SEPTEMBER 2011 - CHARLES DICKENS IN MANHATTAN AND EMILY BRONTE IN VENICE

After hosting a successful exhibition dedicated to Jane Austen ,   A Woman's Wit - Jane Austen's Life and Legacy, in 2010, The Morgan Library & Museum in Manhattan, NYC opens a new great one to celebrate Charles Dickens's 200th birth anniversary. This is how they present the event: 

Alfred Bryan (1852–1899). Caricature of Charles Dickens

Charles Dickens (1812–1870) was Britain's first true literary superstar. In his time, he attracted international adulation, and many of his books became instant classics. Today, his popularity continues unabated, and his work remains not only widely read but widely adapted for stage and screen.

The Morgan Library & Museum' si collection of Dickens manuscripts and letters is the largest in the United States and is one of the two greatest collections in the world, along with the holdings of Britain's Victoria and Albert Museum. Charles Dickens at 200 celebrates the bicentennial of the great writer's birth in 1812 with manuscripts of his novels and stories, letters, books, photographs, original illustrations, and caricatures. Sweeping in scope, the exhibition captures the art and life of a man whose literary and cultural legacy is unrivaled. 

(September 23, 2011 through February 12, 2012 )

BACK TO WORK AND ... IT WAS RATHER TIME!

I'm just happy it's time to go back to work. You think I'm mad, don't you? I guess it must sound rather weird! Someone who wishes to go back to work and is happy his/her holidays are over. Totally nuts! I agree with you. I'm weird. I've always been. I hate Christmas Holidays, Easter Holidays and love ordinary, working days. Summer Holidays are the best to me. But they are maybe too long. Actually,   I longed for these holidays. I needed a break , body and soul.  I was terribly stressed and exhausted at the end of the school year . But now, after many relaxing hours at home,  I long  for some healthy working hours. I know, I know, in a while  I'll be complaining of my students, colleagues, tests to be prepared and corrected, lessons to be planned, reports to be written, parents to be received, meetings to be attended and  born. However, now I am just happy I'm going to start a new school year.

FORGOTTEN CLASSICS - WALTER SCOTT, ROB ROY

Modern historical fiction is quite well-appreciated and well-sold both among male and  female readers.  There's been a huge spreading of best- selling authors and series in the latest years. But where does this genre come from, actually? The Father of the Historical Novel was Sir Walter Scott ( 1771 - 1832 ) who started the  publication of a long series of successful volumes to pay back his debts with Waverley (1814). The story takes place between Scotland and England in the years just before the first Jacobite Uprising (1715) and features both historical and fictional characters involved in historical and fictional event . The prototype for hugely successful Gabaldon's Outlander saga?  Surely it was. Of that one and many more.

COMING SOON - GHOSTS AND MUSKETEERS

The Woman in Black

I'm not so sure I'll have the heart to go to the cinema and see this movie though I'll be strongly tempted when it comes out. I'm still terrified by my childhood memories of watching The Spiral Staircase or of just listening to the soundtrack of Dario Argento's Deep Red (Profondo Rosso), though it happened aeons ago. Thriller and ghost stories, horror and mystery films are not exactly my cup of tea. But I've seen several and even liked them. I must convince myself to see this one, I'm intrigued by the trailer, the pictures and everything I read about it.

AUTHOR GUESTBLOG - JENNIFER BECTON INTRODUCING THE SOUTHERN FRAUD SERIES + DOUBLE GIVEAWAY OF ABSOLUTE LIABILITY

Almost a year ago, Maria Grazia invited me on her blogs (HERE and HERE) to promote the release of Charlotte Collins: A Continuation of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, a book that I self-published in the hopes of gaining a traditional publishing contract. What I didn’t know then was that I would fall in love with book industry and decide to start my own publishing company, Whiteley Press, which is dedicated to bringing professional-quality fiction and nonfiction books and ebooks to market.

In July, I released my second book—Absolute Liability: A Southern Fraud Thriller—under the Whiteley Press imprint, and it has since climbed into the Amazon (US) Kindle Top 100 Bestsellers list. Seeing such a positive response to this book has literally been a dream come true for me, and I am grateful to everyone who has taken a chance on a new mystery/thriller author. Now, I am excited to be able to share my book here, with those who played such a large role in the success of Charlotte Collins.

BRIDESHEAD REVISITED (2008) - CONTRA MUNDUM

I'm sure it was an advantage. I've never read the book by Evelyn Waugh and only have vague memories of me bored to death by the endless 1981 ITV series  . I know this must sound rather unpopular but I like to be totally honest. I remember myself  trying to watch it in English with Italian subtitles but catching very little of the meaning of  the story and giving up watching the rest of it after a while . I apologize with all those who loved it,  I found it just terribly slow and boring. Maybe I should give it a try now that I am more experienced and ... older.  However, my almost total ignorance of what Brideshead Revisited meant in the past,  is why I could freely watch  and sincerely  enjoy the latest 2008 film adaptation written by Andrew Davies and directed by Julian Jarrold.   Without the burden of having to compare it with something else, I watched it simply  as a period movie, the latest addition to my DVD collection (thanks A.!) ,  set in a wonderful location I'd just visited in Yorkshire. I found it  good and I was definitely into it , its story, the characters and  the atmosphere. And I don't feel guilty at all!

NO MYSTERY UNSOLVED: MISS MARPLE IS HERE!

Geraldine McEwan

Miss Marple is the amateur detective Agatha Christie featured in 12 of her  novels and 20 of her short stories. Though I find Christie's plots rather repetitive and her characters definitely stereotypical, I enjoy watching the TV adaptations of her works, especially the latest remakings because they star lots of our beloved British actors from other period and modern dramas. In the last two weeks I've managed to see several Miss Marple episodes  on one of the satellite channels we pay for and which I hardly ever watch. For once, on holiday and alone at home, I was master of ... the remote control!

AUGUST 22nd - THE DAY OF MY RICHARD(S)

On 22nd August 1485 Richard III, the last of the Plantagenet kings of England died fighting at Bosworth. The last king of England to die in a battlefield. On 22nd August 1971 Mr John Armitage decided to call his son Richard after the king he so much admired despite Shakespeare's distorted portrait of him as  a deformed, awfully wicked tyrant. 

This is why today it is doubly special to me. Honour to the noble king defeated on the battlefield and scorned by his victor's historians and happy 40th birthday to a very special person, an incredibly gifted man and talented actor who was christened after him by his father. 

AT THE THEATRE - THE TWELFTH NIGHT, OR WHAT YOU WILL (LA DODICESIMA NOTTE)

Going to Rome , just one hour's drive from home, and walking around as a tourist, spending time with good friends or going to the theatre can be activities for a great weekend schedule, don't you agree? Well, it isn't  a schedule but what I did in the last couple of days. And it was great! It often happens and I must do it again: I must thank my very good friend K/V for being the generous,  incredible  host-lady she is and for making all that happen!

Now, to the main topic of my blogpost which  is not praising my friends' virtues - which are many! - but to tell you about the play we saw at The Globe in Rome, La dodicesima notte  (The Twelfth Night),  by William Shakespeare. 

GIVEAWAY WINNER - SALT BRIDE BY LUCINDA BRANT

One of you will soon have the pleasure of reading this beautiful Georgian romance.  The winner of the giveaway will get  the e-book version of Salt Bride directly from the author, Lucinda Brant. The lucky winner this time is ... 

GIVEAWAY WINNER - THE WEDDING SHROUD BY ELISABETH STORRS

Though living in Italy, I've read pretty much from the other side of the world recently, more precisely Australian authors. I'm really grateful to the Net and the blogoworld for letting me wide my scope so much. Among the new Australian writers I've met and interviewed, and whose work I've read and reviewed, Elisabeth Storrs . Her first novel The Wedding Shroud is set in Italy in ancient times, Early Rome, and it has actually hooked me. Now it's someone else's chance to be enchanted by the Etruscan world and mesmerized by the characters in this novel. I've picked up the name of the winner of the autographed copy given away by Elisabeth Storrs on occasion of my review here on Fly High!  Random.org has chosen and I'm going to announce it!

GEORGETTE HEYER, DEVIL'S CUB - MY REVIEW

Like father , like son. The Duke of Avon was “Satan” in These Old Shades  and, since the excesses of the young  Marquis of Vidal are even wilder than his father’s before him, the reckless duelist and gamester is called “the Devil’s Cub.”

Dominic is his name and he is  the protagonist of  Heyer 's, Devil's Cub.

The Duke and his Leonié are still among the protagonists of this second installment in the Alastair Trilogy and they are still very active between England and France -  each in his/her own peculiar way  - after 25 years.  With them,  many of the unforgettable characters of the previous novel,  involved someway or another,  in the adventures of the new ones:  young Marquis of Vidal and Miss Mary Challoner, Juliana Marling and Mr Comyn, young wench Sophia Challoner and her scheming , unscrupolous mother.

COLIN IN COMEDY OR ... WHERE HAS MR DARCY GONE?

It's been some time since I last posted in this series dedicated to my attempt to catch up with the long successful career of Colin Firth. I'm in shameless delay but he is relentlessly overactive! I've chosen to see Mr Darcy lose his "à plomb" and perform in comedy  in two films I hadn't seen yet . I 've seen Colin Firth in two of his recent light roles, as Harry in Mamma Mia (2008) and as Richard in The Accidental Husband (2008). 

UK JULY 2011 - CASTLE HOWARD AND LACOCK

This is the last installment of my UK JULY 2011 series.  I promised you I'd  tell about our location hunting activities and here I am with this final post about Castle Howard and Lacock. 

Two different adaptations of Evelyn Waughn's Brideshead Revisited were set at Castle Howard and being there, well nearby, we couldn't resist the idea of a trip to this gorgeous, luxurious residence and its magnificent park, groves and lakes .

We were extremely lucky and had  fine weather, warm and sunny, that day. It was so good that we could have a quick snack on the meadows  -  we also had several  uninvited guests at our picnic - and could admire the lake,  sitting on a terrace while drinking cappuccino -yes,  you're right not  a very British drink .

SALT BRIDE - A GEORGIAN ROMANCE BY LUCINDA BRANT, REVIEW AND GIVEAWAY

If you love good Georgian historical romances, you can’t miss this delightful novel by Lucinda Brant. Witty prose and well-researched context, skillfully drawn characters you’ll be captivated by, are the main features in her style . Salt Bride is my second read from Lucinda’s work  - after Deadly Engagement - and I must thank her for hours of pure literary pleasure.

The story starts in medias res, and impressively so. The first pages are really tense with drama and you  can't but sympathize with the heroine, Jane Despard , since the opening : 

RA COMIC CARDS

My husband didn't imagine what was going to happen  when,  as a joke,  he made a comic-strip (above)  with pictures of Heinz Kruger from Captain America using his IPhone and sent it to me via mail. Poor him!  I started sending him pictures of other roles Richard Armitage played and asking him to make others. I chose the photos, wrote the captions  and ... you can't imagine what a pain in the neck I have been.  Or better, maybe, some of you can! 

Well, he and his iPhone helped me to create these comic cards dedicated to some of RA's characters. I've posted them on facebook and twitter from time to time, so you might have already seen them. Today I've decided to put them  all together in one post , here on Fly High, adding  a brand-new one at the end. Discover which of RA's characters it is dedicated to. I hope you'll like them all and, remember, they are just for fun.

THE WEDDING SHROUD BY ELISABETH STORRS - REVIEW AND GIVEAWAY

It got me hooked from the first words in the Prologue -  "Her whole world was orange" - and I couldn't put it down for a while. THE WEDDING SHROUD is a surprising page-turner , about-500-page- thick, dense with tension, emotion and sensuousness, crowded with unforgettable vivid characters: Cecilia, Mastarna, Tarchon, Marcus, Drusus, Larthia, Ulthes, Erene, Artile, Arruns, Cytheris, Tulumnes, and even dead Seianta. Elisabeth Storrs combines detailed research and remarkably talented writing in her portrayal of life in Early Rome. Her heroine, Cecilia, is a complex character,  presented in all the frailty of an unloved child grown-up into a torn young woman. It is not easy for her to love, trust or rely on others, especially once she gets to an enemy city and culture. Prejudiced, stubborn, frightened and divided between her loyalty to Rome and her duty as a Veientane wife, her mind keeps her tied to Roman values and morality, while her heart and her senses wish and escape and are fascinated by the freedom and beauty she finds in Veii. 

AT THE CINEMA - THE CONSPIRATOR

Italian poster

It was released in the USA in 2010 and after reading about  it, I ticked this film  as definitely to be seen. Directed by Robert Redford, starring James MacAvoy, Robin Wright, Kevin Kline, Tom Wilkinson, THE CONSPIRATOR has just been released in Italy and I couldn't miss it. It's a remarkable, sharp, dry account of the facts following a shocking event in the history of the US . It's also a movie denouncing a vision of justice stained by revenge in moments of fear. It's impossible not to read the political  aim in  Redford's choices, but it is also unavoidable to admire the beautiful photography of his work and his masterly and highly symbolical use of light all over the movie. There have been other tragic shocking moments in recent history for the Americans, when the democratic ideal of a fair trial was suspended and frozen, and I'm sure they are constant reference to Redford while narrating these history-handbook events in this awesome 19th century period postcard. It's the story of Mary Surratt (Robin Wright) , sentenced to death for conspiration against President Abraham Lincoln, and  Frederick Aiken (James MacAvoy) , the young lawyer who tried to demonstrate her innocence.

COMING SOON - DANGEROUS KEIRA IN A DANGEROUS METHOD

Based on a play by  Christopher Hampton, this film tells how the still experimental psychoanalytic method was developed focusing on the peculiar relationship between Sigmund Freud, and his beloved pupil  (then antagonist) Carl Gustav Jung and their Russian patient Sabina Spielrein, loved and sought after by both. Sabina Spielrein will later on go back to her native country spreading the knowledge of psychoanalysis . As a Jew, she will be caught and killed by the Germans.  Sabina's story had already been told in another beautiful Italian film directed by Roberto Faenza Prendimi l’anima and also inspired a remarkable thriller  ,  The White Hotel (1981) written by Donald M. Thomas. 

M THE MAN WHO BECAME CARAVAGGIO BY PETER ROBB - BOOK REVIEW

I read an Italian translation of this biography by Australian author Peter Robb, "M L'Enigma Caravaggio", which I bought in Rome in one of my recent errands with friends around the capital. Honestly,  I thought it was a fictionalized biography, instead, it is a biographical work based on a thourough research and a great deal of documents. I've always been attracted by the dark, violent, realistic paintings of the man called Caravaggio from the name of the town he was brought up in. What make them so special is how the light breaks into the darkness often revealing shocking realistic portraits of human sufferings, pains, sorrow and violence. 

The entire existence of Michelangelo Merisi, known as Caravaggio, is still today a highly fascinating enigma. Thanks to his sensitiveness  and to his accurate researches based on first-hand documents, Peter Robb brings back to life both the man and the artist in the 527 pages of this book, and he does that  with great, powerful tragicality. He dares  word his own hypothesis on the inexplicable facts in Michelangelo Merisi's life, such as his final disappearance. Nobody knows where, when and, especially, how he died.

PERIOD MOVIES RECENTLY WATCHED

Watching period drama or costume movies is one of my favourite pastimes and being on holiday helps a lot! I've recenlty watched several films, these are just three of them, all of them set  around the years of WWII: BBC 2 The Night Watch (2011) , Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day (2008) and Within the Wirlwind (2009). 

The Night Watch  - I was in England when it was on BBC2 on 12 July and could see it while in Nottingham. My attention was caught by the first scenes showing Anna Maxwell Martin (Bleak House, North and South, South Riding) in men's clothes wandering about the crowded streets of London as haunted. So I decided to go on watching though I didn't know anything about it. 

 

"If you go to the cinema midway through a film, you watch the second half first, don't you?" Kay - the character Anna Maxwell Martin plays - says at the beginning. The Night Watch then also unfolds from back to front, beginning in 1947, then jumping back to 1944, then again to 1941( it is just the same device used by Sarah Waters in the novel (2006) this TV movie is an adaptation of ).

UK JULY 2011 - ABBEYS & CATHEDRALS WITH KINGSBRIDGE IN MIND

Cloister - Salisbury Cathedral

Here's another instalment of the travelogue of my recent tour in England. This is what I called "The Pillars Trail" .
They call it literary tourism - a type of cultural tourism that deals with places and events from fictional texts as well as the lives of their authors - and it seems it is precisely what we did  in that week in July. With Ken Follet's The Pillars Of  The Earth and its TV adaptation in mind  (have a look at my review of the book and at that of the series, if you want), it was such a stirring experience to visit impressive English cathedrals like York Minster, Salisbury or Winchester or their fascinating remains like at Fountains Abbey or Rievaulx.

Eddie Redmayne as Jack in The Pillars of the Earth

It was as if Tom the Builder's dream took shape under our astonished eyes and Jack's (his step-son), ambitions materialized in front of us. We could appreciate the efforts and pains to achieve such stunning achievements much deeply. It was a heart-felt journey into medieval history and architecture, but also into a book which we all had loved reading.

THESE OLD SHADES BY GEORGETTE HEYER - MY REVIEW

“Set in the Georgian period, about 20 years before the Regency, These Old Shades is considered to be the book that launched Heyer’s career. It features two of Heyer’s most memorable characters: Justin Alastair, the Duke of Avon, and Leonie, whom he rescues from a life of ignomy and comes to love and marry”.

If you meet Satanas in a dark alley in the middle of the night and you are desperately seeking escape from a wretched life of  violence and harassment, maybe you’d be as happy as young Leòn at becoming his,  body and soul, bought for a diamond pin. Very happy to become his page and wear good clothes,  to follow him wherever his libertine life led him without complaining, without questioning.

Especially if Satanas is just a nickname for a rich, elegant, fascinating nobleman: Justin Alastair, the Duke of Avon. And mainly if he appears to you like this:

“ He walked mincingly, for the red heels of his shoes were very high. A long purple cloak, rose-lined, hung from his shoulders and was allowed to fall carelessly back from his dress, revealing a full-skirted coat of purple satin, heavily laced with gold; a waistcoat of flowered silk; faultless small clothes; and a lavish sprinkling of jewels on his cravat and breast”.