Henry James master class
Is NJ about to pop off you tell me
Christopher Cawley is opening an antiques shop in Stockton, NJ. He has an impeccable memory and great taste. A few summers ago, I was invited to the Jersey Shore, and it made me think: Will there be a New Jersey revival? Is Jersey already popular? Many questions. I didn’t go on the trip, because—I’m embarrassed to admit—my politics did not perfectly align with my host, and I was wary of having an argument while also suffering from heat stroke, to which I am prone. I think of myself as perfectly amenable to differing viewpoints, as long as I can see an exit sign. Marooned with the other side, that’s another story.
For someone as “obsessed” with Henry James as I am—to me he is perfect—I must admit I’m not near a completist. I just read The Wings of the Dove and The Portrait of a Lady whenever I get a yearning for a withering world. So I have a great temptation to take a class with Garth Greenwell, who does a graduate seminar on James. I like that he lets you silo out which books you’d like to be taught, and doesn’t require you do the whole course. (For instance, I have no interest in revisiting his short stories and novellas, nor my favorite novels.) I really need to tackle The Ambassadors and The Golden Bowl; I can’t source my resistance to these works!
When I was in London, I had a running list of restaurants to try. I didn’t get very far down the list, because my husband is from there, and allergic to hip menus. Now I’m kicking myself, I want to go to Italo! Sadly, I maxed out my six months in the country. Banned!
Apropos, a travel influencer I’m enjoying is this hot girl called Freja. She’s very good at tagging. It’s one of my great pet peeves that people post travel destinations and self-consciously try to hide the location. It took a bit of reverse image searching, but I can confidently say that Clare Cole’s “favorite place” is in Lagrasse. If you’re going to promote, you might as well PROMOTE. It’s like when people put stickers over their children’s faces. Just don’t photograph them??
Clearly in an accumulation phase, I’ve bought Country People on the strength of this review. I do think teachers make for good subjects, and I trust Alexandra Jacobs! I called the local book shop in Kent, and they reminded me that authors sign sheets of paper, which are then bound into the book, and would I like a signed copy. Why not. I get to pick it up tonight.
Tiny American folk art buildings—oh, the charm! “The little churches with their soaring steeples, the quaint storefronts, the homespun bowling alleys, Art Deco theaters, Ferris wheels and farmhouses, all of them handmade and many dating to the late 19th century.” (A curator discovered the collection via the collector’s own book. A win for self-publishing. And Ebay, which is what this collection is really about.)
A wildly ostentatious hotel in Ireland certainly plays well on Instagram. I’ve rather turned against destination hotels. It should really only be about convenience. (Still, I got a text this morning from a friend who is at the opening of a hotel in Abbeyleix, nearby. “Sublime,” she reports.)
“The New York Times has hired a Texas culture reporter, Sasha Oldershausen.” Interesting! And smart.
Melanie Masarin found quite the Phoebe Philo dupe on ASOS. I’m trying to look within myself and admit whether or not I’d wear these. There’s something so creaturely about them. Possibly just too “hostess” for me.
In a piece on the composer Joe Hisaishi— “Few Composers Can Sell Out Arenas. He’s One of Them”—the Times included an audio button to listen to an actual chord of music. I suppose we should be emphasizing the evocative power of the written word, but it was cool to just… hear what they were talking about.
Not that the Times is always on the forefront of trends. I was amused to see them writing an article on Psyllium Husk, the preferred bowel clearer of gay men all over the world. Homosexuals are not mentioned in the piece.
Slow clap to New York magazine for a piece on Erling Haaland’s hair ties. Funny stuff. Even if he is a minority owner in the company, it’s this quick thinking low brow stuff that keeps the click factory alive.
I feel both revulsion and compulsion towards the new Chanel shoes. What is the moral of Jack and the Beanstalk—the thieving idiot prospers? How very Trumpian.
