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Greetings digesters!!!"Today is the third or fourth day of Spring and I am sitting at the Place Clichy in full sunshine. Today, sitting here in the sun, I tell you it doesn't matter a damn whether the world is going to the dogs or not; it doesn't matter whether the world is right or wrong, good or bad. It is—and that suffices. The world is what it is and I am what I am." *** Indeed, spring has also sprung here in Big Sur (although as this photo suggests, it isn't exactly "going to the dogs.") It is also Digest time, and this installation is as robust and delectable as charcuterie in a sun-splashed Parisian cafe.
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The Times on Henry, circa '82!
Money quotes:
"What he liberated or made natural was not sex, but American fiction, which in the 30's and 40's was inhibited by self-consciousness and feelings of literary or social obligation." and... "It wasn't Miller's sexual promiscuity that was remarkable, but his indiscriminate or promiscuous acceptance of life. "He gave himself up to it with an abandon that was almost unknown before him in our literature." [Read the whole thing!]
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Save the date: June 30!
Pico Iyer is coming to the Library.
We've 'known' Pico for many years in part because of his wonderful tribute to Henry on his 100th birthday in TIME 1991.
It's been a long time and we've been wondering when his day would come. The guestbook left an indication that he had been here, but who knew, he did not introduce himself...!? Many books, Ted talks, a beautiful book on Dalai Llama (The Open Road: The Global Journey of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama), book on The Art of Stillness : Adventures in Going Nowhere (we can relate since we are 'doing nothing here') later he is coming to visit us...we will soon announce more detail...but June 30!
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Folkdancing at Nepenthe: Art imitates life!A kind visitor recently sent us an email after digging up a Morley Baer photo... "Looks like it was taken from the same vantage point as the Emil print (“Folkdancing at Nepenthe”) we have hanging in our house,” he said, “which we bought at the Library a few years back." It’s likely true! Emil must have had Morley’s photo when he made his Folk Dance painting...
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|  | “Nepenthe” by Morley Baer
©2018 the Morley Baer Photography Trust, Santa Fe
All reproductions rights reserved. Used by permission. | |  | Foldance at Nepenthe
by Emil White | |
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For the love of Ferlinghetti...To commemorate the incredible fact that Lawrence Ferlinghetti just turned 99 (!), New Directions just published Ferlinghetti's Greatest Poems.
We carry it at the Mothership, so if you'd like a copy, call us or stop in!
Meanwhile, check out this great review and homage, courtesy of the Times' Jeff Gordinier, who, upon first reading Ferlinghetti, asked, "Why is this guy allowed to write that way?"
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and...on a recent rainy afternoon, Ferlinghetti warmly welcomed an interviewer at his second-floor apartment on a country-quiet street in North Beach...click on arrow!
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...then we had the West Coast Poetry Slam Championship in 1999. Magnus was sitting at the 'scorekeepers' table taking abuse from the emcee Jerry Quickley as the sun was beating down on the crowd of approximately 200.
Teams from as far away as Vancouver and Santa Fe had assembled – most poets were camping at the "Slam Camp" at Molera State Park in the old creamery meadow... Presently Magnus gets a note delivered from one of the volunteers working the gate (see attached here). He looks up and there he is. Lawrence Ferlinghetti at the gate! He had no money and we had a $10 charge. The girls did not know who he was, did not let him in. Magnus ran up to greet him. Guess if the crowd knew who he was!
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Check out the February audio guestbook!
It's live HERE! Grab your headlamp, rain boots, and click on it to become transported.....
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Henry Miller....Rancher?
A few years back an elderly couple came to the libary and upon entering the woman said
"Harry! I told you it wasn't THAT Henry Miller!
Every now and then, folks continue to come into the Library thinking the Henry Miller in question is actually the rancher of yore named Henry Miller—aka "the Cattle King of California."(If anyone's ever been to the Madonna Inn, you'll see his photo on the walls.) Indeed, at one point in the late 19th century was one of the largest land-owners in the United States. If that doesn't deserve a shout-out in the Henry Miller Library Digest, we don't know what does!
Well as it turns out...maybe THIS one deserves it! A few days ago a couple came in to the HMML thinking it might be yet a third Henry Miller namely the Henry who in the dawn of the electrical age creates the world's first electrical workers' union, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.
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Peek "behind the curtain" of the BSISFSS!!As you read this, we are still accepting submissions for the 12th annual Big Sur International Short Film Screening Series.
(The deadline is April 15 Click HERE to submit.)
But what goes on behind the scenes? What makes the series tick? Who are the creative, hardworking, and unheralded volunteers that bring the series to life?
For an answer, we turn to an exclusive film, shot all the way back in 2010, and narrated by DAN BERN (!) about the inner workings of the fabled Big Sur International Short Film Screening Series….
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And that's a wrap! See you next month!!- Magnus, Sarah, Mike, Nate, John, Jack, and Alice
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