Almanac of Story Tellers: Odetta Holmes

  Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 31st.

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    It is the 365th day of the year, the final day of 2021. So, happy 2022. Let's hope it's better than this year, and last year.`

   
    On this date in 1930, the multi-talented singer and activist Odetta Holmes was born in Birmingham, Ala. She was known simply as Odetta, and told her stories in folk songs.

    She took her first opera lesson in 1943 -- and the following year made her professional debut in musical theater. By 1949 she was part of the national touring group of Finian's Rainbow, and it was during a stop in San Francisco she discovered folk music.

    Odetta found her true love and became part of the America folk music revival in the 1950s and 1960s. She inspied artists such as Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, and Mavis Staples.

    When Pete Seeger heard her for the first time in the 1950s, she sang "Take This Hammer" in a friend's living room. "She was astonishingly strong and direct and wanted her songs to help this would be a better place," Seeger told NPR when Odetta died in 2008.

    It was the American Civil Rights movement that inspired her, and her fans included Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr., who called her "the queen of American folk music." At the 1963 March on Washington, she was on stage, singing, "O Freedom."

    She also added to her musical repertoire, singing blues, jazz, and spirituals. She sang a famous and popular duet with the legendary Harry Belefonte. She acted in several films in the 1960s and '70s, including The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman. 

Almanac of Story Tellers: Rudyard Kipling

  Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 30th.

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    It is the 364th day of the year, leaving one day remaining in 2021.

 

  On this date in 1865, the British novelist, poet, and short story writer Rudyard Kipling was born in Bombay -- now known as Mumbai -- India.

    Kipling remains a controversial story teller. Born in India at the height of British colonialism, educated in Southsea, England, and a world traveler who lived part of his life in Brattlesboro, Vermont, in the United States, he has been condemned as a propagandist for "brazen-faced imperialism," and as one who gave warnings on the perils of empire.

        He is the author of the novels Captain Courageous and Kim, dozens of short stories and collections, including the Jungle Book series, The Man Who Would be King, and Plain Tales from the HIlls, his first short story collection. His poems include If, Gunga Din, and The White Man's Burden, perhaps his most controversial work.

    He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1907.

    He is widely considered to be one of the finest writers in the English language, whose books and poems are still taught today, and as one who "excelled at telling a story but was inconsistent in producing balanced, cohesive novels," as the encyclopedia Britannica put it.

    He died in 1936 at his home in London

Almanac of Story Tellers: The Squaw Man

    Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 29th.

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    It is the 363rd day of the year, leaving two days remaining in 2021.

   

    On this date in 1913, shooting began on "The Squaw Man," a silent film generally recognized to be the first full-length feature movie to be made in what is now Hollywood.

    Its directors were Oscar Apfel and the pioneering Cecil B. DeMille, also credited as a writer and as  "picturized by," in his first feature film. It was a western about an English nobleman, Captain Wynnegate, who came to the United States after being accused of embezzlement, a crime actually committed by his cousin.

    While out west, Wynnegate (Dustin Farnum) and a Native woman, Nat-U-Rich (Red Wing), fall in love and marry after saving each other from an evil cattle rustler. Later, Nat-U-Rich commits suicide after believing that her husband will be accused of murder for the cattle rustler's death.

    The movie's portral of Native Americans was both ahead of its time as several, although not all, of the Native roles were played by Native actors, and of its time in the language used in its tagline:

A Wild Western story of blue blood and red blood; of white-souled redskins and black-hearted whites; of love that demands all and love that gives all.

    Although DeMille's earlier career in theater was a failure, his first movie was an instant success, and he went on to a legendary career in Hollywood. He was one of the few early directors who made the transition from silent films to talkies.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Stan Lee

    Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 28th.

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    It is the 362nd day of the year, leaving three days in 2021.

    On this date in 1922, comic book maven, writer, artist, editor, and soon-to-be legend Stan Lee was born Stanley Martin Lieber in New York.

     From his days as a teen-ager, Lee wanted to work in the publishing industry, and his first job was as a go-fer, filling the artists's ink pots at his family's company, Timely Productions.

    And while Lee didn't invent comics or superheroes, he did -- let's face it -- revolutionize the comic story telling industry by inventing flawed superheroes who lived in the real world with its real problems, as opposed to Superman and Batman and Wonder Woman's other-worldly near-perfect crime-fighters.

    Into the 1950s, DC Comics and its superheroes dominated the comic books scene. But in 1961, while working at the then-lesser-known Marvel Comics, Lee was assigned -- along with Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko -- to create his own team of superheros. They started with the Fantastic Four, a group portrayed as a bickering family with petty grievences, which included a grumpy rock-man.

    They continued with Spiderman, a young man who questioned whether he deserved his powers and fretted about his life; the Hulk, who often was unable to control the rage that turned him into the Hulk; Iron Man, the X-Men, and Thor. And while artist Kirby is often credited as the man whose artistic talents gave the comic book characters their life and image, Lee was often seen as the man behind the superheroes.

    The new superheroes's popularity soon pushed Marvel Comics past DC Comics. Spiderman becane an iconic figure. Television shows and cartoons featured members of the Marvel world, to varying degrees of success.

    Then in 2002, a Spiderman movie came out, setting off a comic book-movie industry that continues to this day. And while Lee was long-retired by then, he remained the face of Marvel and its characters, and often appeared in cameo roles in the movies.

    Lee has been inducted into several comic book halls of fame. In 2008, he received the NEA's National Medal of Arts. 

    He died Nov. 12, 2018, in Los Angeles.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Radio City Music Hall

   Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 27th.

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    It is the 361st day of the year, leaving four days in 2021.

    On this date in 1932, Radio City Music Hall opened on New York's Sixth Avenue, between 50th and 51st streets, in the heart of midtown Manhattan.

    Over the years, the massive theater has helped tell stories through movies, stage performances, rock concerts, and  television shows. It has hosted the Rockettes, a precision dance team best known for kicking their legs in unison. Its annual Christmas show brought tourists from all over the world -- until it was shut down because of COVID in 2020. 

    The new Music Hall was not an overnight success -- partly because the premiere performance ran well in the overnight, and into the early morning. Starting at 8 p.m. and featuring an elaborate stage show, many of the acts were overwhelmed by the large, expansive stage. The show ran until past 2 a.m., causing many of the theater-goers to leave early. 

    One reviewer, film historian Terry Ramsaye, called it the "unveiling of the world's best bust." Set designer Robert Edmond Jones quickly resigned. Less than a month later, after losing $180,000, the Music Hall converted to a movie theater with accompanying stage performances.

    That worked until the 1970s. By 1978, the Music Hall faced bankruptcy and closure, but was renovated and re-opened the following year. It was again renovated in 1999, and has diversified its performances with stage shows, concerts, and hosting television and award shows. 

    Its future remains threatened by COVID and changing entertainment choices.  

Almanac of Story Tellers: The Curse of the Bambino

  Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 26th.

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     It is the 360th day of the year, leaving five days in 2021. It is also known as Boxing Day in the United Kingdom and some of its former colonies.

 

    On this date in 1919, Boston Red Sox pitcher/outfielder Babe Ruth was sold to the New York Yankees, a deal that later came to be known as "The Curse of the Bambino." It was so named because while the Red Sox had won five of the first 15 World Series, the team then went 86 years before winning its sixth in 2004.

    Journalist and author Dan Shaughnessy is widely credited with inventing the phrase, which is the title of his 1990 book on the subject. It quickly entered the vernacular, and media throughout New England played up the term.

    Soon, every failing of the Red Sox was tied back to the sale, after which Ruth -- who led the Yankees to their dominance in the 1920s -- supposedly said the Red Sox would never win again without him: Johnny Pesky "holding the ball" instead of throwing out Enos Slaughter at home in Game 7 of the 1946 Series; Bob Gibson out-pitching Sox ace Jim Lonborg in Game 7 of the 1967 Series; Bucky Dent hitting a pop-fly home-run in the 1978 playoff game with the -- your guessed it -- New York Yankees; and Bill Buckner failing to catch Mookie Wilson's ground ball to first, giving the New York Mets a come-from-behind victory in Game 6 of the 1986 Series.

    It was all a great story until 2004, when the Red Sox "broke the curse" and won the World Series.    

    But between 1918 and 2004, the Yankees were easily the dominant team in baseball, winning  26 World Series, with the Sox did not win any. Ruth, of course, went on to set records in home runs and hitting, revolutionizing the game, which until his time centered around contact hitting and speed.

    In Boston and New England, fans embraced the curse as an explanation as to why their beloved team could always come close, but never won. Other sports teams and their fans invented their own curse myths -- the Chicago Cubs, for instance, had the "curse of the Billy Goat," attributing a championship drought that lasted from 1945-2016 on the vengeful owner of the nearby Billy Goat Tavern because his pet goat was excluded from a Series game in 1945.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Shane MacGowan

 Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 25th.

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    It is the 359th day of the year, leaving six days in 2021. It is also Christmas Day.

    

    On this date in 1957, Irish singer Shane MacGowan -- the front man and songwriter for  the punk-rock band The Pogues -- was born in Kent, England.

    Although born in England, MacGowan was the son of Irish immigrants. His mother, Therese, was a traditional Irish dancer. MacGowan's early influences were the pioneering punk group The Clash and Irish poet and playwright Brendan Behan.

    MacGowan rearranged and sang traditional Irish tunes, and wrote and sang songs of Irish nationalism, drinking and gambling, and sentimental ballads. He is known for his heavy drinking and a stage presense of drinking on stage, slurring his words, and being late for concerts. Still, he is a popular artist whose vocals are praised.

    His best-known composition is the Christmas song, "Fairytale of New York." Its opening line is pure MacGowan -- "It was Christmas Eve, babe/In the drunk tank." The video shows MacGowan being roughed up and hauled to a jail cell,

    But the duet with Kirsty McCool has proven to be powerful and popular. The song premiered in 1987, and went to No. 2 on the charts in the United Kingdom -- being kept from the No. 1 song by a Pet Shop Boys' cover of "Always on My Mind." But it regularly hits the Top 20 in the UK around Christmas time, including every year from 2005-2017.

    The song tells a story about two former(?) lovers who bicker, in a call-and-response form, about their failed relationship, their dreams crushed by alcoholism and drug addiction. Yet the song ends on a hopeful note, with MacGowan singing that he hasn't crushed her dreams.

    "I kept them with me babe

    "I put them with my own

    "Can't make it all alone

    " I've built my dreams around you." 

Almanac of Story Tellers: The Christmas Truce

  Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 24th.

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    It is the 358th day of the year, leaving seven days in 2021. It is also Christmas Eve.

    On this date in 1914, the Christmas Truce began. It is, perhaps, the greatest war story of them all -- when soldiers walked across No Man's Land on Christmas Eve, holding flags of truce, and stopped the war for a celebration of the Prince of Peace.

    It was an unplanned, unauthorized truce along the Western Front during the early days of World War I. 

    The story of men gathering, unannounced, to sing Christmas carols in multiple languanges, share their meager rations and family pictures, and play a friendly game of football was pretty much unknown at the time. But reports about it were whispered and then rumored, and as historians researched it, discovered it was mostly true.

    Word spread widely after folksinger/songwriter John McCutcheon heard the tale and wrote and performed "Christmas in the Trenches" in 1984. It is one one of the great story songs of all time, and you can listen to it here, and read its lyrics here.

    McCutcheon also told stories of old World War I veterans traveling to see his concerts, standing in the back to listen to the song. One veteran told him his family never believed his tales of the truce until hearing McCutcheon's song.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Samuel Beckett

 Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 22nd.

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    It is the 356th day of the year, leaving nine days in 2021.

    On this date in 1989, Samuel Beckett, the Irish novelist, poet, short-story writer, and playwright, died in Paris.

    Although he was born in Dublin in 1906, Beckett lived most of his life in France. However, he wrote mostly in English, and he kept his Irish citizenship, and is widely considered to be near the top of the considerable list of great Irish writers.

    His best known work, and one that maintains its place in the thearteric canon, is Waiting for Godot. The play, originally written in French as En attendant Godot, premiered in Paris in 1953. Its English version premiered in London two years later.

    Billed as a "tragicomedy in two acts," the play consists of two main characters, Vladimir and Estragon, discussing various topics and meeting people while on a country road near a tree, waiting for a character who never arrives.

    Beckett rarely discusssed or commented on the play, although scholars have written dissertations on its meaning. Who or what Godot represents is unclear, and Beckett never explained.

    The play is part of Beckett's minimalist writing style -- it has two acts but just one setting, and the stage is stripped bare. The characters themselves are known only through their words.

    Later in his life, Beckett embraced minimalism in his theater work. Play had three character who were immersed up to their necks in funeral urns. Eh Joe, a television production, has the camera focusing upon the face of the title character. The play, Not I, shows, in Beckett's direction, "a moving mouth with the rest of the stage in darkness."

    Beckett is often contrasted with the loquacious James Joyce is an old Irish joke: What's the difference between Beckett and Joyce?

    The punch line: Joyce leaves nothing out; Beckett puts nothing in.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Snow White

  Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 21st.

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    It is the 355th day of the year, leaving 10 days in 2021.

    Today is the Winter Solstice, when because of the earth's tilt, the North Pole reaches its farthest point from the sun, meaning the northern hemisphere has its shortest period of daylight. Consequently, the South Pole is closest to the sun, meaning the southern hemisphere is in its Summer Solstice, and it has its longest period of daylight.

    On this date in 1937, Snow White -- the first animated, full-length feature movie -- debuted at the Carthay Circle Theatre in Los Angeles.

    This new method of story telling, a twist on the then-still new presentation form of talking moving pictures, was well received. The star-studded audience gave it a standing ovations at the conclusion. 

    Within the week, Walt Disney and his animated cast were on the cover of Time magazine. In less than a month, Snow White opened at Radio City Music Hall in New York, 

    By Feb. 4, its success persuaded RKO Radio Pictures to put out the film in a general release. It quickly became the must successful "talkie" to that point.

    The Snow White story was based on a century-old German fairy tale by the Brothers Grimm. It was produced by the newly formed Walt Disney Productions. It was nominated for an 1938 Academy Award for musical score, and the Academy presented Disney with a special award for the film.

    It continues to be popular today, and Snow White remains one of the most popular characters in the Disney canon. In 1989, the Library of Congress, calling it "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant," selected it as one of the first films to be preserved in the National Film Registry. In 2008, the American Film Institute ranked it as the greatest American animated film of all time.

Almanac of Story Tellers: John Steinbeck

  Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 20th.

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    It is the 354th day of the year, leaving 11 days in 2021.

    On this date in 1968, the Nobel Laureate and Pulitzer-prize winning author John Steinbeck died.

    Steinbeck is among the United States' greatest story tellers and writers, known for his "realistic and imaginative writings, combining as they do sympathetic humor and keen social perception," as his Nobel prize citation said.

    Steinbeck wrote novels, novellas, short stories, and non fiction. Many of his works of fiction are set in California, when the state was seen as holding the golden promise of America. His characters were the state's immigrants -- agricultural workers who came to work in its fields of plenty: poor refugees from Dust Bowl Oklahoma, Mexicans and other emigrates from Latin America; and common laborers down on their luck.

    His magnum opus, The Grapes of Wrath, is set during the Great Depression. It follows a tenant farming family from Oklahoma to California. They are driven out of Oklahoma by drought and economic hardships, and along with many others in similar circumstances, are seeking a new and better life in California. But their new life is much like the old one, with additional hardships and exploitations.

    

    The novel has become part of the literary canon, and continues to be taught in high schools and colleges around the country. Many of his other novels and novellas are treated the same way -- Of Mice and Men, The Pearl, The Red Pony, and Cannery Row are among his best known works. Many have been adapted into award-winning movies or stage plays, extending Steinbeck's reputation. 

    One of his last writings published in his lifetime, in 1962, was Travels With Charley. Steinbeck wrote about a road trip he and his poodle took in 1960 as they traveled some 10,000 miles around and through the United States in a modified camper/pickup truck.

    Steinbeck said he wanted to see America. His son, Thom Steinbeck, said his father knew he was dying. 

Book Review

 New York, My Village, by Uwem Akpan

• Where I bought this book: The Book Loft, Columbus, Ohio
• Why I bought this book: It has a map

****

    My indelable memory of the Biafran War is the Catholic Charities "relief campaign" that used pictures of starving African children with bloated stomachs to raise money.

 

   That's it. I knew nothing about the reasons for the war, or even where in Africa Biafra was.

    So I was hoping this book would help me learn just a little bit about the war, and just as important, what happened and what is happening now. 

    It kinda did. But it also taught me the war has a long background, involves colonization and other crimes committed on the African peoples, and pretty much boils down to why any war is fought -- hatred, discrimination, jealously, and control.

    Briefly, and I hope I get this right: Biafra is a small province in the south of Nigeria. Northern Nigerian tribes, particularly the Hausa-Fulani, dominated. In 1967, representatives of the Igbo tribe in southern Nigeria, based in Biafra, claimed they controlled the south and proclaimed their independence.

    It did not go well. There's a reason you don't hear of Biafra anymore. It's no longer a country, and hasn't been since 1970.

    In this fictionalized account, Ekong Udousoro is a book editor, and he receives a fellowship to intern at a small publishing company in New York City. He is part of the Annang, who also lives in southern Nigeria, but have had little control to the dominant Igbo. Or as Ekong puts it, his group is a minority within a minoiry. 

    This book is an account of his months learning the book publishing industry, coupled with memories of the war -- which actually happened before he was born, but which has shaped his family, his village, and himself.

    But it's also about his family relationships -- which are confusing; his troubles and joys adapting to living in Hell's Kitchen -- ugh! far too much information on bedbugs and his problems with them; his relationships with his landlord, the man he is subletting his apartment from; the racism he confronts on the job and in book publishing; his difficulties getting along with his new neighbors, and much, much more.

    It's really too much. He covers too many issues, confusing us on many occassions, and spends far too much time on the damn bedbugs. (And even when you think he is done with that, they come back! I was ready to toss the book across the room at this point.)

    Still, at its heart, the book's theme is about how we complicate our lives by dividing ourselves in too many groups -- by color, ethnicity, religion, jobs, community, and so much more. In short, perhaps we are all minorities of a minority.    

Almanac of Story Tellers: Phil Ochs

     Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 19th.

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    It is the 353rd day of the year, leaving 12 days in 2021.

    

    On this date in 1940, the folksinger Phil Ochs was born.

    Ochs, who originally wanted to be a journalist  and attended Ohio State University before travelling to Mississippi in the Freedom Summer of 1964, eventually turned his story telling talents to music.

    He became know for his biting, satirical songwriting, (Here's to the State of Mississippi), his anti-war anthems (I Ain't Marching Anymore), and his pensive empathy (There But for Fortune).

          Show me a prison. Show me a jail

Show me a prisoner who face has gone pale

And I'll show you a young man with many reasons why

There but for fortune may go you, or I.

    He started singing in New York's Greenwich Village with the likes of Bob Dylan. He numbered Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger among his musical heroes. He carried a guitar, sung at civil-rights rallies and anti-war protests throughout the land, and described himself as leftist. 

    While Ochs' albums generally received critical acclaim, and he was popular among the folkie crowd, he rarely received radio play, and none of his songs was a big hit. None of them ever made it into the Top Ten; indeed, his biggest hit was Small Circle of Friends, which reached No. 119 on the Billboard Charts.

    Indeed, his type of protest song -- Ochs preferred the terms "topical song" -- fell in popularity in the 1970s. He tried to change gears, getting more pop-oriented, and including more than his usual accoustic guitar in this music. He even took on an Elvis swagger, wearing a gold lame jumpsuit in one concert tour and as the cover of an album.

    But long standing mental health issues, along with drug abuse and alcoholism, lead to his downfall. In 1976, he hanged himself. 

Almanac of Story Tellers: Nutcracker Ballet

    Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 18th.

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    It is the 352nd day of the year, leaving 13 days in 2021.

    On this date in 1892, the Nutcracker ballet premiered in St Petersburg, Russia.

    The now widely popular Christmas poroduction of the show, whose score was written by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, had an inauspicious beginning. 

    One critic called the ballerina who portrayed the Sugar Plum Fairy as podgy and corpulent. Another said dancer Olga Preobrajenskaya (the Columbine doll) was "completely insipid." The choreography was deemed "quite amateurish," and the libretto "lopsided."

    

    Yet, it endured. A later production of the two-act ballet -- an adaptation of an adaptation by Alexandre Dumas -- used adults as the majority of the dancers, instead of the children who originally performed. The first full performance outside Russia was in Britain in 1934, and the San Francisco Ballet gave the first performance in the United States in 1944. It since has presented the show every Christmas Eve and throughout the winter season.

    Other ballets, particularly in the United States, quickly followed the San Francisco example. Today, major ballet companies take in up to 40 percent of their revenue on the Nutcracker alone.

    And while it has been criticized for its cultural and ethical stereotypes, ballet companies have worked to eliminate some of the worst examples.   

Almanac of Story Tellers: The Simpsons

   Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 17th.

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    It is the 351st day of the year, leaving 14 days in 2021.

    On this date in 1989, The Simpsons premiered on the Fox Network. Thirty-three years later, it is the longest running series ever on television, telling its 30-minute animated stories of a dysfunctional yet loving family in middle America.

    The series was created by Matt Groening as an interlude during The Tracey Ulman Show, a skit-comedy series hosted by the British actress. The animated sketches usually came before and after commercial breaks, and proved exceedingly popular. A couple of years later, The Simpsons began as a half-hour series.

    Then, as now, it was based on a simple sitcom formula, with the exception that it was anmated. It featured a basic white American suburban family, played for laughs, with Homer, a dopey husband; Marge, the resourceful wife; Bart, the bratty 10-year-old son; and Lisa, a talented 8-year-old daughter. Later, a child was born, and Maggie remains the perennial infant, forever speechless but communicative by sucking on a pacifier. 

    The family was based on Groening's own -- only the surname and the boy's name was changed. It was set in an anonymous Springfield, partly because as many at 29 states have a town with that name.

    But it was a hit. As of today, it has the same number of episodes as Babe Ruth had home runs -- 714. And both proved to redefine the landscape. Ruth led to the explosion of power hitting and home runs. Before The Simpsons, cartoons aimed at adults were rare; even rarer was an animated series in network prime-time. Today, entire stations are geared to such programming.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Noel Coward

    Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 16th.

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    It is the 350th day of the year, leaving 15 days in 2021.

    On the date in 1899, Noël Coward was born outside of London, England.

    Coward was a polymath, a gentleman, and an expansive story teller. Best know as a playwright and for his dashing, yet dry wit, he also was a composer, musician, singer, actor, and dancer.

    He began his career on stage as a dancer at the tender age of 11. By the next year he was acting regularly, and had written his first play, I'll Leave it to You, at age 20.

    He continued to write light comedies, but in 1924, his first serious play, The Vortex. cemented his reputation as a writer to be reckoned with. He entered high society, which he took to with great enthusiasm, and in which he set many of his most popular plays and musicals. 

    Time magazine said his personal style was a "combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise." Britannica said Coward "caught the clipped speech and brittle disillusions of the generation that emerged from World War I. His songs and revue sketches also struck the world-weary note of his times."

     He wrote many plays retelling British history, and during World War II distinguished himself by churning out information on the British war effort.

    Many of his shows continue to be revived and staged. In 2006, the refurbished and renamed Noël Coward Theatre reopened in London's West End Theater District.

    Coward died in 1973 at his home in Jamaica.

    

Almanac of Story Tellers: Edna O'Brien

     Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 15th.

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    It is the 349th day of the year, leaving 16 days in 2021.

   

    On this date in 1930 Edna O'Brien, who helped bring women's stories into contemporary Irish fiction, was born in Tuamgraney, County Clare.

     O'Brien  started writing at a time when church and state in Ireland was seen as one -- and that one was oppressive, particularly towards women. Her first novel, Country Girls, published in 1960, was banned by the Catholic Church for its frank discussion of sexual issues.

    But O'Brien books remained centered around women and their lives. Because of her frank writings, she was sometimes accused of "corrupting the minds of young women." She told an interviewer with The Irish Times in 2015 that she "felt no fame. ... All I could hear out of Ireland from my mother and anonymous letters was bile and odium annd outrage."

    But Ireland changed, and progressed, influenced in no small part by O'Brien's novels. Former Irish President Mary Robinson called her "one of the great creative writers of her generation." She was an inspiration for other women writers in Ireland, including the novelist Anne Einright.

    Later in life, Ireland has embraced her. She won the Irish PEN Award in 2001. In 2006, University College Dublin awarded her its Ulysses medal. In 2015, Aosdána, the Irish association for artists, gave her its highest honor, the Saoi.

    As she has for most of her life, O'Brien lives in London.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Martyred Intellectuals Day

   Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 14th.

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    It is the 348th day of the year, leaving 17 days in 2021.

    Today, in Bangladesh, it is Martyred Intellectuals Day.

   

The Martyred Intellectuals Memorial in Dhaka

The commemoration day came about as the result  of the Pakistani Armed Forces' kidnapping, torturing, and slaughtering more than 1,000 intellectuals -- writers, artists, professors, doctors, scientists, and story tellers -- near the end of the Bangladesh War for Liberation in 1971.

    In 1971, Pakistan was divided into east and west, with more than 1,000 miles of Indian territory separating them. Little united the two territories except both were Muslim areas, as opposed to the Hindu-dominated India. Britain divided the sub-continent after abandoning its colonial empire in  southwest Asia in 1947.

    In March 1971, as East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) was seeking independence, its Awami League Party won an election. The Pakistan People's Party, based in West Pakistan, refused to accept the results. Violence and war followed, and the Bengali people demanded independence and self-determination.

    Bangladesh was successful on the battlefield, but rather than acknowledge defeat, Pakistani forces systematically abducted Bengali people from their homes, torturing and killing more than 1,000. Two days later, Pakistan admitted defeat and surrendered, creating an independent Bangladesh.

    Martyred Intellectuals Day is commemorated partly as an effort to ensure that the killings are  remembered throughout the world.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Taylor Swift

    Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 13th.

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    It is the 347th day of the year, leaving 18 days in 2021.

   

    On this date in 1989, Taylor Swift, one of the U.S.'s most popular musical artists, was born.

    Swift, who first and foremost considers herself a lyricist and a story teller, started writing her own songs when she was 13. She released her debut album at 16.

    Many of her narrative songs tell stories about the lives of young women, and Swift has acknowledged many are based on her own experiences. She has written and recorded songs about heartbreak and breakups, and about young girls and woman forging their own way. 

    She wrote Fifteen, about being a girl of, well,  15, entering her first day of high school. The Last Great American Dynasty tells the tale of Rebekah Harkness, an eccentric and wealthy widow who previously lived in a Rhode Island mansion that Swift later bought.

    She has becomes a role model for many girls and women, who became fans of hers as children or teen-agers, and have remained so throughout Swift's career. Swift has stood up for women's rights, successfully sued a radio disc jockey for sexual assault, and fought for control and ownership of her recordings, often expressing her belief that artists should have the right to own their own work. She wrote My Tears Riccochet partly about her dispute and eventually falling out with Scott Borchett, who originally signed her when she was 14, and whom she believes took advantage of her youth. 

    She has sold more than 200 million albums so far, making her one of the best selling musicians of all time. She has recorded nine studio albums in multiple genres, starting with country and pop, and experimenting with folk and some pop-punk. Her tours draws hundreds of thousands of fans.

    She is currently re-recording some of her early albums, partly as a way to regain control over her work.

Book Review

Once There Were Wolves, by Charlotte McConaghy

• Where I bought this book: The Book Loft, Columbus, Ohio
• Why I bought this book: I loved her first novel, Migrations

*******

    Inti Flynn is trying to start a new community. It is one that she feels -- in her very bones and in her soul -- to be a part of, but also one she can only watch from afar. 

    Her goal is to reintroduce wolves into rural Scotland. They once lived there, but the shepherds ran them off. As a result, the deer population exploded, and the grasslands and forests are slowing dying, She knows in her heart that returning the  wolves to the area will put its envionment back into balance.

    But the community fears the wolves will kill all their sheep.

    Flynn should be the perfect candidate for the job. She can be hard, but she has a natural empathy toward others. 

    She has a condition called mirror-touch synthesis. Whenever she sees a person feeling pain or pleasure, she experiences the same feeling.  Literally: If she sees two people kissing, her lips experience the act of kissing and being kissed. On the other hand, if she watches two animals fighting, she endures what both animals suffer -- if one is bitten, she can feel the sensation of biting and the painof being bitten. She will see and feel her phantom blood flow. 

    (Yes, it's a real conidtion. I checked. It affects about 2 percent of the population.)

    Flynn -- who is mostly an introvert -- has a symbiotic relationship with her twin sister, Aggie, who has even more introverted tendencies. Aggie has a troubled psyche, having been the viction of domestic abuse and sexual assault. The sisters have a complicated relationship with their divorced parents, who live on two separate continents -- Australia and North America. Flynn also finds a lover and becomes pregnant in the novel, which is paired with the wolves mating and reproducing.

     (Yes, lots of metaphors here, which tie down the book.)

    Anyway. The book focuses on Inti bringing the wolves back, and fighting with the local shepherds -- she both upbraids them and tries to calmly bring them along. Most don't want to listen, although a few here and there are willing to hear her out. Her approach is complicated by her belief that getting too close to some of the residents will simultaneously help her understand them, as well as destroy her ability to view them from afar.

    (Another metaphor. She also takes this approach to the wolves, because if they become too comfortable with humans, they will lose part of their natural instincts for survival.)

    And, at times, the book gets almost into a detective/thriller mode (yes, there is an unsolved murder) that also tends to bog it down.

    Yet, McConaghy is such a good writer she is able to rise above the complicated mess she has gotten herself into. The book moves along with grace and style, and the story is about a community that needs to love and care for all its members, with understanding, and with a heart, and a soul.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

   Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 11th.

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    It is the 345th day of the year, leaving 20 days in 2021.

    On this date in 1918, the author and historian Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was born in Kisolovodsk, Russia. He went on to become one of the best known Soviet dissidents and an outspoken critic of communisn and political oppression.

    His novel, One Day in the Life Of Ivan Denisovitch, was pushlished in 1961 with the approval of then-Soviet leader Nikita Khruschev. It was a short novel based on Solzhenitsyn's arrest during World War II for writing a letter that criticized then-Soviet leader Josef Stalin. Solzhenitsyn spent eight years imprised in a Gulag, and another three years in internal exile.

 

    Solzhenitsyn became famous both in the Soiet Union and worldwide for the novel, and it inspired other dissidents to publish their own works. In a couple of years, however, crackdowns in the Soviet Union led Solzhenitsyn to fall out of favor, But he continued to write , and his novels earned him international acclaim..

     In 1970 he won the Nobel Prize for Literature. The citation praised him for his dedication to the "indispensible tradition of Russian literature." He did not travel to Stockholm to receive the prize for fear that his government would not allow him to return to Russia.

    But a few years later, the first edition of his masterpiece, The Gulag Archipelago, was published in Paris. The work is Solzhenitsyn's effort "to compile a literary-historial record of the vast systems of prisons and labor camps that came in being ... (in 1971) and that underwent an enormous expansion during the rule of Stalin," according to the Encyclopedia Britannica.

    The work describes the arrest and imprisonment of thousands in the Gulag, with historical detail and Solzhenitsyn's own experiences and interviews with fellow inmates. It was coinsidered a "head-on challenge to the Soviet state." The Soviet government responded with his arrest on charges of treason, and his exile. Solzhenitsyn eventually settled in the United States, where he lived before returning to Rusia in 1994, after his Soviet citizenship was restored.

    He remained in the public eye in Russia, writing, speaking, and hosting a television show.

    He died of a heart attack on Aug. 6, 2008. He was 89.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Selma Lagerlof

  Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 10th.

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    It is the 344th day of the year, leaving 21 days in 2021.

    On the date in 1909, Selma Lagerlöf became the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.

    The Swedish novelist's first work was Gösta Berling's Saga, a novel she wrote for a literary competition in the Swedish weekly Idun in 1890. The book, described as magical realism, takes the form of a Icelandic saga. It tells the story of Gösta Berling, a defrocked priest who was saved from freezing to death by the Mistress of Ekeby, who gives him a place to live in return for his servitude. He later leads a revolt against her, and becomes the leading spirit for the rest of his band. 

    The novel was published in 1891, and several years later received critical and popular acclaim after it was translated into Danish. 1n 1924, it was made into a Swedish silent film starring Greta Garbo.

    Lagerlöf, who was a school teacher when she wrote the novel, received funding from the Swedish royal family and the Swedish Academy -- which awards the Nobel Prize -- and begin travelling and writing full time. (Much of the background for this article comes from the Swedish Academy website.)

    Her other works included Antikrists Mirakler (The Miracles of Antichrist), and Jerusalem, a novel about Swedish peasants who emigrated to the Holy Land.  

    She died at her ancestral home in Värmland, Sweden, in 1940 at the age of 81.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Dalton Trumbo

  Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 9th.

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    It is the 343nd day of the year, leaving 22 days in 2021.

    On this date in 1905, Dalton Trumbo, the great novelist, screenwriter, newspaperman, and blacklisted member of the Hollywood Ten, was born in Montrose, Colo.

    Trumbo's best known work, perhaps, is Johnny Got His Gun, an anti-war novel that tells about Joe Bonham, an American soldier who wakes up in a hospital and gradually discovers he has lost his arms, legs, and his face, but he remains alive and concious. The novel depicts his thoughts as he reminices about his life, and his thoughts on the pointlessness of war and the men forced to kill and die for little or no reason.

    The novel was pubished in 1939. In 1943, Trumbo joined the American Communist Party. Although he resigned from the party in 1947, he re-joined in 1954. 

    His writings and his political activities led his to being called before the House Un-American Activities Commitee in October 1947. But he refused to testify or to provide names of other possible communist sympathizers or report on their activities. He was convicted of contempt of Congress and served 11 months in federal prison.

    At the time, the motion pictures industry said Trumbo and the nine other producers, directors, and screenwriters who refused to testify could not longer work in Hollywood. The so-called Hollywood 10 -- 10 named men who were part of a larger blacklist from Hollywood -- were indeed officially not permitted to work for more than a decade.

    But Trumbo and other writers were able to work using "fronts," -- un-blacklisted writers who put their names on others' works -- or under assumed names. During his years as an outcast, two of Trumbo's screenplays -- Roman Holiday and The Brave One -- won Academy Awards. Trumbo was not credited for his work or his awards, and information about his nominations did not become public until  decades later.

Almanac of Story Tellers: 1962 New York Newspaper Strike

   Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 8th.

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    It is the 342nd day of the year, leaving 23 days in 2021.

    On this date in 1962, at 2 o'clock in the morning, Bert Powers, president of the International Typographers Union Local 6 in New York City, called for a strike against four daily newspapers -- The New York Times, the Daily News, the New York Journal-American, and the New York World-Telegram & Sun. Quickly, five other dailies -- the New York Mirror, the New York Herald-Tribune, The New York Post, the Long Island Star Jornal, and the Long Island Daily Press -- called for a lookout and shut down their presses.

   The New York newspaper strike of 1962-63 was on.

     It would last 114 days, and have major impacts in the journalistic world of story telling. For instance, due to the lack of published obituaries, attendance at funerals took a precipitous drop and flower shops saw sales decrease -- "A lot of people just don't know when their friends died," one florist told the weekly magazine, Newsweek

    It helped bring television reporting into the mainstream of daily life. Residents of New York, which had no less than seven daily newspapers in 1962, saw that number drop to three a few years later. The culture of daily reporters consistently watching over politicians who made and supposedly enforced the rules slowly diminished as the power of newspapers shrank.

    It helped change the culture of papers, ousting linotype operators in favor of computerized typesetting equipment. In the newsrooms of New York, it helped bring out a more literary style of reporting -- during the strike one group of reporters and editors began the New York Review of Books, which continues today. Among the reporters who stretched their writing talents during and after the strike were columnists and novelists such as Calvin Trillin, Gay Talese, Nora Ephron, Pete Hamill, Jimmy Breslin, and Tom Wolfe.

    The strike began to end when Dorothy Schiff, then publisher of the Post, ended the lockout at that paper, which began publishing again on March 4, 1963. New York Mayor Robert Wagner and labor negotiator Theodore Kheel eventually brought together the publishers and the 10 unions on strike, and a settlement was reached on March 31.

    The strike was off.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Royal Opera House

  Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of December 7th.

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    It is the 341st day of the year, leaving 24 days in 2021.

    On this date in 1732, the Royal Opera House in London opened with the play, The Way of the World, by William Congreve. Theater and drama were, of course, enormously popular in London, and their powers of story telling were enhanced by the majestic new theater.

    For years, it competed with the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, for talent and playwrights

    It was then know as the Theatre Royal, Covent Gardens, duly commissioned by King Charles II, who was long dead by the time the first theater was built in Covent Gardens. For much of its first 100 years, the theater showed performances of the dramatic arts, although its first ballet was performed in 1734, and in the same year, the first opera, Il pastor fido, was sung.

    The composer, George Frideric Handel, served as its first music director. Indeed, from 1735 until his death in 1759, Handel gave regular concerts at the theater, and he wote many of his operas and oratoris specifically for the venue.

    A fire destroyed the theater in 1808. It was rebuilt and re-opened the following year. Fires hit again in 1846 and 1856, It was again rebuilt, and in 1892, was re-named the Royal Opera House.

    It has been renovated and expanded several times in the 20th Century, and today it includes a theater along with educational facilities to help it fufill its role as "the national centre for opera and ballet."