LiteraryTraveler.net

Sitting in a beer garden atop the ancient Vyšehrad courtyards, my host, Radka took a swig of pilsner and began, “A friend once asked me, ‘What are the Czech people like?’ And I said, ‘Czechs, we just don’t bother.” She laughed before elaborating. “We work hard, but all we want is a home and a happy life. We don’t think bigger than that, usually.”

But Radka thinks bigger than that. She’s restless and wants to see the world, which marks another change in a country that has seen so many: a growing generation of dreamers. She is learning Arabic in an effort to learn more about a culture that she believes is grossly misunderstood, and I had to agree.

We peered down at central Prague from across the Vltava River. Punk-rock hippes and young families mingled together on the grass along the cliffside. It was nearly sunset, and night and dreams, like the vivid fantasies of Kafka, would soon arrive.

A bronze statue of Franz Kafka sitting on the shoulders of a headless, limbless man stands in the city of Prague. It represents a dream that he had, which is described in one of his earliest short stories, “Description of a Struggle,” published in 1909, six years before The Metamorphosis.

Critics often dismiss Kafka’s “Struggle” as one of his lesser works – unpolished and adolescent. But Prague went through many stages as well before the city reached its bright, shiny state. From the first settlements in the Paleolithic era to the iron fist of the Soviet Union, Prague has survived many dynasties, dukes, and kings. Now it is a lovely tourist sight, but that was certainly not always the case. Perhaps this is why the “Struggle” statue so well represents both Prague and Kafka.

In 1924, Kafka died at the age of 40 from a combination of tuberculosis and starvation at a sanatorium in Vienna, but his body was returned to his true home in Prague, where it remains inside the New Jewish Cemetery, with so many others.

Prague, though, lives on. And Kafka’s “Struggle” is now intrinsically a part of it. He sits on the headless man’s shoulders, witnessing the changing world.

Radka and I left the beautiful Vyšehrad and returned to her apartment 20 minutes from the center. There the buildings shot up from the flat ground in identical cubes with small windows and dull paint – the remnants of communism. Shops and restaurants were rare, not like the vibrant neighborhoods of other cities I’d seen. But inside the apartment, Radka whipped up a delicious regional stew and opened a bottle of Moravian wine. Stories and laughter followed. We weren’t bothered.

Hemingway drinks in the Plaza Del Gastillo, July 1959.

Today’s edition of Key West Friday is going to focus on something very near and dear to my own heart: literary cocktails. More specifically, I want to talk about one of the greatest mixologists of the 20th century—I’m speaking of Ernest Hemingway, of course—and his personal creations.

Though some may think of Hemingway as just another author you had to read in high school, overlooking Hemingway’s massive influence on American culture, masculinity, and writing would be a sorry mistake. Even if we leave aside his incredible literary talents, Hemingway was far more than simply a writer. He was a celebrity before we truly had celebrities; he single-handedly defined a generation in a way that few authors have since. While his perpetually disillusioned anti-heroes certainly played a role in capturing and symbolically creating the post-war American, (Hemingway’s case is, I happen to believe, one of those chicken-or-the-egg issues. Did he simply record what he saw, and capture the disenchanted drifting of many young men, or did his novels contribute to a certain image of the American identity that was beginning to coalesce? I imagine it was a bit of both) his actual person was just as instrumental in the process. He was, according to those that knew him, a force of nature.

He let loose his forceful personality during his time in Key West, where he lived for several years before relocating to Cuba. During this time, Hemingway did little to reel in his natural vivaciousness, and found himself what PBS’s Michael Palin describes as “Hemingway’s wild adventures:”

In a rain-splattered Key West street, he duked it out with Wallace Stevens after the poet had insulted him. In his beloved boat, Pilar, he battled man-sized fish (managing to shoot himself in both legs while trying to gaff one shark). Hemingway belted back drinks at Sloppy Joe’s, a speakeasy that went legal after Prohibition ended. While at his favorite watering hole, he befriended a young journalist named Martha Gellhorn, who traveled with him to Spain to cover the civil war there. Eventually, she would become his third wife.

As Palin makes clear, these episodes were often fueled by alcohol. But what kind of alcohol?

Here we have to turn to another source. According to the wonderful site Codex 99, in 1937, Hemingway created a drink that Charles Barker later included in his book The Gentleman’s Companion. Hemingway called it a “picker-upper” but it went down in history as “Death in the Gulf Stream.” Despite the morose name, the actual mix sounds rather delicious. For those of you interested in celebrating Key West Friday at home, here’s the recipe for Hemingway’s scary little cocktail:

2 oz. Lucas Bols Oude Genever
4 dashes Angostura
1 lime
Add crushed ice to a thin tumbler. Lace the ice with 4 dashes of Angostura and add the juice and crushed peel of 1 lime. Nearly fill the tumbler with Genever.

Of course, you can always go the traditional route and make yourself a mojito, but we think this Death sounds much more impressive. Happy drinking.

Though I love paperbacks and adore my Kindle, there is nothing that feels quite as literary, quite as solid and impressive, as a leather-bound book. I’ll admit, my current collection is made primarily of used books and well-thumbed paperbacks, but I treasure the few nice books I own. Someday, I like to think, I’ll have floor-to-ceiling shelves, displaying a Hogwarts-esque collection of weighty old classics, covered in just the right amount of dust.

My library fantasies were recently reawakened when I stumbled across a collaboration between Brooklyn-based designer  Jessica Hische and Barnes & Noble. Working with art director Jo Obarowski, Hische created an exclusive series of covers for a collection of classic novels. The books, which are available only in Barnes & Noble stores and on their website, are very reasonably priced. For $63, you can get the entire boxed set, which includes a copy of Dracula, Pride and Prejudice, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, and The Picture of Dorian Gray.

Though I already own many of these books, I’m still considering getting Hische’s set—mainly because they’re so gorgeous. I am not an expert in typography, but even I can see that the fonts are truly wonderful; each one is clearly chosen to fit the subject matter within. For example, the cover for Dracula is done in a vivid red and black, dripping blood and decorated with creeping vines that morph into batwings, rather than the expected three-pointed ivy leaves. In contrast, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn brings to mind a vintage fairground flier. Cattails extend from the sunburst corners and little leafy tendrils underline each carefully-set letter. The titles are in turn eerie and spectacular, whimsical and romantic.

A quick look through Hische’s portfolio shows that this isn’t unusual for the designer. Under her hand, letters don’t look like stark symbols, but individual pieces of art. We are so surrounded by the written word that it no longer feels at all miraculous (after all, a highway sign rarely evokes emotion, much less a feeling of admiration for the chosen font), but projects like this serve as a reminder that this doesn’t have to be the case. Books were once hard to come by, and letters were once treated with a sacred and artistic respect.

Leaving aside for a moment my personal bibliophile tendencies, I have to point out that this box set would make a perfect gift for a recent graduate—particularly if that newly minted scholar happened to major in English. Or you could consider them the first step toward the creation of your own perfect library, which is precisely what I plan to do.

Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” is a short story worth remembering.  I won’t ruin the ending for you if you haven’t read it … but it’s quite frankly one of the most memorable and bizarre endings in literary history.  It’s no wonder that Utne Reader has decided to revisit the publishing of “The Lottery” in The New Yorker in 1948.

I first read “The Lottery” in elementary school in a program called Junior Grade Books.  I recall being bored by a lot of the stories we were required to read, but when we started “The Lottery” I felt an immediate attachment to it.  I loved the way Jackson describes the heightened tension–but without letting the reader in on the big surprise.  At the end, I was completely shocked as were the rest of the kids in my class.

Fast forward to nearly 15 years later.  As a Peace Corps volunteer in Estonia, I taught English as a foreign language.  My advanced class loved reading American and British literature and it was a good way to build their context clue reading skills.  Therefore, I gave them “The Lottery” to read.  And they loved it too.  Only one student foresaw the ending while the others were left in the dark as I was reading it for the first time as a kid.

As Utne Reader reports, when “The Lottery” first came out, readers of The New Yorker were horrified and disgusted, even canceling subscriptions and flooding Jackson with hate mail.  My, how times have changed.  As a society we’ve gotten much darker.  Is that a good thing?

Join us in celebrating “The Lottery” with our article entitled Shirley Jackson’s Outsider Perspective of Bennington, Vermont.

Our latest article, Jim Morrison & Lipstick Kisses at Oscar Wilde’s Pere-Lachaise, is very rock-n-roll.  Wilde was flamboyant, fun-loving and ostentatious, so why not be buried in Pere-Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, France, along with other celebrities such as The Doors Jim Morrison, Chopin, Proust and even Edith Piaf?

Oscar Wilde found a resting place that suited him.  He is buried in a grave that is adorned by literary fans and fans who just want to leave their lipstick kisses on his tombstone.  Kevin E.G. Perry, the writer of the Oscar Wilde article, completely agrees: Oscar is living in death, the way he loved living in life.  And good for him.  We should all be so lucky.

A new literary tradition we’re trying at LT is to go “Behind The Article.”  Now you can read more fascinating tidbits and observations about the writer and the place … things that weren’t included in the article.  For this blog post, we asked Perry a couple of questions that we’re sure our readers would love to know.

Literary Traveler: We hear you visited Edith Piaf’s grave as well.  Did it evoke any different emotions than visiting Wilde’s or Morrison’s graves?

Kevin E.G. Perry: Edith Piaf’s grave is very close to Wilde’s, but it’s an altogether more modest affair. It’s a family plot which displays only the inscription ‘Famille Gassion-Piaf’, and you’d easily miss it if someone hadn’t attached her photograph. This simplicity and the fact that it is set back away from the path seemed to add to the air of reverence that surrounds it–and makes it even more startling to think that when she was buried there, over 100,000 mourners attended the ceremony.

LT: Can you tell our readers a little more about The Doors fans at Jim Morrison’s grave?  How many fans were there?  Did you find the experience overwhelming or overly-touristy?

KP: On the day I visited Pere-Lachaise there were six or seven Doors fans who seemed to be spending the day at Jim Morrison’s grave, quite apart from the ebb and flow of other cemetery visitors. They were smoking cigarettes and playing music at a low volume–the latest torch holders in a perpetual vigil that has lasted almost 40 years.

We hope you enjoyed this first installment of “Behind The Article.”  We’ll keep them coming.  In the meantime, please enjoy Oscar Wilde at Pere-Lachaise.

Black History Month is finally here.  And we’re celebrating it by highlighting all of our articles about African American writers.  We’ll also be throwing in a couple Caribbean writers and an article on Ghana, so stay tuned!

We’d like to start off Black History Month 2011 with a powerful, black writer by the name of Zora Neale Hurston.  Hurston was not only a staple in the Harlem Renaissance, but she can also be classified as a Southern writer as she spent much of her life in Eatonville, Florida.  The town honors her legacy each year by hosting the Zora Neale Hurston Festival in January.  Festival-goers celebrate her work and life as well as focus on a specific theme that varies from year to year.

Hurston is the author of Their Eyes Were Watching God, a classic in American literature.  We honor Hurston with our two articles entitled Zora Neale Hurston, A Literary Life and Zora’s Immortal South.

So kick off Black History Month with these two engaging articles on Hurston.  We promise you, there will be more to come …

Just this past week, Nobel laureate Derek Walcott won Britain’s most prestigious award for poetry, the TS Eliot prize.  He won for his poetry collection White Egrets, which meditates on aging and dying.

White Egrets was published after Walcott suffered from allegations that he sexually harassed two female students at Harvard University.  One of the students alleges that Walcott said, “Imagine me making love to you.  What would I do?” (The Independent).  Walcott says he was a victim of a smear campaign because, at the time, he was up for the highly regarded Oxford Professor of Poetry at Oxford University.  He eventually dropped out of the race.

Walcott hails from the Caribbean, from the island of St. Lucia, the setting for White Egrets.  The poet chose to celebrate his 81st birthday on St. Lucia, instead of traveling to London to accept his award.  In Walcott’s absence, Anne Stevenson, a judge for the TS Eliot prize, described his collection as a, “moving, risk-taking and technically flawless book by a great poet” (The Independent).

To continue this celebration, please enjoy our LT article entitled The Helen of the West Indies: Derek Walcott’s St. Lucia.

Paulo Coelho, famous Brazilian author of The Alchemist, reported on his blog on January 10, 2011 that the Minister of Culture of Iran has banned his books.  Coelho reports that his books have been published in Iran since 1998 and in various publishing houses.  To the author’s shock and dismay, this is no longer the case.

6 million copies of Coelho’s books have been sold in Iran under various governments.  He works with official publisher Caravan Books.  He blogged that his books have been sold in Iran for 12 years and that the decision to ban his literature is “arbitrary” and is most likely a “misunderstanding.”

Coelho ends his blog post saying that he hopes the misunderstanding will be cleared up.  He asks for the support of his native Brazilian government to help him in this matter.

If literature is being banned in Iran, what is next?  What other books will the Iranian Minister of Culture decide to ban … or is this just a simple “misunderstanding” as Coelho leads his followers to believe?

Either way, it’s a hot topic we’ll be watching for days to come …

When I think of Agatha Christie, I definitely think of her on the Nile.  But did you know that when she visited Egypt as a kid she hated it?  I had no idea either.  One of our favorite LT writers, Veronica Hackethal, takes our readers on a journey down the Nile on a fabulous, five star cruise.  You will see how to experience Egypt in style, feeling the luxury and decadence of Agatha Christie’s time spent there.

Hackethal shows us how oppressive the desert can be, yet how spectacular the pyramids really are.  As she says in her article, “everyone handles the desert differently.”  With these observations, our readers understand how Agatha Christie felt when she toured Egypt both as a child and as an adult.

I’ve personally never been to Egypt, but friends of mine have gone and raved about the experience.  Agatha Christie’s connection to the Nile just makes the trip more desirable to me.  Thus, I hope one day I’ll be writing about cruising down the Nile in a five star ship, dreaming of Hercule Poirot, murder mysteries, sordid affairs.  It sounds like a perfect, literary trip to me.

Enjoy our latest article, Death & Life on the Nile, Agatha Christie’s Egypt.

~ Jennifer, Network Editorial Director

2011 already looks like a big year for literary movies.  The much anticipated movies The Rum Diary by Hunter S. Thompson (starring Johnny Depp) and On the Road by Jack Kerouac (starring a host of famous faces including Kristen Stewart, Steve Buscemi, Amy Adams, Viggo Mortensen, etc.) are finally set to release in 2011.

But there’s one movie release I can’t wait for.  I’m obsessed with 20th-21st century literary great Philip Roth, so it’s only natural I’m waiting for American Pastoral to come out on the big screen.  This is the book that taught me how to write.  And this is the book which has incredibly complex and compelling characters such as the Swede and his sociopath daughter Merry.  It won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1998.

The movie has been slated to release for a while now.  Even at press time, I cannot find the exact details or release date.  But what I do know is that Evan Rachel Wood will play Merry, an absolute crazy, which Woods has already proved she can play in Thirteen and on the HBO series True Blood.  The pick for the Swede is Paul Bettany, who played uber pale Silas in The Da Vinci Code.  He is a perfect pick for the Swede because the Swede is actually Jewish, but he looks Scandinavian, hence his nickname “the Swede.”

The Swede’s troubled wife and former Miss Jersey is to be played by the beautiful Jennifer Connelly of House of Sand and Fog and A Beautiful Mind fame.  She is gorgeous enough to play the Swede’s wife and she certainly knows how to play a woman in emotional turmoil.

So as you can see, I’m psyched about American Pastoral.  I will keep our literary travelers up to date on when the movie will be released to the big screen.  And I’ll definitely be the first in line.

~ Jennifer, Network Editorial Director

Happy New Year to all our literary travelers! In order to ring in 2011, we start with a fan favorite: Agatha Christie.  She is one of those authors you just have to admire.  Her brilliantly woven stories and exciting life make her an enigmatic and well-respected writer of mystery.  Christie seemed to have “owned” the mystery genre in a sense.  She even won accolades over his male counterparts–not an easy feat in the early to mid 20th century.

Thus, Christie was a trailblazer in many ways.  In our latest article by DJ Coode entitled Agatha Christie’s Torquay, learn how and where Christie developed her plot lines and mystery writing chops.  Christie always considered Torquay home, so join DJ Coode as she journeys to all the spots Christie roamed and loved.

Also, don’t forget to tell us what you think.  Sign up for your very own blog on LiteraryTraveler.net for 2011.

Russians invade American book market in 2011!  Is that really true?  Actually, it is.  In my Vladimir Nabokov post, I discussed how Vladimir Nabokov’s son is publishing his father’s love letters to his mother.  This book is one of the most highly anticipated of 2011.  The publication date is TBA.

Now, we are lucky enough to have three more books about famous Russians in literature coming out in January 2011.  Let’s take a look:

1. Leo Tolstoy and the Alibi of Narrative by Justin Weir, Yale University Press

This book is an exploration into Tolstoy’s complex narrative and how he continues to mystify interpreters.  Weir, professor of Slavic languages and literature at Harvard University, gives a fresh, in-depth look to Tolstoy’s storytelling strategies.

2. Count Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy: The Critical Heritage by A. V. Knowles, Routledge UK

Knowles takes a closer look at Tolstoy’s writing and why the author’s contribution to literature is so important.

3. Joseph Brodsky: A Literary Life by Lev Loseff, translated by Jane Ann Miller, Yale University Press

This insightful and intense biography written by Lev Loseff, one of Brodsky’s dear friends, shows the genius and influences of the great Russian poet.  Loseff discusses Brodsky’s rise to literary greatness as winner of the Nobel Prize and America’s poet laureate.

So ring in 2011 with Russian literature.  It can’t get better than Tolstoy and Brodsky!

*

Russian Articles on Literary Traveler

Amy Grace Loyd, Literary Editor of Playboy, Talks Nabokov and The Original of Laura

In Search of Vladimir Nabokov in St. Petersburg, Russia

Vladimir Nabokov in the Grand Canyon & the Discovery of Butterfly Neonympha

An evening candlelight tour at Washington Irving’s Sunnyside home in Tarrytown, NY seemed like the perfect way to kick off the holiday season.

Sunnyside is perched atop the Hudson River, allowing for striking views even on a cold December night.  Before the tour, I entered a converted barn where carolers in traditional costumes of the 1800s sang Christmas carols and explained their significance and origin between each song.

My tour group descended down a lantern-lit path to meet a costumed guide, who properly welcomed us to Sunnyside.  In each room, a costumed guide provided history and read an excerpt of Irving’s personal letters or writing.

The house was narrow, but festooned with evergreens, holly and lit candles.  However, I couldn’t find a Christmas tree.  As the guide explained, Christmas trees were a newer tradition in those days and many houses, such as Sunnyside, did not have them.  Irving loved Christmas so much that from his ambassador post in Spain, he would instruct his family to meticulously decorate Sunnyside.

Irving never married, instead sharing his home with his extended family.  His two nieces resided as the ladies of the house.  They tended to daily life, including Christmas dinner.  Dishes included breading pudding, mincemeat pie and turkey.  A holiday favorite was wassail, a hot punch of mulled cider, sugar, cinnamon and ginger.

In Irving’s study, a box of brightly-colored eraser-like objects seemed out of place.  In fact, they were ribbon candy, a common holiday treat in the 1800s.  In the living room, a costumed guide played piano and urged us to sing along to Silent Night and Jingle Bells.

Upon exiting Sunnyside, I drank hot apple cider.  I stood by the small bonfire.  I was finally ready for the Christmas season.

Note: Dress warmly, including hats and gloves, because you do walk outside.  Strollers cannot fit inside Sunnyside.  Children must walk or parents must carry them.

Christmas Articles from Literary Traveler:

The Real Story Behind Dickens’ A Christmas Carol

Who Wrote ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas. A Literary Debate

Vladimir Nabokov, the scandalous author of Lolita and The Original of Laura, will have his love letters to his wife Vera published in 2011.  His son, Dmitry, found the 300 unpublished letters in Vera’s archives.  However, Vera destroyed her own letters to Vladimir.  The author died in 1977, so this is quite a discovery for the literary community.

It was also Dmitry who gave permission for The Original of Laura to be edited and published in Playboy magazine.  Playboy’s literary editor, Amy Grace Loyd, took on the challenge of editing The Original of Laura for publication for the December 2009 issue of the magazine.

The love letters will be published in English sometime in 2011, hopefully around Valentine’s Day.  For those who read Russian, the letters were published in the Russian magazine Snob in mid-November 2010.

Translated from Russian, a language known for its terms of endearment, readers should expect a romantic and passionate side of Nabokov.  In one excerpt published in The Independent, Nabokov writes:

“How can I explain to you, my joy, my golden one, my heavenly happiness, just how much I am fully yours …”

In anticipation of the publication of Nabokov’s love letters, please enjoy an interview and two articles about the legend himself:

Amy Grace Loyd, Literary Editor of Playboy, Talks Nabokov and The Original of Laura

In Search of Vladimir Nabokov in St. Petersburg, Russia

Vladimir Nabokov in the Grand Canyon & the Discovery of Butterfly Neonympha

Everyday the price for flying and additional fees slightly increases. Baggage fees, pet fees, and airline meals are greatly overpriced. As a traveler, I would rather spend my money on exploration and spontaneity. So I choose driving across country instead.

As you explore the depths of the road, the act of traveling becomes part of the vacation and not something to simply endure. Traveling by car allows for the journey and the destination to be the vacation.

I drove across country this past summer, and one of the many reasons why I prefer to travel by car compared to by plane is because of the spontaneous stops.

As I traveled the country, I decided to cross into Missouri from Illinois via the Mississippi River. I stood on the Ste. Genevieve ferry and reminisced about the story of Huck Finn and his adventures along the Mississippi River. As I watched the twigs float by and felt the cool breeze wisp across my face, I pictured Huck Finn on his raft drifting across the river beside me.

Take it from a traveler that often takes the wrong turn, spontaneity is freeing.  It presents a new layer of traveling. As I took unintended turns, I instantly rerouted myself along another path towards my destination. Every unintended turn became a spontaneous new adventure and a shift in a new direction.

One of the great things that we get to do as part of Literary Traveler is take a neat trip now and then. Not all of the time mind you, but sometimes everything aligns and we get to take a once in a lifetime trip.

It’s even more special when you travel to a place you remember but have never actually been. This happens when you are traveling through a landscape that you have only read about. This was the case for me when I was invited by the National Trust for Historic Preservation to help lead a trip on the Historic (A National Historic Landmark) Delta Queen Steamboat.

The trip was to celebrate Mark’s Twain’s Mississippi and was ten days at the beginning of July a few years back. We went from St. Paul to St. Louis and stopped at number of memorable places as we wound down the river.

The trip combined travelers from the National Trust for Historic Preservation, Stanford Alumnae and Smithsonian. We had some great people on that trip including the travelers, the presenters and the people behind the scenes who made it all happen.

Sadly the Delta Queen is not currently riding the rivers and is docked in Chattanooga, TN. As part of a series of ongoing videos that we are producing at Literary Traveler, we wanted to share the magic that we felt on the Mississippi.

I thought to myself, when was the last time I’ve been to a haunted house?  Not since I was a kid, for sure.  So I jumped at the chance to go to Horseman’s Hollow, a literary haunted event run by the Historic Hudson Valley.

Horseman’s Hollow follows the story of Washington Irving’s The Legend of Sleepy Hollow on the lawn of the historic Philipsburg Manor in none other than the village of Sleepy Hollow, New York.

The event began with a candlelight walk down a dark path on the Manor grounds, which put me in the Halloween, haunted house mood, especially when I heard the screams of terrified guests from afar.

At the event, ghostly specters and bloody corpses interacted with guests.  Terrifying statues jumped out at unsuspecting visitors, startling even the bravest and eliciting screams.  A cannon erupted.  An ax-wielding Headless Horseman galloped by on his white horse–the first of three Headless Horseman that night (my favorite spectacle).

I met Ichabod Crane, who eerily welcomed visitors into his house.  I pushed through bean bag sacks, struggling to make my way through a haunted barn.  A ghostly face illuminated in midair, telling the story of the Headless Horseman.  And the Headless Horseman stomped his foot down, blocking my escape to the exit door.

Overall, Horseman’s Hollow keeps to the literary and historical aspect of Irving’s story.  The theater actors reveled in playing their characters, making the event realistic and scary.  It was a fun and creepy evening, perfect for autumn in the Hudson Valley.

A couple notes: There is a lot of walking (I was actually surprised by how much), especially from the parking lot and going through the event.  Wear comfortable shoes (do not wear heeled boots like I did.).  Also, it is pretty scary in certain parts, especially when characters jump out at you, so do not bring young children.

Our Dark New England theme continues with these great LT articles:

I am Providence: The City that Made H.P. Lovecraft

A Brief History of Edward Gorey’s Creepy Cape Cod

Shirley Jackson’s Outsider Perspective of Bennington, Vermont

I often sit on the San Francisco transportation and allow myself to be carried to a new destination. I find myself daydreaming of my recent adventure across this beautiful country.

My mind retraces all the amazing and memorable moments and I wish that sometime soon I will again be on the road. Traveling is not only an adventure for me—it is a time to be free of the daily stress and daily uncertainty of what am I going to do with life? I feel that more often than not I am ‘boogled down’ by uncertainty; I am driven by the need to endlessly search for a tangible answer. However, traveling makes me feel as though this answer is right in front of me, as if this answer is unimportant, a mere speck of what is truly out there. When I travel, this mere speck is just a weightless distraction left behind.

As I was nearing the end of my trip across the country, I found myself at Seven Falls in Colorado Springs, Colorado. It was enchanting. The color of the mountainside against the beautiful blue sky and forest green trees on my way towards the entrance, promised an unforgettable afternoon.

Entrance fee was $9.25, but well worth the hike and afternoon out of the car.

Seven Falls is located in the South Cheyenne Canyon. It received its title based upon the water that cascades from 181 feet in seven distinct steps. The water falls from the southern edge of Pikes Peak and allows for a picturesque, tranquil sight.

In addition to the waterfalls, Seven Falls has 2 hiking trails: Trail to Inspiration Point and Trail to Midnight Fall. The Trail to Inspiration Point is a mile long, intermediate hike that is the location of the original gravesite of Helen Hunt Jackson. Helen Hunt Jackson was a writer of the 1800s. She is best known for her interest in the mistreatment of American Indians by government agents. This hike was a great way to stretch my legs and breathe heavy as the hill sat in front of me. The sun was beautiful as it set upon the mountainside and the clouds swiftly moved across the evening sky.

Seven Falls is a gem of this country. It is a secluded area, with rushing water as its soundtrack. It is a great place to become in touch with nature and breathe in the amazing fresh air that this earth has to offer.

It makes my list for the top 10 places to visit in America. What’s on your list?

My Southern England trip continues as I edge closer to my time ending in Salisbury. As I write this post, it’s a washout as the Brits like to say. In other words, it’s raining heavily. Therefore, yesterday was my big excursion; I visited Lacock and Bath in one day … and without a car.  Here’s how it went:

I took the train from Salisbury station to Trowbridge.  I have to admit I much prefer the buses because they’re much cheaper and you get to see much more sitting atop the double decker.  The train costs 10 pounds for only a 30 minute or less trip.  The day before I took a bus ride for 30 minutes for 3 pounds, 80 pence. It’s a huge difference to a budget traveler.

I got off at Trowbridge, a bit lost, but a nice Brit walked me to the town center and showed me to the right bus.  Trowbridge is the county seat and a busy, little town, and I was glad I was able to see it.  I hopped aboard the 234 (or you can take the X34) toward Chippenham.  I made sure it stopped at Lacock, even though it clearly said it on the sign.  The bus cost 4 pounds, 15 pence.

The ride was charming on my absolute favorite, the double decker bus.  We went through villages and farmland and even got to see a version of a British trailer park.

Then we arrived at Lacock after a 30 minute or so ride. Lacock is the National Trust village where scenes from world-famous BBC films such as the original Pride & Prejudice (the Colin Firth version) and Cranford were shot.  Scenes from two Harry Potter films were shot here as well.

Lacock is a step back in time.  It looks like an 18th to 19th century, English village. The English tudors, flower boxes, lush green landscapes help the tourist step back in time.  It was easy to see how Lacock was a film set.  Simply throw down some dirt for the roads and place actors in old-fashioned clothes and you’re ready to shoot.

I walked around Lacock, winding through the cobblestone streets, peering up at the perfect English cottages, adoring a kitten in a window (see photo) and even stopping off at the bakery to smell some goodies. I stopped outside The Abbey and took some photos through the fence and thought of Jane Austen. This was a perfect setting for her novel.

After sitting on a bench and eating in Lacock, I walked down the road towards Chippenham and caught the X34 (you can also take the 234) to Chippenham.  Only a 10 minute ride and 2 pounds, 40 pence, I got off at the Chippenham bus station. Alas, there was a bus waiting to go to Bath.  I hopped aboard for 4 pounds, 45 pence.

It took over an hour to get to Bath.  The bus was not double decker, and the ride was uneventful until we approached just outside of Bath …

Please continue reading about my travels in Bath on the Editorial Director’s Forum.

And don’t forget to read about my non-touristy, Stonehenge visit.

- Jennifer, Editorial Network Diector

One hundred and sixty years ago this month, Edgar Allan Poe met a penniless end after being found on the streets of Baltimore. The city of Baltimore has been host to many celebrations of the poet’s life and works, and the focus on this city is fitting, as Poe felt much adoration for Baltimore, having lived there for several years. But 2009 also marks the 200th anniversary of the poet’s birth, and this year the city of Boston put aside pride to commemorate a decidedly prodigal son.

Edgar Allan Poe was born on Carver Street in Boston, Massachusetts, to actors Elizabeth Arnold Hopkins and David Poe. Though he moved to Virginia when he was only three years old, after his parents died, Poe returned to Boston after dropping out of the University of Virginia. Only 18, Poe faked his age and name to enlist in the Army, and was subsequently stationed briefly at Castle Island in the Boston harbor. Poe later moved back to the south, but he returned to Boston a year before he died.

Unlike Longfellow, Lowell, and the other Boston literati of his time, Poe scorned the city, insulting Boston with barbs that sting as only the gleefully clever can. In fact, a very public debate played out in contemporary newspapers following his appearance at the Boston Lyceum in 1845. After audience members took offense to Poe’s demeanor, a Boston editor published a critical review insulting his work. In response, Poe wrote:
We like Boston. We were born there–and perhaps it is just as well not to mention that we are heartily ashamed of the fact. The Bostonians are very well in their way. Their hotels are bad. Their pumpkin pies are delicious. Their poetry is not so good. Their common is no common thing–and the duck-pond might answer–if its answer could be heard for the frogs. But with all these good qualities the Bostonians have no soul. …The Bostonians are well-bred–as very dull persons very generally are. (Poe, The Broadway Journal, Nov 1, 1845.)

Surprisingly, Poe’s first published work, an 1827 collection of poems entitled “Tamerlane,” was signed simply, “By a Bostonian.” Eighteen years later, Poe would vilify Bostonians, who he often referred to as Frogpondians: “The fact is, we despise them and defy them (the transcendental vagabonds!) and they may all go to the devil together.” (Poe, The Broadway Journal, Nov 22, 1845.)

And now, all these years later, the transcendental vagabonds have finally honored the great poet: although his birthplace is now occupied by a State Transportation Building, the corner of Boylston and Charles streets shall evermore be known as Poe Square.

Check out the newest article on LiteraryTraveler.com to learn about the “Poe Toaster,” a mysterious masked man who pays a tribute to Poe annually at the poet’s grave.