Vassar Delights

If I could have my favorite day, it would include like-minded people exploring art, literature, music, history.  Wait?  That happened today!

The intrepid New York Chapter of the Jane Austen Society of North America traveled to Vassar for an almost unbelievably pleasant and stimulating day.  This was my first trip to the 150+ year old campus.  No surprise, it’s lovely.

2016-04-09 12.03.20We first met in the art history building where refreshments were in a room that resembled a little, red schoolhouse, only really the little, red-chair school room.

But the lectures that kicked the day off were in a very comfortable, modern auditorium.  We would have to travel into history in our minds.

Marilyn Francus, a Professor of English from West Virginia University, regaled us with her work from Chawton House, a research center on early women’s writings.  She admitted to geeking-out on manuscripts and books that Jane Austen wrote in, sussing out from that her mentoring relationship with young writers, particularly her nieces.  She investigated the family’s charades and riddles and shared how the love of language was reinforced in everyday life in the Austen home.  More about that below.

Francus wrapped by deciphering the advice Jane Austen would give to new writers.  Essentially, know the canon (read, read, read), write what is real, and practice your craft.  Good advice indeed.

And that got put into action with our next set of presenters.  Susan Zlotnick, a Professor of English at Vassar, is currently teaching a course on The Gothic Novel (including Austen’s parody Northanger Abbey).  She gave us an introductory talk, then invited seven of her students to read us their “3-Minute Gothic Projects,” reflecting their learning on the tropes of the genre.

What you need to know is that Gothic novels draw upon the philosophical underpinnings of the Romantic Sublime, by Edmund Burke–the awe of God, nature, and our emotional selves that fuels literature, music, and art of the period; Freud’s ‘The Uncanny’ centering on re-surfacing unconscious desires, the return of the repressed, and the Self confronting itself; and the female Gothic, which penetrates patriarchal power by using male villains to threaten the heroines.

The latter is an intriguing take on the genre.  Zlotnick suggests that when men labeled strong women, with challenging and uncomfortable ideas, as ‘mad’, the woman would be imperiled in a number of thematic, violent ways.  The woman reader could become aware of how women lacked personal power and rights, when male domination is threatened.

There was much more to these ideas, beyond the scope of a blog, but clearly offering very fresh ways to understand detective fiction, thrillers, and Gothic romances.

The students were tasked with writing Gothic stories that take place on the Vassar campus, not necessarily today.  The results ranged from exceedingly clever to outright hilarious.

I loved Christian Lewis’ story about the mysterious disappearance of Meryl Streep (an esteemed Vassar grad) from a production of “The Cherry Orchard” that is repeated by a contemporary in the current production, literally on campus now.  He is playing with early detective fiction with his funny, funny “The Mysteries of the Martel” and its sly references to Streep films that show up as ghostly Meryl hauntings.

Jennifer Ognibene, an English major who is pre-med, read her “Demolition of Mudd Chemistry,” referring to the current tear-down of the chemistry building.  Her fantastical story of a woman student who is a chemist murderer would even make Edgar Allen Poe laugh.  The trouble starts when the student runs an experiment, injecting herself with black widow spider venom, and it all does downhill from there.  Seriously, it’s ready to be filmed.

Lexi Karas’ clever “A Strong Girl Displaced” was more serious, delving into notions of the Self and doubling from Freud’s theories.  The plot twists and taut writing would make Austen proud.

None of these students is a creative writer per se.  They put into action Austen’s code–know the canon first.  They have read a lot of Gothic novels.  Candidly, better them than me!  I can leave the Bronte’s and Bram Stoker on the shelf.

Concert in the chapel

Concert in the chapel

After lunch, we were serenaded by the Vassar College Women’s Chorus, with madrigals and other traditional British songs.  But noteworthy were the two sets of Austen writings put to song.

The Three Prayers by Jane Austen have been put to music by Amanda Jacobs, who wrote a wonderful Pride and Prejudice musical I saw in 2011.  Today, Jacobs directed the chorus in the US premiere of these works.  Here’s a tiny sliver.

What tickled me were the parlor game songs, commissioned by Vassar College Music Department for the Women’s Chorus and put to music by Eleanor Daley.  The three poems survived when Austen copied them into a letter in 1807.

Jane, her sister Cassandra, and their mother played a game where they devised poems where every line ended in a rhyme with the word rose, in “Verses to rhyme with ‘Rose’.”  Jane’s was clever, Cassandra’s romantic, their mother’s so funny.  Here’s her poem:

This morning I woke from a quiet repose,
I first rubb’d my eyes, and I next blew my nose;
With my stockings and shoes I then covered my toes,
And proceeded to put on the rest of my clothes.
This was finished in less than an hour, I suppose.
I employ’d myself next in repairing my hose.
‘Twas a work of necessity not what I chose;
Of my sock I’d much rather have knit twenty rows.
My work being done, I look’d through the windows,
And with pleasure beheld all the bucks and the does,
The cows and the bullocks, the wethers and ewes.
To the library each morning the family goes,
So I went with the rest though I felt rather froze.
My flesh is much warmer, my blood freer flows,
When I work in the garden with rakes and with hoes.
And now I believe I must come to a close,
For I find I grow stupid e’en while I compose.
If I write any longer my verse will be prose.

She seems destined to be a model for the Twitter-verse!

We wrapped the day with a visit to the campus art museum.  Much too short.  Lots of great works.  I’ll share just one, in honor of the day.  A woman artist, of course.  Adele Romany, a French artist, and her 1804 “A young person hesitating to play piano in front of her family.”  Shame on her!  No Austen heroine every would!

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Disapproval!

Disapproval!

What is Papa thinking? Paintings like this could be used to put a young lady's advantages forward. Hung in a pre-modern version of match.com

What is Papa thinking? Paintings like this could be used to put a young lady’s advantages forward. Hung in a pre-modern version of match.com

What is she thinking?

What is she thinking?

 

Mash-ups

2014-06-29 11.14.02Today, I’m living juxtapositions.  My day started at the Bellamy-Ferraday House, where the Connecticut Chapter of JASNA had its annual Box Hill Picnic.  First, we had a private tour of the house.  What really stood out for me are the ironies.

The land was bought from the Indians in the 1720s, and the first English families came  in the 1730s.  Well, in the winter, it was too far to go the seven miles into town for the Congregationalist Church.  So now a newly minted parish, the farming area got its own minister, a very young Yale grad named Bellamy.  This house was pretty fancy for the era and the isolated location near Bethlehem (ahem, Connecticut).

Mr. Bellamy made money from his sermons and pamphlets, but what I found so hilarious is that he wrote a best seller, True Religion Delineated, which according to our tour guide is completely unreadable today, even for ministry students.  Bellamy made enough of a splash with the book that it became popular in England, too.  Positively an 18th-century Stephen King!

His wealth came from such an unlikely source, when in the Colonies, fortunes were usually the way from trade.  Bellamy lived really well, as did his descendants.  So it took the last owner of the house to appear the most big-hearted and service-oriented.  Again defying 2014-06-29 12.13.21expectations, Caroline Ferraday ventured forward as an actress, with a glamor shot showing her to be a gorgeous lady.  She contributed to the Victorian appearance and additions to the house.  Living the good life.

But I think she’s remarkable for taking the global lead on helping the Jewish women who were experimented on at Dachau concentration camp, when literally no one else would.  The details are too graphic and disturbing to include here.  Suffice it to say, she made a difference and even became friends with some of the survivors.

The minister seemed to savor his money; the actress used hers to help others.  Ironic.

Not being too far way, I then jumped on the Northwest Connecticut Arts Council Open Your Eyes artist studio tour.  I had a wonderful conversation with Anne Delaney.  For the tour, she luscious studies for works she may paint based on the particular tour setting.  Instead of in her New York studio, this tour brought people to the Harwinton Community Hall, which also houses a jail.  Delaney Anne Delaneydid graphite works of John Brown and other more abstracted figures along this theme.

I picked up this little painting from her Family Car series, loving the back-of-the-head invitation into the painting.

She also told me about a friend who has made a documentary film on the Baroque artist Artemesia Genileschi, juxtaposing the artist’s story with her effect on women today, including the filmmaker.

Here’s the trailer from the film “A Woman Like That.”  It’s on the film festival and university circuit, so keep you eyes open for it.

Judith Bird makes these lovely mash-ups of Mexican-style retablos and the fanciful color andJudith Bird, Wild Wood Bird magic realism of an artist like Florine Stettheimer.  Bird loves using birds in her work, as they touch both heaven and earth, soar and are grounded.  I love that!

You can see the artist’s sweetness in Wild Wood Bird.”  The painting definitely has the devotional feel of the folk art retablo with her own eponymous bird symbol.

The funniest mash-ups of the day came from 84-year-old artist Salvatore Gulino.  Sal was really why I went on the tour, and we talked for almost an hour about his work and his life.  He is extremely modest about his work and that I would go ga ga over it.  But really, what art historian wouldn’t?

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Forget Modigiliani, I”m turning over in my grave.

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A classical portrait of Giovanna Tornabuoni by Ghirlandaio juxtaposed on a classic screen-shot.

 

 

 

 

 

For my 50s modern house, I couldn’t resist this mash-up from the Art Wheels SeriesNefertiti never had it so good!

Salvatore Guilino, Nefertiti

And neither will you, when you come to visit!

 

 

 

Beats volleyball on the beach

Today, I’ve been at summer camp–the Jane Austen summer camp.  Forget ‘capture the flag’!

Goodies and favors for all the campers

Goodies and favors for all the campers

 

We’ve had a very full day practicing our penmanship with quill pens, dressing our hair in Regency styles, sewing reticules and pocketbooks, and making the daintiest watercolors.  For geeks like me who despise dodge ball, this is the perfect way to while away a summer Saturday.
Check out the slide show for snaps.

 

Here are some things you definitely need to know.

Irene has a bunch of quills for us to choose from

Irene has a bunch of quills for us to choose from

 

When you’re picking out your feather–goose, turkey, duck and crow all work–for your quill, consider whether the feather came from the bird’s right wing or left wing.  Yes, feathers have sides, and you need to know this.  Victorians believed you match your handedness with the side of the wing.  During the Austen era, the Regency period, eh, not so important.

From another camper, I learned that the ink is very, very permanent.  Remember when Gilbert dips Anne of Green Gables’ braid in the inkwell?  No doubt, her braid would then have dripped ink on her dress, a permanent marker on what was probably her only garment until she grew out of it.  Sure enough, a camper got some ink on her Regency gown.  Sigh.

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We practiced writing some “moral maxims.”  My favorites are “Art polishes and improves nature” and “Content alone is true happinefs.”  Note the fs for our double-s.  f’s substituted for s’s at times and not at others.  All part of the very complex set of rules that went along with superlative penmanship, which by the way leans to the right at a 56 degree angle.  Good thing we had a guide to help us get that slope just right!

 

Henri-François Riesener (1767-1828) -  Alix de Montmorency, Duchesse de Talleyrand

Henri-François Riesener of
Alix de Montmorency, Duchesse de Talleyrand
probably early 19th century

We started with the “round hand” style, used by women and men, but I found myself preferring the “Italian” style–a precursor to our italic and favored by women.  Now your posture is very important.  Take a lesson from this young lady.

Note her beautiful uprightness.  Also she has turned sideways, so that her entire forearm rests on her writing desk.  She holds the quill with a delicate touch, like holding chopsticks.

You don’t want any blobs of ink!

Now this Regency lady had plenty of time to sew for pleasure and probably plenty of help dressing her hair.  We did some of both.

James Martin of
Abigail Noyes Sill
courtesy of
Florence Griswold Museum

 

Kandie showed us willing ladies how to make a butterfly curl, like you see on Abigail here.  You can find out how to do this on youtube, but the basics are to make a spit curt, then wrap your triangular shaped tissue paper around the curl, heat it, and wait.  You can wrap your whole head, so it looks like you are covered in butterflies!  By the time the tissue paper cools down, take it off, reveal your curls, and you’re ready to dance…

 

 

 

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Several of the ladies had their hair done by Kandie.  Do check out the slide show above for several examples.  Me, I’m a short-haired girl.  But I got a kick out of the transformations!

Thin hair becomes thick with a donut.  Thick hair can be tamed as it is here–elegant and beautiful!

 

 

 

I had some success with hand stitching my pocketbook, the Regency equivalent of a wallet.  Lisa was a huge help, of course.

Here she shows off reticules, replacing “pockets” worn under the skirt when dress styles changed to become skimpier.  The proper lady carried her reticule rather than bulk up her gown with a pocket.  Just the right size for all your essentials–your Regency cell phone included.

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Silhouette of Jane Austen

 

Originally for the rich, silhouettes became popular at markets and carnivals, bringing the uncanny form of capturing a likeness to the masses.  Although we didn’t get a chance to make them (working with watercolors instead), I know how to do a silhouette now and have the kit.  So call me and come over at dusk.  Let’s give it a try!

After all that hard work, I was ready for tea.  This tea came complete not only with scones, but also chocolate-covered strawberries and tea sandwiches.  And a performance.

Two campers put on a show–an extremely condensed version of the five acts of Lover’s Vow.  For those of you who know Austen, that’s the very naughty play that causes such an uproar in Mansfield Park.

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We were prompted when to hiss and even more importantly gasp at just the right moments.  The “Audience Gasps” sign was liberally used.  Thank goodness we all had our smelling salts.

smelling salts

 

 

I’m of a hardy constitution and made it through the play without fainting.  In fact, the whole day was a wonderful boost for the system.

Who says adults can’t go to camp?