Gift Shopping
Advice to Little Girls by Mark Twain —You ought never to "sass" old people unless they "sass" you first
Mark Twain writes in 1865: "You ought never to take your little brother's 'chewing-gum' away from him by main force; it is better to rope him in with the promise of the first two dollars and a half you find floating down the river on a grindstone. In the artless simplicity natural to this time of life, he will regard it as a perfectly fair transaction. In all ages of the world this eminently plausible fiction has lured the obtuse infant to financial ruin and disaster." more »
Anders Zorn: A European Artist Seduces America; Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum's 23-Year-Old Theft
The exhibit presents new international scholarship about an artist who was considered among the most prolific and talented artists living around 1900. Although highly esteemed by his contemporaries on both sides of the Atlantic, Zorn is little known to the general public in the US today. "Anders Zorn is one of the most significant artists of the Belle Époque." more »
Culture Watch Book Reviews: My Beloved World and Consider the Fork
Reviewer Jill Norgren writes that Justice Sotomayor has said that she wrote My Beloved World because being a role model “is the most valuable thing I can do.” It is to her credit that the memoir is, like the justice, unpretentious and welcoming to readers of all ages. Reviewer Julia Sneden declares the depth of the research for Consider the Fork mind-boggling, but Be Wilson's style is simple, direct, and leavened with wry humor; calling her just “a food writer” would be a bit like calling Yo Yo Ma “a guy who plays the cello.” more »
Shopping at the Museum: NYC's Historical Society
Tam Gray writes: A favorite museum of ours is the New York Historical Society. Their online shop is appealing and quite different. Products range from Tiffany-style lamps, to retro dresses and handbags based on their own spectacular Audubon collection, which is the largest single repository of Auduboniana in the world. more »