Raspberry and Tomato

I'm a little stuck with the book right at the moment so instead you get a knitting post from me!  (Cue the band).  Some my stuck is that the last three weeks have been nuts.  Piglet had the end of his cross country season during tech week for Birdie's play, Midsummer Night's Dream.*  

The show was wonderful! Absolutely hilarious. I worked on altering costumes again this year and I was sewing right down to the last minute because Helena's costume ended up needing a last-minute alteration and zipper replacement.  

The spring musical looks to be a sartorial challenge, so I imagine Feb and March will be All Costume Alterations, All the Time.

After the Shakespeare madness, the kids were off school a bunch of days for various and sundry, and now we are in the slide toward Thanksgiving. Piglet made the high school basketball team and has started practices, which are pretty intense.  His game schedule starts in December and is like whoa.  It all feels a bit fast, and I wonder how anyone manages to write a novel during November.

Which is not to say I've gotten nothing written.  I've actually gotten a lot done.  But the story feels slightly stalled right at this minute.  So I'm letting it stew for a day or two before getting back at it.  In the meantime, I'm reading around it, and researching.  Which is fun!  I made an interesting thematic discovery this week that means a little bit of reworking, but I've got to think about how to best play it out.  Meantime, I always have a little book and pen with me in case a scene or dialogue pops in my head.  It's Listening To Music From Another Room time.**

I finished this sweater way back in May, just as the weather warmed up enough that I couldn't wear it.  I blocked it but didn't even weave in the ends until last month.  It is the White Lizard pattern and I enjoyed working on it.  It was just enough of a challenge to be interesting, but not so much so that I felt like I was losing my mind every other line (unlike the piece I'm working on right now...more on that in a future post).

Nothing to say about the pattern that I didn't write in my ravelry notes.  The yarn is a German one I bought on sale 18 months ago and I've no complaints about it.  I would use it again, for sure.  

The garden is almost done for the season; I'm still picking tomatoes from the one super productive plant, but we are getting close to frost, so I think it is just a matter of days before that is all done.  The pics represent only a fraction of the tomatoes I've picked off that plant.  This is probably three or four weeks' worth and I started picking in August.

The squirrels have been an absolute nuisance in the back this year and NOTHING deters them, being the hardy urban creatures they are.  I got a sonic thing with flashing lights and nada.  Doesn't even slow them down.  

Tried coffee, that worked for a day, but then they acclimated. Tried putting the coffee pods from our espresso machine, which worked for a day, but they acclimated. Tried Irish Spring soap, nothing. 

I did get packets of some kind of natural deterrent from amazon that seem to have done something. It deters them more than anything else, but not 100%. I'll take what I can get, since they seem determined to dig up all my plants back there.

In my garden plot, I got three more watermelons in September! They grew after I picked in August and assumed the vine was done. While not as tasty at the August ones, they were fine enough.

I need to plant spring bulbs, but there's not a screaming rush at the moment.  I did something to my shoulder this week and while the chiropractor was able to do some good yesterday, I'm still uncomfortable, so I should hold off on heavy work for a bit.  Maybe next week. 

On the off chance you are looking for family-friendly viewing, may I recommend the Netflix reboot of Lost in Space?  It is so good!  (And pretty squeaky clean by today's standards).  There are three seasons that form one coherent narrative arc.  I've been rewatching it with my kids and we are all enjoying it.  The production values are very high, the acting and writing wonderful.  I love the family dynamic at the heart of the show.  Highly recommend.

Right, so that's me!  

~

*I don't generally post pics of other people's kids, but these were already shared on our school's social media page, so I feel comfortable sharing them here.

**This may just be my own process, but I find there comes a point where the characters are living enough in my head that scenes and dialogue come to me in random moments.  The experience is like eavesdropping; you just listen to see what they have to say and put it down as fast as you can!  I don't always use everything I write down, but it is always helpful.

Shakespeare Lovers, Rejoice!

For Antony and Cleopatra is available to watch at home!  I recently discovered that the National Theater in London has an At-Home rental option, so you can watch shows that were staged there over the past few years.  The filming is professionally done and with a live audience, so you feel like you are in the room with the production.

This production of Antony and Cleopatra was staged in 2018 with Ralph Fiennes in the title role of Antony and Sophie Okonedo as Cleopatra. Ralph Fiennes (pronounced Rafe) is a particular long-time favorite of mine; it is a joy to watch that man work. Also, I admire that he taught himself Russian and now speaks it well enough to have done two films in the language!

Antony and Cleopatra features electric performances by both actors, and the production is amazing.  The actors deliver the lines in a naturalistic way (much like the amazing Henry IV/V triology in the The Hollow Crown).  Once your ear accustoms to the rhythm, it is very easy to follow what is happening.  

The sets are clever, placed on a rotating wheel that allows for different central sets to rise from the floor, including a shallow pool with real water in it!  Fiennes has a particular passion for Shakespeare staged in modern dress, and this production does that very well. (I don't always love this approach with Shakespeare, because it can get campy or be distracting).  The costumes are wonderful!  There is surprising humor in the show, and unexpected moments (there is a collective gasp from the audience toward the end that I found affecting).  

Let me know what you think if you watch it!  I'm hip-deep in costume alterations/fittings for the Upper School musical at my kids' school, and this was the perfect accompaniment to my sewing. 

Talking Tuesday: Hamlet's Just Deserts

 

 

Recently, I rewatched Kenneth Brannagh's masterful production of Hamlet.  It is possibly his best work on screen.  The film came out when I was in college, and I remember eagerly awaiting its arrival in the video stores (remember those?)  I went to a small college in the middle of nowhere, and had to wait on the small local video store to get it before renting, but I promptly declared I had a hot date with Shakespeare and settled in on a Friday night to watch it.  All four hours.  

 

Most productions of Hamlet cut some of the subplots to bring it to a more standard 2 hours, but Brannagh chose to make an uncut version, weaving together all the complex story lines.  (I took several days to watch it, since these days I rarely have four hours to sit in front of a screen uninterrupted).

First was what an excellent cast Brannagh assembled--the top Shakespearean actors of the time (it is a kind of a Who's Who of that set) plus a high quality listing of American actors like Charlton Heston, Billy Crystal, and Robin Williams.  Simon Russell Beale has a small role as one of the grave diggers (I almost didn't recognize him!) and John Gielgud has a role as Priam--I believe it was one of Gielgud's last screen roles, although his portrayal of the Pope in Elizabeth may have been the very last.  The two films were released close together, so I couldn't say exactly.  Brian Blessed, a long time collaborator of Brannagh's, plays the dead king to perfection, and Derick Jacobi's Claudius is oily and inspired.  

Hamlet is, at its heart, a play about grief.  It is about a son grieving his father, about a wife grieving a husband and making poor choices about her future life from the depths of that grief by marrying her brother-in-law. 

 

 

(The movie Ophelia makes the bold claim that Gertrude's choice to marry Claudius came from a desperate desire to maintain her youth and sexual desirability.  I'm not sure what I think of this, but it certainly could be true.  A perimenopausal woman watching her vigorous son and Ophelia together may well have felt the forgotten woman.  On the other hand, you have to feel for Ophelia, who was madly in love with Hamlet, had given herself to him in anticipation of a marriage to come, but instead is driven to madness by Hamlet's poor treatment of her.  One wonders if he had just let her in on what was going on, perhaps she would have gone along with the deception.  I found myself increasingly frustrated on her behalf, and wanted to yell at Hamlet to just tell her already). 

 

 

I heard someone say once that it was too bad that Gertrude and Hamlet couldn't have just sat down for a heart-to-heart and shared their grief over the king's death, as the whole tragedy of what follows could possibly have been avoided.  But then we wouldn't have a play to discuss and use as a mirror for ourselves.  Hamlet's famous "To be or not to be" speech is about a man in deep pain; a pain so deep he contemplates the end of his existence.  By the end of the speech, Hamlet recovers himself, and decides that yes, he does want to live, but his life will be one of revenge for his dead father.

There was a line that struck me between the eyes, so to speak, in Act 2, Scene II.  In it, Hamlet meets his university friends, Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern, whom Claudius has sent for in the hopes that they will rouse Hamlet from his melancholy madness.  Hamlet's madness is written in such a way that it can be played a deliberate deception or as genuine insanity; Brannagh chooses the former, clearly using the guise of madness as a cover for his real plans to uncover the poisoning of the old king by Claudius.  

Toward the end of the scene, a group of players arrive at the palace to put on a play for the court.  Hamlet is delighted to see them, and sees that he can use them for his own ends.  That is, he will direct them to put on a play that exposes Claudius' perfidy to the entire court in the guise of a story about Troy.  Hamlet is giving his instructions to the lead player, and Lord Polonius (Ophelia's father) is increasingly concerned about Hamlet's state of mind, particularly given Hamlet's previous attachment to his daughter. 

Hamlet and the lead player have been exchanging words about the play, and the lead actor (played by Charlton Heston), assures Hamlet that he is well aware of the classical references Hamlet seeks.  Polonius is unsure of the subtext of the verbal parrying between the two men and keeps interjecting his own commentary.  Hamlet rudely tells Polonius where to put it, but then this exchange caught my ear:

LORD POLONIUS
My lord, I will use them according to their desert.

HAMLET
God's bodykins, man, much better: use every man
after his desert, and who should 'scape whipping?
Use them after your own honour and dignity: the less
they deserve, the more merit is in your bounty.
Take them in.

Given Hamlet's underlying desire for vengeance over the old king's untimely death, it is an interesting thing to say: that everyone under the sun is deserving of death and destruction, but that we should not use people thusly.  We should rather treat people as we would be treated, with honor and dignity.  It is, I think, the moment that Hamlet reveals his hand: that his madness is an affect, that he desires justice for his father, and a redress of the wrongs done.  

Unfortunately, Hamlet's machinations take on a life of their own, and in the scandal and intrigue that follow, the Danish court is too distracted by the unfolding drama to notice that their old enemy Fortinbras, at the head of the Norwegian army, has breached their borders and overrun the palace, finding the king, queen, Hamlet, and Laertes dead, Polonius and Ophelia having met their untimely ends earlier in the play.  

It is a tragedy of the highest order, and so very human.

Talking Tuesday: Sonnet 116 {read aloud!}

 

 

 

 

Yarn Along: Coriolanus and Mending

Longtime readers will know that I have a long-standing love affair with Shakespeare, and I find that when things look bleak, his work always has something to say to me.  The National Theater in London decided to offer some of its catalog of filmed live performances in limited free YouTube runs to raise money for the arts since the theaters remain closed.  

Last Thursday, 6/4, Coriolanus opened for a limited one-week run.  I've seen this (filmed) production before, and highly recommend it.  The Ralph Fiennes film version is also excellent, but I really like Josie Rourke's work and style, and the stripped down sets in the Donmar Warehouse pared with the minimalist costuming really let the words shine.  It's a very muscular performance.  We showed the play to the boys this weekend, and it was surprisingly resonant.  

Coriolanus is a play about a military hero who returns to Rome after an unlikely victory over northern invaders, and is pushed by his monstrous mother into a political position he neither desires nor is well-suited for.  He is a man consumed by anger against his enemies, who seeks revenge at every opportunity; the pivotal moment he learns to temper his rage and seek peace, he suffers greatly for it.  

It is also a play about the power and fickleness of the mob, and how things get twisted all out of shape by passions run amok.  There were so many lines that stayed with me, particularly the one about Coriolanus' all-consuming quest for revenge.  After Coriolanus is banished from Rome and joins forces with his former enemy to sack Rome, the Roman senator Menenius says:  "This Martius [Coriolanus] is grown from man to dragon: he has wings; he’s more than a creeping thing."  

The free YouTube access will end this Thursday, so watch it while you can!  It is well worth the time.

In the middle of all that is going on in the world (and indeed, continuing in my own city), the small intimate details of daily goings on continue to color the tapestry of life.  School is officially out.  We had our last homeschool work on Friday, Piglet had his virtual graduation into Logic school (a big deal in the classical curriculum), and are now on "summer" break.  Whatever that means this year.  I'm sad for all that Piglet missed, but so so grateful for all the ways the school tried to celebrate the kids' transition to Logic school as best they could.  Mostly, I'm just relieved to not be teaching Ponchik (aka Captain Pokey Pants) right now.

I still can't write, because: lockdown (on yellow phase since Friday, but not that different from the red phase), so I've been sketching and coloring.  The above is a little composition I worked on last week.  I have a few other pencil sketches ready to color, but have other things I need to do this week before I get to that.  It is creatively satisfying, I'll say that.

I've been knitting a little here and there, but not with any real concentration.  I set aside my wool work for some linen yarn I had in the bin, leftover from the Gemini.  I decided to make a little summer shawl with it and am using the same Simply pattern as I was using on the tonal sock yarn from last month.  I don't love knitting with this yarn (as evidenced by how long it took me to finish the Gemini) but I want to use it up, and the color works well with my summer palette.

 My reading has been all over the place, but I finally cracked Kate Davies' Wheesht last week, and am finding much to ponder in it.  As with so much of her work, she manages to shine a light on things I had not considered before, to reframe ways of doing, and to think differently about the world.  All to say: I'm enjoying it immensely. 

The first chapter is about mending, so I present: my mending pile.  So.much.darning.  My only observation about the mending chapter is that while it is a good thing to mend, and to find meaning in darning, and creativity in the process, there is also a lot of dull drudgery in keeping up with mending for six people, three of whom are extremely hard on socks.  But still.  There is something to mending that which is broken, both physically and metaphysically, and one can inform the other.

This passage from the second chapter spoke to me as well:

It was a hard choice between her book and Who Fears Death as my next read, but decided Kate's work was worth a ponder at the moment.  Yuri Slezkine's In the House of Government just showed up this morning, but as it is a doorstop of a book, I think it will take some time to get through.   

We celebrated Pentecost yesterday, and the house has green leaves stuck various places, plus we had a small kitchen garden of edibles installed last week.  It is good for my soul to see green things growing.

 

Linking with Ginny for Yarn Along.

Shakespeare in the Quarantine

My sister sent this little cartoon to me a few weeks ago, and I love it so much. 

We finished showing the Henry IV-V triology to the boys this past weekend (The Hollow Crown, series 1.  Go right this instant and watch it if you haven't yet.  I'll wait...) It was so much fun to not only go on the journey of Prince Hal once again, but to share it with the boys.  They've read the stories in our Usborne books, and have a lot of history under their belts, so they were able to situate the plays and follow the plot.  It just so happens that Piglet is studying this period of history in school this year anyway, so that was an added bonus (they are currently up to the Wars of the Roses).

One of the best things I ever heard said about Shakespeare was by Ewan McGregor, who spoke about preparing to play the lead in As You Like It in drama school.  He said he was intimidated by playing Shakespeare, and initially couldn't get past the idea that he had no right to be on stage doing it.

McGregor (26:11): "But then, something happened in the second or third week of rehearsal, something just went...[plock], it just tasted so good in my mouth, the words." 

Yes, exactly.  Delicious.

March Magpie Madness ~Yarn Along~

How's that for an alliterative title??

 

~knitting~

I worked steadily on my Sorbet Doocot...right up until I got magpie fever and decided to stash bust some orangey-yellow yarn on a raglan cardigan for Ponchik.  In fairness, she is outgrowing almost all her sweaters right now, and we still have several months of layer-weather, whereas I can get along without another sweater at the moment.

 I've had the yarn for ages (two skeins of Preciosa from KnitPicks in a discontinued color), but I'm not sure I have enough, so I might have to augment with another color somewhere in there.  The yarn is a funny wind--it feels almost like knitting with roving, but the hand-dyed effect is undeniably pretty!  The yarn does have a subtle twist to it, so perhaps it is single-ply?  I have some vintage buttons that I think will match perfectly and am excited to use.

I've officially hit the part of the year where my hair makes me crazy and have been wearing berets on the regular.  The two I have aren't quite enough, so I swatched my ample supply of Lava Heather Swish for another, and have plans to make a second out of the leftover yellow yarn from last year's Daisy Carbeth (now retired, RIP).  I'm all about the yellow accents this year--it's my new neutral.

(This is a purchased hat, because I don't knit particularly fast, and just needed something).

 ~reading~

Nothing worth writing about.  A fantasty triology by Sarah J. Maas called The Court of Thorns and Roses.  It's fine--light bedtime reading.  Still haven't finished book two of the All Souls Triology or cracked anything I got for Christmas.  All in due season, I suppose.  Fr. Alexander Men's An Inner Step Toward God is back on my stack for a re-read during Lent.  I confess I've started this Lent with absolutely nothing--no reserve, no emotional filter, very little energy for much beyond the bare essentials of keeping the household running.  

~sewing~

Kinder Chinners!  The violin teacher at my kids' school approached me a few weeks ago about purchasing these for the younger violin students at the school (I head the Parent Association, and these kinds of requests often come to me).  They are used with beginning violin students to make the chin rest more comfortable for them.  When I priced them out, it was much cheaper to make them myself.  

It was the perfect Clean Week thing to do, and I spent yesterday cutting and sewing in an assembly line while watching Henry VI Part II and part of Richard the III with Benedict Cumberbatch as Richard.  (I decided that I can't give up screen time for Lent for a variety of reasons, but am restricting what I do watch to a narrow set of options).

~watching~

The second series of The Hollow Crown is good (but flawed as history, given Shakespeare's position at Elizabeth's court and the need to legitimize the Tudor throne).  Cumberbatch gives a great performance, but I like the first series better, both for the plays and the performances.  Also, can I just note that Anton Lesser is a very busy man these days?  He's become the British character actor to watch.  

Just before Lent started, I watched Kenneth Branagh's story about the end of Shakepeare's life called All Is True.  It was a good thing to watch without close attention (i.e. while folding laundry).  Ditto Knives Out, which was a collection of great performances, although Daniel Craig definitely stole the show.  The film is what would happen if Agatha Christie and Guy Ritchie had a movie baby together--ha!

My husband and I have been watching The Crown on and off for some time, and are slowly working through season 2 (I know, I know).  We watched episode six ("Vergangenheit") and it was stunningly good, grappling with issues of forgiveness and reconciliation, both at a societal and personal level.  My husband noted that the writers could have parsed this a bit further, and I agree, but given the complexity of the subject matter, I thought it was handled extremely well.  If you want to go all tin-hat conspiracy theory, if Joseph Kennedy had won the U.S. presidency in 1932 instead of FDR, and Edward VII had stayed king of England instead of abdicating, the world would have been a completely different place in 1950 (and by extension, today).

That's all I got today!  Linking with Ginny for Yarn Along.