Far from sated with sites commemorating literary greatness, we went the very next day down to Amherst to invade the sanctuary of Emily Dickinson, whose birthplace and lifelong home is now a museum.
In spite of the apparent size of the house, the tour only includes four rooms, one of which is not furnished other than with modern chairs. Nonetheless I enjoyed the tour, as the guide speaks for about ten minutes in each of the rooms, and the information is generally interesting. I find as I get older that I like going on guided tours, provided that the guide is at all capable. It is pleasant to walk leisurely through an old building listening to an intelligent person talk, regardless of the comparative importance of the facts being relayed.
The tour did not go into great detail as far as breaking down the actual poetry of Emily Dickinson, the greatness of which I must confess even at my advanced age I have a hard time truly convincing myself. And this is a real failure, because it is something that is so obvious to serious literary scholars that not to grasp it is to relegate oneself eternally to a lower status of literacy than all genuinely educated people. It is not that I do not like the poems of Emily Dickinson, or that I am not happy that they exist. To this point however I am incapable of seeing that they are great in the way that Donne or Sir Philip Sidney or Herrick seems to me to be really great. At this point I have no choice but to keep plugging away. It is too late for me to try to pursue expertise in any other worthwhile area of human endeavor.
I have noted this elsewhere on the internet, but I really enjoyed being in Amherst for the day. College towns are wonderful places, and it will be a sad day if they disappear because everybody is spending the years from 18-24 acquiring job skills on the computer at their parents' house, and not only because I have five children and am desperately counting on some of them leaving the house once in a while before they are thirty-five. The combination of youthful energies, above average intelligence, and free time in which to indulge in the course of an average day is highly attractive, to me anyway.
Because we have little children still, we had to go on alternate tours, mother and children 1 & 3 on one, and myself and child 2 on the other. But I liked this, as it enabled us to wander around town a little, which we probably would have neglected to do otherwise. At one of the parks there were a number of hyper-progressive looking student types about, female mainly, unsmiling towards me, and reading and writing out longhand notes on paper just like the old times, when my two year old daughter decided to skip around the fountain singing "I'm a princess, I'm a princess", much to my horror as you can imagine. She did not pick this up from me, I assure you.
Along the walk to the other house on the property, where Emily Dickinson's brother lived. I would have liked to seen that too, but to see that required going on a combined tour that was an hour and forty minutes long, and seeing as we had to go on two separate tours as it was I thought that would be pushing it.
In front of the other house.
The main entrance, with a full view of the front of the house.
The West Cemetery in Amherst, where Emily Dickinson is buried, is a bit shabby, and is occupied by a number of people of the sort who look like they dropped out of college many years back and now hang around the cemetery all day acting weird.
I don't know why I included three different grave pictures, I guess to give a feel for the setting, which, in contrast to most cemeteries I go to, was not very peaceful. It is small and is bordered by a gas station and the business district of Amherst, and all sorts of people are constantly tramping through, and there are the aforementioned people who are camped out there for no apparent reason and watch you tramping dutifully to Emily Dickinson's grave.
I do not know what the significance of the toy chair is, though I suspect it is something obvious, even juvenile. Nonetheless, it eludes me.
We made a trip out to this very tiny graveyard, which lies within the Green Mountain National Forest in the vicinity of a settlement that I am not sure even qualifies as a town. The cemetery is down a long gravel road, and no other cars or people passed by in the entire 30-45 minutes that we were there.
We took our lunchboxes and had a picnic. The spot is tranquil and beautiful and well-maintained.
Given that Robert Penn Warren as an author is so strongly identified with the South, it was somewhat of a surprise to find his grave in this well-kept but obscure corner of Vermont. Evidently he summered there for many years.
What thoughts did I have at this memorial? Nothing pertinent. I do not know very much about Robert Penn Warren, other than that he had a successful career, and people trusted and respected his talent and knowledge in literary matters, which has always struck me, absurdly really, as the most desirable state to which a person could attain. I thought about the loneliness of the spot, the now complete passing of Warren's literary generation, which retained some prominence and authority even in my youth. I thought about the universal male desire for money, power, and sex, and thought that in his own milieu Warren seemed, compared to me anyway, to have attained a fair portion of the first two of these--I don't know about the sex. So yes, this is what I thought about, in between my major concerns about my children behaving, not climbing on or tipping over gravestones, and so on.
This has a Vermont Life magazine feel to it, don't you think. I must confess, I love that magazine. Though the older numbers from the 60s and 70s are a world of their own that can never be recaptured, I like the newer issues too.
I thought this was an unusually beautiful tree. It reminded me of one that used to be in my grandparents' yard.
Amphitryon: Tiryns (ruins) nr Nauplion, Peloponnese, Greece
Jean Giraudoux (1882-1944) BP: Musee Jean Giraudoux, 4 Avenue Jean Jaures, Bellac, Limousin, France. Buried: Cimitiere du Passy, 16eme, Paris, France. Les Deux Magots, 6 Place Saint-Germain-des-Pres, 6eme, Paris, France.
The birthplace museum does not appear to have a web page. Les Deux Magots is associated with many more renowned artists and writers than Giraudoux and is well-known to be an expensive tourist trap nowadays. I would not have put it up hereexcept that it turned up numerous times in my researches as particularly associated with Jean Giraudoux, and perhaps I will want to go there at some point, seeing as I will likely be an old and from the social standpoint totally insignificant tourist if I ever do go back to Paris at this point, and people like that are supposed to go to places like this anyway.
Alcmene: Buried: nr Olympieum, Megara, Attica, Greece
Heracles: Heracles of Mantinea (sculpture), Louvre, 1ere, Paris, France. Torre de Hercules, La Coruna, Galicia, Spain. Heracles Gate, Ephesus, Turkey. Caves of Hercules, Tangier, Morocco
S. N. Behrman (1893-1973) Birthplace: 31 Providence Street, Worcester, Massachusetts. Died in New York, New York. College: Harvard
A playwright and New Yorker-type writer, widely admired by fellow writers of this school, from the 1930s-60s. Associated with the famous Lunts, who starred in several of his productions. I had never heard of him before.
Alfred Lunt (1892-1977) Birthplace: Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Buried: Forest Home Cemetery, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Ten Chimneys, Genessee Depot, Wisconsin. College: Carroll (Wisc.)
Lynn Fontanne (1887-1983) Birthplace: Woodford, London, England. Buried: Forest Home Cemetery, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Ten Chimneys, Genessee Depot, Wisconsin.
Robert Burton (1576-1640) The Anatomy of Melancholy (1628) Birthplace: in trees behind Motor Industries Association Research Building, Linley, Leicestershire, England. Buried: Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford, Oxfordshire, England. College: Oxford (Brasenose).
Floyd Dell (1887-1969) Birthplace: Barry, Illinois. Buried: We don't know.
Paul Jordan-Smith (1885-1971) Birthplace: Wytheville, Virginia (?). Buried: Newbern Cemetery, Dublin, Virginia.
Democritus (460-370 B.C.) Birthplace: Abdera, East Macedonia & Thrace, Greece.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) Birthplace: Samuel Johnson Birthplace Museum, Breadmarket Street & Market Square, Lichfield, Staffordshire, England (*****7-6-01*****) Buried: Westminster Abbey, Westminster, London, England. Dr Johnson's House, 17 Gough Square, City, London, England
Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) Andersen's Fairy Tales (fr. 1835) Birthplace: Bangs Boder 29, Odense, Denmark. Buried: Assistens Kirkegard, Copenhagen, Denmark Hans Christian Andersen Museum 1680 Mission Drive, Solvang, Santa Barbara, California. Hans Christian Andersen Fairy-Tale House, Radhuspldsen 57, Copenhagen, Denmark. Hans Christian Andersen Place, Hans Christian Andersens Boulevard 22, Copenhagen, Denmark.
The website for the birthplace museum no longer appears to be up. I hope it is still open. I believe there are a couple of other small sites in Copenhagen to see as well, but information on the internet is poor, or perhaps it is only available in Danish, though that seems unlikely to me.
The North Pole.
MacKinlay Kantor (1904-1977) Andersonville (1955) Birthplace: Webster City, Iowa. Buried: Graceland Cemetery, Webster City, Iowa.
Mikhail Sholakhov (1905-1984) And Quiet Flows the Don (1928) Birthplace: State M.A. Sholokhov Museum Reserve, Veshenskaya, Rostov Oblast, Russia. Buried: Farm, Veshenskaya, Rostov Oblast, Russia. Museum Complex Mikhail Sholokhov, Daryinskoye, Kazakhstan. Don River, Russia.
Joseph Stalin (1878-1953) Birthplace: Joseph Stalin Museum, Gori, Georgia. Buried: Kremlin Wall Necropolis, Moscow, Russia.
I include him here because he was name dropped in one of the outlines and was obviously a significant historical figure of the 20th century. Obviously I am for some reason wary of seeming to honor bad people whose awfulness it will be assumed I can not begin to understand. No one cares about me or my lists or my politics or my historical or literary understanding. Intellectually I am about as alone in the world as one can be. I almost certainly will never go to these sites and maybe would not go to Gori even if I had endless leisure and money to visit every place on these lists. Though maybe I would, because the system calls for it and the purpose of the system is to lead me to certain kinds of experiences irrespective of their moral implications, and the two sites here certainly would be representative of those types of experiences.
Philip Barry (1896-1949) The Animal Kingdom (1932) Birthplace: Rochester, Ulster, New York. Buried: Most Holy Trinity Catholic Cemetery, East Hampton, Suffolk, New York. College: Yale
George P Baker (1866-1935) Born: Providence, Rhode Island. Buried: Swan Point Cemetery, Providence, Rhode Island. College: Harvard
Margaret Landon (1903-1993) Anna and the King of Siam (1944). Born: Somers, Wisconsin. Buried: Wheaton Cemetery, Wheaton, Illinois. College: Wheaton (IL)
Anna Leonowens (1831-1915) Born: Ahmednagar, India. Buried: Mount Royal Cemetery, Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Anna Leonowens Gallery, Nova Scotia College of Art & Design, 1891 Granville Street, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
Rama V of Thailand (1853-1910) Born: Bangkok, Thailand. Buried: Royal Burial Ground, Wat Benchamabophit, Bangkok, Thailand. Phya Thai Palace, Bangkok, Thailand.
Richard Rodgers (1902-1979) Born: Brandreth Avenue, Hammels Station, Queens, New York. Buried: Ashes scattered at sea. College: Juilliard. Richard Rodgers Theatre, 226 West 46th Street, New York, New York.
Oscar Hammerstein (1895-1960) Born: New York, New York Buried: Ferncliff Cemetery, Hartsdale, Westchester, New York. Highland Farm Bed & Breakfast, 70 East Road, Doylestown, Pennsylvania. Highland House, Montego Bay, Jamaica. College: Columbia
Curious that both extant residences are inns now, though the Pennsylvania location begins at $160 a night while the Jamaica house ranges from $6,500 to $8,500 a week (I am assuming the Jamaican rates are in US dollars).
Pauline Lord (1890-1950) Born: Hanford, Kings, California. Buried: Kensico Cemetery, Valhalla, Westchester, New York.
Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) War and Peace (1865-9), Anna Karenina (1877) Born: Yasnaya Polyana (Museum-Estate of Leo Tolstoy), Tula, Russia. Buried: Yasnaya Polyana, Tula, Russia. Leo Tolstoy State Museum, 11/8 Prechistenka, Moscow, Russia. Leo Tolstoy Museum, 21 Leo Tolstoy Street, Moscow, Russia. Leo Tolstoy Museum, 12 Patnitskaya, Moscow, Russia.
Hervey Allen (1889-1949) Anthony Adverse (1933) Born: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Buried: Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, Virginia. College: Pittsburgh
Sophocles (495-406 B.C.) Antigone (c. 440 B.C.), Oedipus Rex (429 B.C.), Electra (411-410 B.C.) Born: Colonus (Athens), Attica, Greece. Buried: Along road to Deceleia, (Athens), Attica, Greece. The Sophoclean, Louvre, 1ere, Paris, France. Bronze Head, British Museum, Bloomsbury, London, England.
Jean Anouilh (1910-1987) Born: Cerisole, Bordeaux, Gironde, France. Buried: Cimitiere de Pully, Lausanne, Switzerland.
Cedric Hardwick (1893-1964) Born: Lye, Worcestershire, England. Buried: Golders Green Crematorium, Golders Green, London, England. College: Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.
Creon (683 B.C.?-???) Born: Thebes, Central Greece, Greece
Plutarch (46-120) Born: Chaeronea, Central Greece, Greece. Bust, Museum of Delphi, Delphi, Central Greece, Greece.
Guthrie McClintic (1893-1961) Born: Seattle, Washington. College: Washington (Mo.)
Lepidus (c.89-12 B.C.) Born: Rome, Italy.
Pompey the Great (106-48 B.C.) Buried: Albano Laziale, Lazio, Italy.
Sholem Asch (1880-1957) The Apostle (1943) Born: Kutno, Poland. Buried: Golders Green Jewish Cemetery, Golders Green, London, England. Beit Sholem Asch Museum, 50 Arlozorov Street, Bat Yam, Israel.
St Paul (5-67) Born: Tarsus, Turkey. Buried: Basilica of St Paul Outside the Walls, Rome, Italy.
John O'Hara (1905-1970) Appointment in Samarra (1934) Born: 125 Mahantango St, Pottsville, Pennsylvania. Buried: Princeton Cemetery, Princeton, New Jersey. John O'Hara House, 606 Mahantango Street, Pottsville, Pennsylvania. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
Don Marquis (1878-1937) archy and mehitabel (1927) Born: Walnut, Illinois. Buried: Maple Grove Cemetery, Kew Gardens, Queens, New York.
George Herriman (1880-1944) Born: 348 Villere Street, New Orleans, Louisiana. Buried: Monument Valley, Arizona (ashes scattered).
Geroge Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) Arms and the Man (1894), Caesar and Cleopatra (1900), Man and Superman (1903), Pygmalion (1912) Born: 33 Synge Street, Dublin, Ireland *****(9-3?-96)***** Buried: Garden of Shaw's Corner, Ayot St Lawrence, Hertfordshire, England.
When I visited in 1996, the Shaw birthplace was open as a museum, though several places on the internet state that it is not currently open.
Oscar Straus (1870-1954) Born: Vienna, Austria. Buried: Friedhof Bad Ischl, Bad Ischl, Austria.
Jules Verne (1828-1905) 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1870), Around the World in 80 Days (1873) Born: 4 Rue Olivier-de-Clisson, Ile Feydeau, Nantes, Pays de la Loire, France. Buried: La Madeline Cemetery, Amiens, Picardie, France. Musee Jules Verne de Nantes, 3 Rue de l'Hermitage, Nantes, Pays de la Loire, France. Le Jules Verne Restaurant, Tour Eiffel, 5 Avenue Gustave Eiffel, 7eme, Paris, France. Maison de Jules Verne, 2 Rue Charles Dubois, Amiens, Picardie, France.
Nellie Bly (1864-1922) Born: Burrell Township, Pennsylvania. Buried: Woodlawn Cemetery, Bronx, New York. Nellie Bly's (Ice Cream Parlor), 529 Main Street, Riverton, New Jersey.
Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951) Main Street (1920), Babbitt (1922), Arrowsmith (1925), Dodsworth (1929) Born: Sinclair Lewis Boyhood Home, 812 Sinclair Lewis Avenue, Sauk Centre, Minnesota. Buried: Greenwood Cemetery, Sauk Centre, Minnesota. Sinclair Lewis Interpretive Center and Museum, I-94 & Highway 71, Sauk Centre, Minnesota. Sinclair Lewis Park, Sauk Centre, Minnesota. College: Yale
Gladys Hasty Carroll (1904-1999) As the Earth Turns (1933) Born: Rochester, New Hampshire. Buried: Hasty Family Cemetery, South Berwick, Maine. College: Bates.
Luigi Pirandello (1867-1936) Six Characters in Search of an Author (1921), As You Desire Me (1931) Born: Casa Museo de Luigi Pirandello, Contrada Caos SS 15, Agrigento, Sicily, Italy. Buried: Same as Birthplace, Agrigento, Sicily, Italy. College: Bonn
Greta Garbo (1905-1990) Born: Blekingegatan 32, Stockholm, Sweden. Buried: Skrogskyrkogarden Cemetery, Stockholm, Sweden. Villa Garbo (Hotel) 62 Boulevard d'Alsace. Cannes, Provence-Alpes-Cote d'Azur, France.
Thomas Lodge (1558-1625) Born: High Street, West Ham, Newham, London, England. College: Trinity (Oxford).
Robin Hood Born: Loxley, Sheffield, Yorkshire, England. Buried: Kirklees Priory, near Mirfield, Yorkshire, England. Nottingham Castle, Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England.
There are currently plans for a 13-20 million pound Robin Hood-themed castle/tourist attraction to be built in Sherwood Forest. Stay tuned.
Algernon Charles Swinburne (1837-1909) Atalanta in Calydon (1865) Born: 7 Chester Street, Belgravia, London, England. Buried: Churchyard, St Boniface Church, Bonchurch, Isle of Wight, England. College: Balliol (Oxford)
Atalanta: Calydon (Aetolia), West Greece, Greece. "Atalanta", Jay Gould's Railroad Car, Jefferson, Texas.
Andrew Lang (1844-1912) Born: Viewfield House, Selkirk, Borders, Scotland. Buried: East Cemetery, St Andrews, Fife, Scotland. College: Balliol (Oxford)
Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861) Aurora Leigh (1857) Born: nr intersection of Kelloe-Coxhoe Road & B6291, Kelloe, Durham, England. Buried: Cimitero Accatolico, Florence, Tuscany, Italy. Greenwood Great House, Montego Bay, Jamaica. Armstrong-Browning Library, 710 Speight Avenue, Waco, Texas. Casa Guidi, Piazza San Felice 8, Florence, Tuscany, Italy
Gertrude Stein (1874-1946) The Autobiography of Alice B Toklas (1933) Born: 850 Beech Avenue, Allegheny West, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Buried: Pere Lachaise Cemetery, 20eme, Paris, France. College: Radcliffe
Alice B Toklas (1877-1967) Born: San Francisco, California. Buried: Pere Lachaise Cemetery, 20eme, Paris, France.
Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809-1894) The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table (1858) Born: Cambridge, Massachusetts (just north of Harvard Yard) Buried: Mount Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge, Massachusetts. College: Harvard.
I have gone on a bit of a hiatus. I am still interested in the twee little essays, but I don't have time to do them for the foreseeable future, and as the main purpose of this blog is supposed to be to store my various lists, which is not being done, I am going to devote the next 60 or so posts to doing that. Trust me, it will be fun, and I hope sometime we can have a meet-up of all the devotees and groupies of the site in one of our dominant literary cities.
Authors, Subjects, Pertinent Sites, Volume I:
Robert Sherwood (1896-1955): Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1938). BP: New Rochelle, Westchester, New York (address unknown). Buried: Unknown (d. New York, New York). College: Harvard.
(Yes, there are a lot of Lincoln Sites. Most of these guys are not so fondly memorialized. And even Lincoln is not as popular as he used to be. According to one Wikipedia page, visitors to the house in Springfield fell from 650,000 a year in the late 1960s to 393,000 in the early 2000s, while those to the village in New Salem fell by half over the same period. The same page claims that visits to the Memorial in Washington peaked at 4.3 million in 1987 and have since declined, though it does not give current figures, and estimates given by other web sources varying wildly, from as low as 3.5 million up to 6 million).
Ann Rutledge (1813-1835): BP: near Henderson, Kentucky. Buried: Oakland Cemetery, Petersurg, Illinois.
Raymond Massey (1896-1983): BP: 519 Jarvis Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Buried: Beaverdale Memorial Park, New Haven, Connecticut. College: Balliol (Oxford).
John Drinkwater (1882-1937): Abraham Lincoln (1918). BP: Dorset Villa, 105 Fairlop Road, Leytonstone, London, England. Buried: Churchyard, Piddington, Oxfordshire, England.
John Wilkes Booth (1838-1865): BP: Tudor Hall, Bel Air, Maryland. Buried: Green Mount Cemetery, Baltimore, Maryland.
William Faulkner (1897-1962): The Sound and the Fury (1929), Sanctuary (1931), Absalom, Absalom (1936), Requiem For a Nun (1951). BP: Jefferson & Cleveland Streets, New Albany, Mississippi. Buried: Oxford Memorial Cemetery, Oxford. Rowan Oak, Oxford, Mississippi; Union County Heritage Museum, 114 Cleveland Street, New Albany, Mississippi.
Absalom: BP: Hebron, Israel. Buried: Tomb of Absalom, Kidron Valley, Jerusalem, Israel. (I am aware that this supposed tomb dates from about 1,000 years after Absalom's death, but in matters of such antiquity, especially where no authentic sites associated with the person can be expected to have survived, I allow longstanding tradition to be accepted as if truth).
Samuel: BP: Ramah (modern Er-Ram), Israel.
George Eliot (1819-1880): Adam Bede (1859), The Mill on the Floss (1860), Silas Marner (1861). BP: South Farm, Arbury Estate, Nuneaton, Warwickshire, England. Buried: Highgate Cemetery, Highgate, London, England (*****9-9-96*****).
James M Barrie (1860-1937): The Admirable Crichton (1902), Peter Pan (1904), Dear Brutus (1917). BP: 9 Brechin Road, Kirriemuir, Angus, Scotland. Buried: Cemetery, Kirriemuir, Angus, Scotland. College: Edinburgh.
Virgil: (70-19 B.C.): The Aeneid (29-19 B.C.). BP: Andes (Mantua), Lombardy, Italy (*****3-2-97*****). Buried (trad.): Salita della Grotta 20, Naples, Campania, Italy.
Aesop: Aesop's Fables (6th century B.C.). Samos, North Aegean, Greece.
Phaedrus (15 B.C.-50) BP: Pydna, Central Macedonia, Greece.
Edith Wharton (1862-1937) Ethan Frome (1911), The Age of Innocence (1920). BP: 14 W 23rd Street, New York, New York. Buried: Cimitiere des Gonards, Versailles, Ile-de-France, France. The Mount, 2 Plunkett Street, Lenox, Berkshire, Massachusetts.
Thomas Paine (1737-1809) The Age of Reason (1795). BP: 6 Thomas Paine Avenue, Thetford, Norfolk, England. Original Burial Site: Thomas Paine Cottage Museum, 20 Sicard Avenue, New Rochelle, Westchester, New York. Thomas Paine's Cottage, 20 New Street, Sandwich, Kent.
King James I (1566-1625) BP: Edinburgh Castle, Edinurgh, Scotland. Buried: Westminster Abbey (Henry VII vault), Westminster, London, England.
Anne Bronte (1820-1849) Agnes Grey (1847). BP: 74 High Street, Thornton, Yorkshire, England. Buried: St Mary's Churchyard, Scarborough, Yorkshire, England. Bronte Parsonage Museum, Haworth, Yorkshire, England.
Eugene O'Neill (1888-1953) Beyond the Horizon (1920), The Emperor Jones (1920), Anna Christie (1921), Desire Under the Elms (1924), Strange Interlude (1928), Mourning Becomes Electra (1931), All God's Chillun Got Wings (1932), Ah, Wilderness! (1933). BP: Broadway & 43rd Street, New York, New York (*****2- -98*****). Buried: Forest Hills Cemetery, Jamaica Plain, Suffolk, Massachusetts (*****8-3-96*****). Eugene O'Neill National Historic Site (Tao House), Danville, Contra Costa, California. Monte Cristo Cottage, 325 Pequot Avenue, New London, Connecticut.
George M Cohan (1878-1942) BP: 536 Wickenden Street (Corner of Governor), Providence, Rhode Island. Buried: Woodlawn Cemetery, Bronx, New York. Statue, Times Square, New York, New York.
Willa Cather (1876-1947) Alexander's Bridge (1912), The Professor's House (1925), Death Comes for the Archbishop (1926) BP: Route 50, Gore, Virginia. Buried: Old Burial Ground, Jaffrey Center, New Hampshire (*****11-25-11*****). Willa Cather State Historic Site, 413 N Webster, Red Cloud, Nebraska. College: Nebraska.
Washington Irving (1783-1859) The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon (1819-20), The Alhambra (1832). BP: 131 William Street, New York, New York. Buried: Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Sleepy Hollow, Westchester, New York. Sunnyside, West Sunnyside Lane, Tarrytown, Westchester, New York. Washington Irving Trail Museum, 3918 S Mehan Road, Ripley, Oklahoma.
Lewis Carroll (1832-1898) Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865), Through the Looking Glass (1872). BP: Glebe Farm, Morphany Lane, Daresbury, Chesire, England. Buried: Cemetery, Guildford, Surrey, England. Lewis Carroll Centre, All Saints Church, Daresbury, Cheshire, England. College: Christ Church, Oxford.
Sir John Tenniel (1820-1914) BP: Bayswater, London, England. Buried: London, England (ashes in wife's grave, location unknown?).
Susan Glaspell (1882-1948) Alison's House (1930). BP: Davenport, Iowa. Buried: Snow Cemetery, Truro, Barnstaple, Massachusetts. College: Drake.
Eva Le Galliene (1899-1991) BP: 42 Doughty St, Holborn, London, England. Buried: Rock Outcropping (?), Weston, Connecticut.
Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) BP: Emily Dickinson Museum, 280 Main Street, Amherst, Hampshire, Massachusetts.*****(7-31-13)***** Buried: West Cemetery, Amherst, Hampshire, Massachusetts.*****(7-31-13)*****
John Dryden (1631-1700) The Conquest of Granada (1670), All For Love, or The World Well Lost (1678). BP: Opposite All Saint's Church, Aldwinkle, Northamptonshire, England. Buried: Westminster Abbey, Westminster, London, England. College: Trinity, Cambridge.
Antony (83-30 B.C.) BP: Rome, Italy. Buried: near Alexandria, Egypt.
Cleopatra (69-30 B.C.) BP: Alexandria, Egypt. Buried: near Alexandria, Egypt. Cleopatra Needles (3): Victoria Embankment, Westminster, London, England. Central Park, New York, New York. Place de la Concorde, 8me Arr, Paris, France.
Augustus Caesar (69 B.C.-14 A.D.) BP: Rome, Italy. Buried: Mausoleum of Augustus, Campus Martius, Rome, Italy. Domus Augusti, Palatine Hill, Rome, Italy.
Actium (Battle Site): Actium, Epirus, Greece.
Erich Maria Remarque (1898-1970) All Quiet on the Western Front (1929). BP: Osnabruck, Lower Saxony, Germany. Buried: Ronco Cemetery, Ronco sopra Ascona, Switzerland. Erich Maria Remarque Friedenszentrum, Markt 6, Osnabruck, Lower Saxony, Germany.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) Henry VI, Parts 1,2 and 3 (1591-2), A Comedy of Errors (1592), Richard III (1593), The Taming of the Shrew (1593), A Midsummer Night's Dream (1595), Richard II (1595), Romeo and Juliet (1595), The Merchant of Venice (1596), Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2 (1596-7), The Merry Wives of Windsor (1597), Henry V (1599), As You Like It (1599), Julius Caesar (1599), Twelfth Night (1600), Hamlet (1602), All's Well That Ends Well (1602/3), Othello (1604), Macbeth (1605), Antony and Cleopatra (1606), King Lear (1607), Coriolanus (1608), Cymbeline (1610), The Tempest (1611) BP: Henley Street, Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England*****(6-30-01)***** Buried: Parish Church, Stratford-Upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England*****(6-30-01)*****
Seat of Count of Rousillon: Perignan, Langudoc-Rousillon, France
Robert Penn Warren (1905-1989) All the King's Men (1946) BP: Third & Cherry Streets, Guthrie, Kentucky. Buried: Willis Cemetery, Stratton, Vermont*****(7-30-13)***** College: Vanderbilt.
Huey Long (1893-1935) BP: Winnfield, Louisiana. Buried: Grounds of New State Capitol, Baton Rouge Louisiana. Huey Long Museum, Old State Capital Building, Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
Henry Fielding (1707-1754) Tom Jones (1749), Amelia (1752) BP: Sharpham Park (house), Sharpham, Somersetshire, England. Buried: British Cemetery, Lisbon, Portugal.
Henry James (1843-1916) The American (1877), The Bostonians (1886), The Awkward Age (1899) BP: 21 (Plaque at 29) Washington Place, New York, New York (*****2-25?-98*****) Buried: Cambridge Cemetery, Cambridge, Massachusetts (*****8-3-96*****) Lamb House, West Street, Rye, Sussex, England.
Edward Bok (1863-1930) The Americanization of Edward Bok (1920) BP: Den Helder, Netherlands. Buried: Bok Tower Gardens, Lake Wales, Florida.
Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945) Sister Carrie (1900), An American Tragedy (1925) BP: 318 South 2nd Street, Terre Haute, Indiana (House now located in Fairbanks Park). Buried: Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale, Los Angeles, California.
A few months back, a prominent culture blogger (whose work I generally like) wrote a little piece, which has remained with me, breaking down some of the differences between that element of society which is creative and that which is not. While obviously the main premise could be argued against on the grounds that many highly creative and prolific people have managed to reproduce and a few have even forged fairly close relationships with their offspring, it is on the whole accurate as far as the masses of would-be artistic types who did not have what it took to avoid falling into the snares of conventional bourgeois life, myself sadly included among these. This demographic makes for a fat target in most areas where delusions of cultural dynamism or meaningful personal achievement are concerned, but its absurdities are not usually delineated so incisively, and with a clarity that even it can understand, as in the above article.
While of course the underlying theme of this article is my sense of my own personal failure, or at least my innate non-artisticness, which while little more than a vague death-feeling that has descended upon my consciousness, is the only one of these feelings I can confidently identify, it is my (probably vain) hope that I will not dwell on myself too much. Suffice it to say, I have not done anything remotely artistic in years--not so much as redecorating a room (or even envisioning doing so), or designing a bulletin board, or displaying the slightest hint of flair either in dress, conversation or movement. My mental life has been completely aimless for years, and I have not felt an energy or passion or any sensation apart from worry about money in so long that I am nearly at a loss to speculate on what the source of any former interest I ever had in any area of life ever was. I am an absolute vegetable. I am dead to everything that might bring flair or spice into my life.
I was reading the other day about the expat American theater scene in Amsterdam--their shows mostly center around the issues of tourists, culture clash, progressive politics, etc. However the shows are well enough attended that one of these particular troupes has been there since the 90s, apparently able to support themselves and lead the bohemian life in this city of art and bars and coffee houses and adventure (read: sex)--seeking tourists from all over the world. They have at the very least averted one of the great soul-killing dilemmas which faces modern man, that of having to live within the corporate system and culture while being at the same time temperamentally and intellectually estranged from it--this latter ensuring that you will not even attain to the consolations of status, superior income and advancement in that system.
I don't believe that marriage and children in themselves are the problem, in my case especially. I was not married until I was 27 and I did not have my first child until I was 32. If I was ever going to do anything substantial, creatively or otherwise, it ought to have been long underway by that second date especially. The problem is my brain and my enthusiasm for day to day life and what has happened to them. Perhaps I am starting to get worn down with having very young children. There has been at least one person in my household in diapers constantly since 2002 (and this will continue to be so probably until early in 2014). The last child won't be in all day school until 2017, at which time I will be 47 years old! My two oldest are currently in 4th and 5th grade. If I had stopped there, like most people do, their pre-school years would seem a mere blip of time, years in the past now. They would be halfway to college age--of course they still are, but as things stand now, we will probably be desperate for them to go because we'll need the space. But everything would be so quiet and empty without all of the little ones, and I'm sure I would not be any smarter or more creative, or even richer. There has been a small spate of articles lately (this week, actually) about the travails of 'older' parents--most of the writers are about my age--a few of which offer laments that perhaps they should have had children earlier. I take some consolation from the fact that I seem to be holding up pretty well physically in comparison to some of the other parents. While my energy for literature is diminished I have much more of it for taking care of children than I would have had at twenty-five, at which time I would really have felt imposed upon. 'Chasing them around' causes me little trouble. It is true I am always tired, and I never get enough sleep, but not much more than I was ten years ago. One of the main problems of having many children is that nearly every day you are roused out of bed not merely before you are ready but by someone screaming or jumping on you or demanding something, which is quite disorienting and stressful. I did really notice the effect this had on my mood until one day last week, doubtless as a result of the days being short and the sun rising fairly late, I actually woke up to silence, and was able to collect my thoughts for a few minutes before I sat up and started pulling my clothes, and it was remarkable how this calm awakening effected my mood the rest of the morning. But literally, I have woken up in this kind of quiet state without any kind of outside prompting maybe five times in the last ten years.
But I am supposed to be writing about the life of the real artist here.
It is not what I have just written, or at least that is not its essence.
I gather from the article that for the urban creative type, sex, and especially new sexual adventures, remain very real aspects of life until the brink of old age. I still think about having sex the overwhelming majority of every day but over time it ceases to be real or to seem possible, for the likes of you anyway, in the mainstream world.
I would be most happy in any of my children grew up to have legitimate bohemian artist souls and live accordingly; I still imagine it as the highest kind of life, the great illusion, because real artistic skills and thought processes, and access to a society of people of similar qualities, make you the most alive, the most engaged with life, that you can be. Nearly all that is worthwhile in experience, social, sexual, intellectual, is open to you...
I cannot expand further at this time. I am too exhausted, and my concentration is absolutely shot.
It all comes back to the American in Paris thing though, the fantasy, and how the fantasy is real to those who understand it, and in most important ways is more real than whatever it is he is supposed at any given time to understand as real.
