of my favourite poets, although I have never been able to fully embrace his work. That is, I realize, a peculiar state of affairs, yet it is the truth. I remain magnetized, humbled, awed and occasionally annoyed with his poetry and his person.


3. ABUNDANCE: A Novel of Marie Antoinette by Sena Jeter Naslund (HARPER) Historical fiction can be compelling or appalling, depending on the ratio of accuracy to imagination: the author needs to be heedful of that important balance. Although I am not as enamored of French Court life as of its English counterpart, this appears to be a truly fascinating read. I am unsure whether it is entirely possible to humanize Marie Antoinette, but I am intrigued enough to find out.


4. A View from Vermont Everyday Life in America by Helen Husher (GLOBE PEQUOT)Vermont is one of my favourite states--I thoroughly enjoyed a stay there 5 years ago. It is very far removed from my own existence--perhaps that is part of my appeal. This book is made up of a series of essays. By its description, it almost seems to be a 21st-Century "Country of the Pointed Firs", with a Vermont setting.


5. Secret Agent AKA Danger Man: Sets 1-6 Starring Patrick McGoohan This is a DVD set of the 1960's television series. I am half in-love with the recently deceased, ridiculously suave Patrick McGoohan. This series preceded The Prisoner, a cult-classic that took me 6 months and multiple viewings to warm up to (I admit to still finding it, on occasion, insufferably silly).I can think of many things far worse than sitting through a marathon of Patrick McGoohan at the pinnacle of his appeal.


6. The Art of Conversation A Guided Tour of a Neglected Pleasure by Catherine Blythe (GOTHAM BOOKS)I became an actor so that I could pretend to be other people. I am a writer so that I can invent other people, and control situations to perfection. This means that conversation is not always my strong suit: I much prefer hiding behind a set of pre-determined words. I envy anyone with the skill, the means, and the magic to weave impromptu conversations.


7. The Human Story Our History, From the Stone Age to Today by James C. Davis (HARPERCOLLINS) What awesome ambition must be required to try to encompass the great sweep of the entire course of history in 466 pages. If nothing else, it must be a fascinating attempt.


8. The Victorian Celebration of Death by James Stevens Curl (SUTTON)19th-Century society had a much healthier grip on how to handle death and mourning. They did not hide it away like we do but accepted and celebrated it for what it is: one stage in the many that all humans must pass through.


9. Firewalk The Psychology of Physical Immunity by Jonathan Sternfield (BERKSHIRE HOUSE) Firewalking absolutely enthralls me. Though I would never jump from an airplane or bungee jump, I would leap at the opportunity to walk across hot coals!


10. To Go Signing Through the World The Childhood of Pablo Neruda by Deborah Kogan Ray (FSG) This is a kid's book. If I am ever pregnant, I will surely read the poems of Neruda to my child while he or she is still in the womb.This looks like a great way to directly introduce a child to the life of the man with the magical voice.

Mmmmm.....pie!!!!

No, Really! I Baked 1 Pie! Then 2! And I have Witnesses!

I topped my promise by making not one, but two , rhubarb pies. The first one came into being last night at around ten, the second was taken out of the oven 12 hours later. I must admit--and I hate to burst 'Radiation Cinema's' bubble--that until yesterday I had never made a pie before. Of any kind. Ever. Although I baked my first cake from scratch at nine,and have made many scrumptious from-scratch desserts since, it had never really occurred to me to bake a pie. Until 8 days ago, as I missed yet another family function. In my isolation, I started feeling sorry for myself. From there, it was an easy step or 2 to dreaming about all of the food that I could be missing. Rhubarb pie made that mental list; I even posted the recipe. It was not until the next day that I realized that , if I wanted it badly enough , I could make it myself.
Until that baking epiphany , pies were , to my mind , the sole territory of my Grandmother (with apologies to every one else in my family who make lovely pies in their own right). However, once the idea took root , the outcome was inevitable: I would bake a pie, crust and all. If I am going to do something, I am going to do it all of the way, and correctly.
I ended up baking 2 pies, as the recipe makes enough dough for a pie with a top crust. I also had more than enough rhubarb. I must say that the pies turned out better than I could have hoped for: they were pretty damn perfect (and I have witnesses to back that up, thank you nicely). Rhubarb was the perfect pie to start with: an easy filling and only 1 crust. Yet, I was amply concerned with screwing up that crust. I need not have worried:it turned out flaky and ideally baked. The photographs are of the first pie, my true baby. (By the second, I felt as if I really knew what I was doing but, as everyone would agree, nothing beats your first.)

Mommy Break

No, not that kind! My lovely Mother is visiting this weekend. It has been a bit since we have seen each other so,for the next two days, I am going to be devoting most of my time to her. I promise to take photos if we do anything interesting. I know for a fact that I will be baking a pie tomorrow. I promised Mykal of 'Radiation Cinema' to post photos of it in all of its Rhubarb Glory, as he has been experiencing some withdrawal symptoms.
I will write and post Part II of my Untitled Fiction Story late Sunday, I promise. I hope to compose 2 installments a week in future, for the duration of 5 or 6 months. Next week, I will be back to my regular output (I have slacked a bit of late, I realize!)with articles on books, classic film and lots of other odd and refreshing goodness.

UNTITLED-PART I

The following is the first installment of a fiction serial that I am writing:I have decided to share it with you good people.At this time it is called 'Untitled'. When I settle on the perfect name, you will be the first to know.I hope that you find it enjoyable.

FOREWORD

It is with honest pleasure that I introduce this collection of columns by Margaret Millet.I do so as her friend as well as her Publisher.I worked with Margaret for approximately eight months,during the period that she wrote for my newspaper,The Estimator.It was in that publication that all of the pieces in this compilation first appeared,from September 2006 until March 18,2007.I met Margaret about 3 weeks before sending her on her stint to Canada.She impressed me immediately,and with great clarity,as a woman and writer of depth,talent,intelligence and vision.I felt,at the time,that The Estimator had fallen too far away from my initial goals:it had become stale,boring and perilously close to extinction.In an effort to shake new life into its tired bones, I mass hired an interesting bunch of characters from all sorts of small publications.The indie artists,as they liked to call themselves,succeeded in infusing vigorous blood and energy into The Estimator. Margaret came to me from a tiny magazine that folded a few months later.That job did not pay her bills,something that bothered Margaret to practically no degree at all.She was a woman in love with words.She thought it privilege enough just to be allowed to set her thoughts to paper.Readership was not really something that she thought about. I changed that when I sent her to Montreal.Instantly,she had 300,000 people reading her columns:it rather quickly became their privilege.I can think of no one else that I would have even considered sending to another country,with no guidelines or subject matter. All that she had to do was write,and write well,to the tune of 3 columns a week. She managed this with beauty,expertise and an entirely unique voice.Margaret wrote incessantly while up North.I am not sure that she did anything else.I never got to know her in an intimate capacity although our relations were always warm,considerate and full of humour.It is my belief that she had given up on the notion of a one-on-one connection with others.She channeled that loss into her writing and,in so doing,intimately connected with her readers in a way that would probably not have been possible otherwise.Margaret Millet,by the way, was not her real name.She chose it for its alliterative quality.Even after I hired her,and gave her that wide readership on a plate,she declined to use her given name,which was perfectly lovely.It is not my place to divulge her true identity, so we will continue to call her Margaret Millet,a name that gave her real pleasure.I sincerely hope that you enjoy the works contained within these covers.I was proud to print them a few years ago,and I remain so.If anything,my enjoyment has increased over time.I hope that you take away something of the intelligence,artistry and whimsy with which Margaret endowed her writing and her person.

GIBSON OLIPHANT
NEW YORK CITY
May 19,2009

Stormy Weather

Thunder Goddess by amisslis featuring Forever21

Storm in a Teacup

A thunderstorm is my favourite natural phenomena. One is occurring as I type these words.Although only mild of fury,it has inspired me to corral my splintering,impressionistic thoughts into a crazy,shuddering little form of expression. Rain,especially when accompanied by thunder and lightning,causes one of two reactions in me:the instantaneous need to seek cozy sleep or the impetus to get up off of my ass and do something either creative or practical.When I wake to a grey,rain-chilled morning,all I can think about is slinking back under the covers,stretching my legs and falling back asleep;setting my internal clock seamlessly to the length of the storm.When the drops cease to fall,I am ready to begin my day.I wish that I lived such a relaxed existence that listening to my internal rhythms was a relevant way to pace things.Unfortunately,that is a luxury that too few can ever know beyond the space of a vacation.

Today's storm has made me active and pensive,an entirely unsurprising duality either for myself or Mother Nature.When the skies darkened a couple of hours ago,and I heard the first faint echoing of thunder in the distance,I became energized after a day spent lulling about with no deeper direction beyond that of passing time.Occasionally,when this storm-activated antsiness sets in,I want to clean things:scrubbing and scouring somehow seems like the proper companion to the water and noise and movement unfolding out-of-doors.Not today.A need to write came upon me,fiercely,as it does when there are things fighting to be released:I swiftly obeyed that call,although I had planned a rare day more or less without words.I had vowed to be disciplined,with my focus firmly pointed outwards:to light and fresh air,to a place where thoughts and creativity could not intrude.Yes, I had planned to attempt that rarest of pastimes but the rain--and the real culprit,thunder--worked against the integrity of my intentions.
So,here I sit,typing away at a subject neither planned nor well-thought out but aching to be released nonetheless.The storm set me to thinking,and brought out my current pensiveness.There is something about nature in turmoil (however slight and of the ordinary)that makes me feel more alive,more willing to take chances.It insists that I flow with the moment and not to a pre-determined schedule that was locked in place before present circumstances erupted.It is a testament to the flexibility of the human mind how a passing storm can cause one to reflect,albeit too quickly to grasp,on so many things.While there is no promise of cohesion to be found in such a state(or the writing born of it),to my eyes at least,everything else is held in the brevity and grandeur of a storm,and in this moment.

Austen Family Cooks:Rhubarb Pie

I only write about food that I am currently craving.At this moment,I am dreaming about Rhubarb Pie.It is the perfect combination of bitingly tart and deliciously sweet.(The leaves of the rhubarb plant are,of course,toxic:only the celery-like stalks are edible.)When I was growing up,my Grandparents always had a rhubarb patch in their garden,making our various treats as fresh as possible.My ex-husband,being Italian,was entirely unaware that Rhubarb is usually used for desserts:he insisted that it could only be enjoyed raw.I have never come across anyone else--Italian or not--with that custom, nor will I ever try it his way:rhubarb is for dessert,period.We prepare rhubarb in many dishes but pie has always been my favourite.Enjoy!!!!

RHUBARB PIE

FILL AN UNBAKED PIE CRUST WITH 3 CUPS RHUBARB THAT HAS BEEN CUT INTO 1/2" PIECES.MIX TOGETHER 1 1/2 CUPS SUGAR,3 TABLESPOONS FLOUR AND 2 EGGS.POUR OVER RHUBARB.BAKE AT 350 DEGREES FOR 1 HOUR.

PIE CRUST

4 CUPS FLOUR (RESERVE 2/3 CUP)
1 1/2 TEASPOONS SALT
1 TEASPOON SUGAR
1 3/4 CUP CRISCO
1/2 CUP LUKEWARM WATER (TRUST MY GRANDMOTHER ON THIS,SHE KNOWS HER CRUST)

MAKE A PASTE WITH THE RESERVED FLOUR AND WATER.BLEND THE REMAINING FLOUR,SALT,SUGAR AND CRISCO.ADD THE PASTE AND MIX WELL (WITH HANDS).THIS DOUGH SEEMS SOFT AT FIRST BUT DO NOT ADD MORE FLOUR UNLESS YOU HAVE TROUBLE ROLLING THE DOUGH.

"As long as you're going to be thinking anyway,think big."-Donald Trump

I never thought that I would agree with or post a Donald Trump quote,but here you go! I have been enjoying a few days off and will be back to my normal output on Tuesday! Have a lovely weekend!!

Happy Birthday,Maurice Sendak!!!!

For all of my literary-minded mania, I do not often write about children's books.Kiddie lit was but a brief phase in my reading life.I more or less went from zero to eighty, contentedly reading dictionaries by the age of five. Yet I had my nursery-school favourites. Chief among them was the "Little Bear" series by Elsa Holmelund Minarik. Little Bear lived in a quiet,home-spun,cozy world where he was loved by his parents and friends of various species,got into and out of minor scrapes unscathed and was encouraged to use his imagination, complete with home-made props.
The best thing about the books were the illustrations by Maurice Sendak.He is recognized and revered for "Where the Wild Things Are",and rightly so,but he has a place in my childhood sense-memories for perfectly capturing the Bear clan.I still have my copy of the stories, which came to me second-hand.I believe that my mother was the original owner, as she is the appropriate age for a volume initially published in the late 1950's.Every time that I spy the dark-blue cover on my shelf, I smile.
A few years ago, I tried explaining to The Chef the nature of Little Bear's appeal.He had never heard of him. I pulled the book from the shelf and flipped it open, explaining to The Chef the gentle and moral whimsy of what it contained.(The words gentle and moral whimsy do not exactly describe my adult self but they are nice attributes to instill in children,at any rate.)It opened to the story of Little Bear pretending he was flying to the moon, complete with cardboard-box space-suit.If I was a slang slinger, I could only call the illustrations adorbs.I'm not, so I will state that they are sweet and endearing.The Chef was baffled,and I never did get my point across.
Little Bear and his low-key,uplifting adventures were special to me as a very young child.They have remained indelible across the space of 30 years because of Maurice Sendak.He endowed Little Bear with a personality and curiosity not entirely present in the writing.I have kept only a handful of books from my youngest years.This volume made the cut because it is one of the few children's books that I could ever imagine reading to my own offspring.

NANCY CARROLL

Imaginative Thinking

I am having something of a Nancy Carroll moment:a scandalously long moment, if you must know.There is no need to Google the conversion rate:it works out to approximately three weeks.I have been doing a little too much inward living lately,which makes me seem perhaps a bit backward:but we all go through phases,rotations.This pull between inner and outer,which to me is as ancient-seeming as the sun or the earth beneath our feet, is mine.It is to be shackled then set free, in an endless loop that has covered all of my days and will continue to do so until the frost sets in and hardens.It is for this reason that I am a writer,and am stage-trained:those two poles reflect the opposite aspects of my most primal nature,and both require the ability to sink into the depths of imagination.
There are those who will tell you that I think too much,dream too much,know too much:as if any of those ends,even after a thousand years of living,could ever be reached.Others consider the imagination to be the sole province of children and imbeciles, and thus far from a right pursuit for adults.They are obviously not artists.I am proud of the way I am. I have no qualms in tossing my imaginative life into the world for all to see:after all, to one extent or another, I do so with every piece that I write.Anyone even distantly familiar with my writing voice realizes that,while I dive to the depths, I am not a dry writer. I do not stack my words dispassionately one after the other,like erect soldiers arow,arow,arow.
My imaginative faculties are like rapids:formidable and ever-moving.While I love being a modern woman, I have always felt an exhilarating affinity with the 1920's.This love affair has easily been aided by books and movies, the 2 lovely-dirty culprits that can be blamed for my sense of connectedness with various historical eras (19th-century Russia, Elizabethan England,Ancient Britain,etc.).The greatest appeal of that decade is in what it meant to be a woman then,in the million little ways that the world opened up for us.There was a delicious clarity to that freedom that has since almost entirely vanished from society.
I am entirely besotted with Silent Cinema, and have been since I saw my first frame.As a history and culture buff, I take an almost Anthropological interest in the first 20 years of the American film industry ( I am not counting the earliest,disjointed years when the flickers were a nascent novelty,neither business nor art form).I think that it should be viewed from the combination of one part Margaret Mead, one part Anita Loos.
As a teenager, I checked out and devoured score upon score of early-20th Century related books,about: Hollywood and fashion and pop culture and art and literature and politics.They were biographies and autobiographies,criticisms and studies,fiction and non-fiction,scathing and naive.They were an apt schooling for one of my temperament and natural bent.
I first came upon the luscious fiery-locked Nancy Carroll in a nameless,forgotten book.I'm sure that the initial appeal was that we shared the same rare hair-colour.I enjoyed reading about her,and enjoyed her films even more.Yet others soon became my favourites. I moved on rather swiftly, as there was so much yet to uncover and explore.I have been reminded of her periodically through the years:each rediscovery has been refreshing,and brief.She was certainly a nonpareil.Her charismatic screen presence was extraordinary.She photographed remarkably well,even though her round face was initially deemed a hindrance to stardom.She was incandescent and peppy but without the hedonistic quality of Clara Bow or the sophisticated yet raw sexuality of Louise Brooks.She could act as well as sing.She received an Academy Award nomination and was stunningly popular for a time.As with so many others with stratospheric attractions,her fame has not lasted:it did not even last the length of her lifetime.I recently came upon a photo of her,somewhere in the vastness of the Internet.Hooked again,just like that.
She is an easy one to build daydreams and stories around.By that, I do not mean that I sit around concocting fictional escapades around Nancy Carroll--although that sounds kind of fun,doesn't it? ( I will own up to looking her way for some beauty tips.) Perhaps something in the vein of those writers who turn historical figures (Jane Austen, Good Queen Bess) into wacky and perceptive sleuths?It is the Nancy Carroll type that is so mesmerizing.Like any good flapper,she was complex,truly dimensional--and ridiculously stylish.The legendary life force of those 1920's women lends itself to fiction in spectacular fashion.They are also model muses for any modern woman looking to get the most from this life.It is largely due to the latter that I find them insanely relatable.Even the most mediocre Flapper has an immediacy of personality almost unheard of with women of even considerably newer vintage.
I have had a 1920's novel floating around in my head for these 3 years past.I woke from a dream,and the bones and flesh of it were before my eyes,palpable and flowing with blood.It is 2nd in the queue of my unborn works of long fiction,but its time of quickening is nearly upon me.Although many of her details need to be imagined,created,shaded,my heroine came to me as tangible as life.She is a Flapper,of course, and as such a woman for the ages.The spirit of women such as Nancy Carroll, as filtered through my imagination and preferences, is to be found in her.
As the race of my days has been temporarily slowed down to accommodate my inner dictation,as mysterious as it is necessary,I have returned again and again to subjects that make me happy,give me no pause,help my imagination soar.It is a process of regeneration and renewal.This time around, I have been lucky to have Nancy Carroll in the mix,to remind me of my own ineffable zest,and the thousand little links between imagination,inspiration and creativity.

EVA CASSIDY-FIELDS OF GOLD

A Few Paragraphs on Eva Cassidy

I'm a tree-hugger.I like granola. I think that Stonehenge is awe-inspiring.I will read any book about The Arthurian Legend.I believe that crystals can,indeed, have healing power.Yet,the sum total of all of those particulars does not equal a love of ethereal music.This is a pretty hard-and-fast rule for me.Chakras,yes.
Enya,no.
I also possess something of a misogynistic streak when it comes to singers.As a feminist,this is no easy thing for me to admit;however, we all have our peculiarities,our albatrosses to bear.This is one of mine.I am drawn to unique and often imperfect voices.Artistry,approach and an often inexplicable hold on my senses is what is required to win me over.This tends to happen within seconds,or not at all.Voices strike me to the gut,or they don't:there is no in-between.Most of the victors are males.Indeed,all of my favourite singers are men, with a few honourable mention slots going to women.There have been individual instances of me falling in love with a specific song sung by a woman, but that is where it rests.Every rule under the sun has an exception:Eva Cassidy is mine,and she breaks two rules.Her voice was heavenly,crystalline,and she covered airy,heart-rending songs.
Her version of "Fields of Gold" stops just shy of giving me chills.It is my personal favourite.I could easily listen to it ten times in a row, or fifty times in a day.It has a ridiculous hold on me,much more so than Sting's revered version.The lure for me is all in her voice,which mesmerizes but never cloys,as so many New-Age-y voices do.She was in a class by herself,and it is a class I was not even aware existed:until embarrassingly recently I had never heard of her.She has been dead nearly 13 years.
I am not upset that I missed being ahead of,or at least on top, of a trend, as I so often am.I am annoyed and grieved that I missed out on 15 or 20 years of that voice,that I was not aware of her at a time when I could anticipate her next great release.As it stands,and this is appropriate,her voice is a disembodied thing for me,a force of beauty and soul:it does not need concrete associations,and has none.She lived and died--oh very young,indeed--and there is nothing else that I wish to know,although I am normally insatiable for biographical detail.This is the lovely thing about music,and all art forms:it stands against time,and it always wins.

SOME OF MY FAVOURITE WILLIAM POWELL FILMS

1. Romola (1925)
2. The Kennel Murder Case (1933)
3. Manhattan Melodrama (1934)
4. The Thin Man (1934)
5. After the Thin Man (1936)
6. Ex-Mrs. Bradford (1936)
7. The Great Ziegfeld (1936)
8. My Man Godfrey (1936)
9. Libeled Lady (1936)
10. Double Wedding (1937)
11. I Love You Again (1940)
12. Love Crazy (1941)
13. Life with Father (1947)
14. How to Marry a Millionaire (1953)
15. Mister Roberts (1955)

And a few honourable mentions:

1. The Canary Murder Case (1929)
2. One-Way Passage (1932)

FROM MY VAULT:WILLIAM POWELL-MORE THAN MYRNA'S OTHER HALF

A couple of weeks ago, I posted an old piece about Myrna Loy. The following article about William Powell originally appeared in the same publication.

Debonair.Urbane.Witty.Sophisticated.Irreverent.William Powell wore all of these superlatives like a very expensive,hand-stitched glove.In the era of the young and overpowering Clark Gable and Gary Cooper,Robert Taylor and Tyrone Power,the slightly bug-eyed,lanky Powell was already middle-aged.Distinguished in appearance,with a to-the-tuxedo-born aura,he found leading man success.His attitude,however,was more street savvy,fast-talker than drawing-room polite.He charmed,cajoled and double-talked his way through dozens of films in a career that lasted more than thirty years.His characters were always willing to be a little shady if it furthered their purpose;indeed,they seemed to revel in being sly and less-than-straightforward,their misdeeds often accompanied by a wink.

He was immortalized as Dashiell Hammett's hard-drinking,wise-cracking Nick Charles,a role that he played to acerbic,dissipated perfection in half-a-dozen films. In what is perhaps the most sublime pairing in cinema history,he flirted,argued,bantered and,occasionally,solved crime opposite the incomparable Myrna Loy.As fresh and sexy today as they were an unbelievable 7 decades ago,the proof of their physical chemistry and verbal syncopation is in the watching.

Nick Charles was not his first successful foray into detective-portrayal.He brought Philo Vance to life in four films from the late Twenties through the early Thirties.Lest we try to pigeon-hole him as a suave city-dweller,it pays to remember that he started his celluloid career as a silent film villain in,of all things,Westerns.Silent films enabled actors to readily and believably play characters of various nationalities without the need to master a foreign accent.In this vein,Powell portrayed both King Francis I and The Duke of Orleans.Although,as a former Broadway actor,he had a wider range than the ironic,tippling,slightly ruthless characters that he is most famous for might suggest.

Myrna aside, he starred with the likes of Jean Arthur,Lillian Gish,Louise Brooks and Marilyn Monroe. On the home front,he was married to one co-star and engaged to another.His second wife was the elegant,brash Carole Lombard. He was engaged to tragic sex-symbol Jean Harlow at the time of her death from uremia poisoning in 1937.He ultimately settled down into one of Tinseltown's rare long marriages,to starlet Diana Lewis,in a union that lasted from 1940-1984.He died in 1984,at 91.

He was nominated for the Best Actor Academy Award 3 times but never won.His career steamed through the 1940's with nearly as much momentum as in the 2 previous decades.Still occasionally starring with Loy,he also performed with such up-and-comers as Ann Blythe and Elizabeth Taylor.He received his final Oscar nomination for the 1947 classic "Life with Father" and finished his film career 8 years later as part of the all-star "Mister Roberts".

William Powell's portrayals remain one of the indelible factors of 1930's cinema.He never took himself too seriously on film and his characters,whatever their situation,always seemed to be having a good time....and a good laugh at life's expense.

ALL WOMEN SHOULD BE SO CONFIDENT

1. "When I look at myself,I am so beautiful I scream with joy."-Maria Montez
2. "I see my path,but I don't know where it leads.Not knowing where I'm going is what inspires me to travel it."-Rosalia de Castro
3. "I totally and completely admit,with no qualms at all,my egomania,my selfishness,coupled with a really magnificent voice."Leontyne Price
4. "So what?Forty is the new 30.It doesn't mean a damn thing."-Sheryl Crow
5. "My agent said,'You aren't good enough for movies.'I said,'You're fired.'"-Sally Field
6. "If you have to make mistakes,make them good and big;don't be middling if you can help it."-Hildegard Knef
7. And one honorary man quote:"I'm not in this world to live up to your expectations and you're not in this world to live up to mine."-Bruce Lee
8. And one more for good measure:"The question isn't who is going to let me;it's who is going to stop me."-Ayn Rand

Marilyn:The Lost 'LIFE' Photos

It is astounding and delightful that some people at LIFE magazine recently unearthed never-before-published Marilyn Monroe photographs (in,of all places, a warehouse in New Jersey).They were taken by Ed Clark in August 1950,2 months after his subject's 24th birthday.The images were snapped at a Los Angeles park and show Marilyn minimally done-up, yet more polished than in the beach photos mentioned in my previous article.She is casually dressed--as she often was in the years before stardom-- surrounded by foliage,water,sunlight and shade.My favourite images are numbers 1 and 11. I do not agree with the captions' assessment that Marilyn was an innocent with no inkling of the fame she would soon command.This is,at best,disingenuous and,at worst, a slam to an ambitious woman who always went after what she wanted.To imply that it just kind of fell into her lap is tinged with some disrespect,however unconsciously meant.However,the photos are stunning.They add more texture to a woman already well-sated with complexity.

Click the word delightful to be transported to LIFE's gallery of lost MM photos.

a la Marilyn, Circa 1956

a la Marilyn by amisslis featuring 1928 jewelry

It is June First--Welcome to My de rigueur Marilyn Post

It can seem as if writing about Marilyn Monroe on 1 June is some kind of odd by-law of the classic film world.While I rarely do anything for the flimsy reason that is is expected of me--I am,frankly,wont to do the exact opposite in such situations--it is too difficult to pass up such an obvious excuse to muse on this most-famous of muses.I will not delve into the great and murky depths of criticism here (that is for another time, forum,state of mind).One of the truly appealing aspects of Marilyn--and she is one of the few stars to inspire first-name informality in fans and commentators alike--is the very personal nature of her attractions.To love Marilyn is to love her passionately,in an almost familial way.(To hate her or,worse yet, to be impervious to her charms, is to simply be baffled.)I will approach her in the words of this wee monograph not as a critic or a fanatic but as a regular woman touched,to a temperate degree,by her imperfect yet dazzling charisma.

As a young teen, I had a Marilyn poster on my wall:one of the stunning Milton Greene shots, all glamorous smoke and mirrors.At about the time I thumb-tacked that poster to my wall, I received my first Monroe calendar.The 12 images inside were something of a wake-up call to my nascent,un-trained senses:Marilyn was not always blonde,larger-than-life,unobtainable.All I had ever seen of her,to that point, was the Divine-MM-in-full-blown-Goddess mode, armored with platinum coif and lame and red-red lips.It had not occurred to me that there was so much more hidden behind that mask.

The photos that gripped me the most were those of the young Norma Jeane, taken when she was a few years older than I was then.The contrast to shellacked, movie-star Marilyn is,at first, a bit shocking but it is a shock that is easy to get over.The exuberance and hopefulness is sweet, especially given the pitted path she was about to set off on.A few years later, she was frolicking on a New York beach.Her kinky-curled brown hair had given way to long,straightened blonde tresses.Clad in a picture-perfect late '40's bathing suit,she was white-on-white for the first time.On the cusp of big things,she looked happy and determined,almost plucky.And still there was a hope so palpable that it jumped off the page.

From there it was on into her glory years:all curves and bedroom eyes for nearly a decade,with the notable exceptions of Milton Greene's subtler work and every photo ever snapped by the incomparable Sam Shaw.His lens caught her,often in private moments,during her New York period,when she was married to Arthur Miller.They capture a healthy,numinous,natural Marilyn.She is pensive,quiet,joyous,serious and,in that most elusive of moods for celebrities,relaxed.She trusted Shaw,who was a personal friend:his work has the feeling of private family snap-shots.Then,there was Marilyn at the end:riveting in her glorious,complex maturity.She was as lovely as ever but in new,richly textured ways,fully human at last.

Those images, taken by a variety of photographers over the entire span of her career,showed not just sides to Marilyn that I did not know existed :they held more incarnations than I thought it possible for any one woman to contain.The possibilities opened to me by mere publicity and glamour shots of a long-gone star were limitless,unfathomable, and lasting.