this week in literature

CHARLES BUKOWSKI TRIBUTE READING

charlesbukowski

SON OF A PONY READING SERIES
Cornelia Street Cafe
29 Cornelia St. between West Fourth & Bleecker Sts.
Friday, January 1, $7, 6:00 – 8:00
212-989-9319
www.corneliastreetcafe.com

If the massive marathon event at the Poetry Project is a little too much for you to take all at once, the Cornelia Street Cafe is holding its second annual New Year’s Day tribute to the rather iconoclastic, eclectic, and iconic Charles Bukowski. Hosted by Kat Georges, the evening includes poetry readings and performances by Peter Carlaftes, Bob Quattrone, Angelo Verga, George Wallace, and Ryan Buynak, videos of Bukowski, prizes, book giveaways, and, appropriately, one free drink with admission. And if you want to read your own favorite poem by Bukowski or your own poem inspired by the writer, you can sign up to participate as well.

WILLIAM BLAKE / JANE AUSTEN / CHARLES DICKENS / GIACOMO PUCCINI

William Blake, “Mysterious Dream,” watercolor over traces of black chalk

Morgan Library & Museum
225 Madison Ave. at 36th St.
Closed Monday
Admission: $12 adults, $8 children under sixteen (free Fridays 7:00 – 9:00)
212-685-0008
www.themorgan.org

While they’re not exactly the Rat Pack and didn’t exactly hang out together – although there is some overlap of when they existed here on earth – William Blake (1757-1827), Jane Austen (1775-1817), Charles Dickens (1812-70), and Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924) make for quite a foursome at the Morgan Library this holiday season. A master engraver, painter, Romantic poet, and religious nut, Blake was a visionary artist who claimed that some of his work came from, well, otherworldly visions. “William Blake’s World: ‘A New Heaven Is Begun’” (through January 3) includes such awe-inspiring pieces as “Satan,” “Chaucer’s Canterbury Pilgrims,” the gorgeous watercolor series he did illustrating the Book of Job (even throwing in Jesus for good measure), the wacky “First Book of Urizen,” a letter from Blake to one of his patrons, a pair of plates of his most famous poem, “The Tyger,” and his anti-New World screed, “America: A Prophecy.” Blake, who died poor and was buried in an unmarked grave, had remarkable skill and a mind that just did not quite fit in his time.

The Morgan takes a revealing look at one of England’s greatest novelists in “A Woman’s Wit: Jane Austen’s Life and Legacy” (through March 14), comprising original manuscripts, letters, and illustrated editions as well as Blake’s portrait of Harriet Quentin, which Austen saw in London. Austen, who published anonymously because of her gender, penned such classic books as PRIDE AND PREJUDICE, MANSFIELD PARK, EMMA, and SENSE AND SENSIBILITY, all dealt with in this exhibition. Her writings are placed in context alongside satiric cartoons by James Gillray and diary entries and a documentary film in which other authors discuss Austen’s lasting influence. The letter from her sister Cassandra announcing Jane’s death is simply heartbreaking.

John Leech, detail, “Mr. Fezziwig’s Ball,” original watercolor illustration for Charles Dickens’s CHRISTMAS CAROL, first edition, 1843

Running through January 10 in the McKim Building, “Charles Dickens’s A CHRISTMAS CAROL” features Dickens’s original marked-up manuscript of the holiday tale, written in six weeks in 1843 and bound in red leather shortly after its publication. The book is in the McKim Building, which will be open to the public for free on Tuesdays from 3:00 to 5:00, Fridays (except Christmas and New Year’s Day) from 7:00 to 9:00 (when the entire museum is free), and Sundays from 4:00 to 6:00. Finally, the Morgan is displaying more than three dozen items that look into the life and legacy of Italian composer Giacomo Puccini in “Celebrating Puccini” (through January 10), including letters, posters, and original manuscripts for LA BOHÈME and MADAMA BUTTERFLY.

LAST CHANCE: CHELSEA ART STROLL

Dan Flavin show warms the heart in cold Chelsea (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

You don’t have to seek out a fireplace, Christmas tree, and cup of cider to escape the chills of the holiday season; instead, you can bask in the warm glow of “Dan Flavin: Series and Progressions,” at David Zwirner in Chelsea through December 19, multiple connected spaces in which Flavin’s minimalist light sculptures bounce soft reds, oranges, yellows, greens, blues, and more off one another. But as welcoming as most of the show is, one of Flavin’s barriers, “untitled (to Helga and Carlo, with respect and affection),” cuts the last room in half, a stark difference from the other pieces, as well as “alternating pink and gold,” which runs around the walls of the cavernous gallery next door. Several other shows worth seeing are also closing on December 19. In Luke Smalley’s “Sunday Drive – A Memorial Exhibition” at ClampArt, the photographer, who passed away in May at the age of fifty-three, has created a narrative series in which three hot young women visit their hot young boyfriends in prison, but Smalley, as was his wont, focuses on the macho males, who seem to have walked right out of a Bruce Weber shoot.

Form meets function in Judd furniture show (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

If you’re still seeking warmth, stop in to see “Bill Viola: Bodies of Light” at James Cohan and allow yourself to be hypnotized by the thirty-minute high-def video “Old Oak (Study),” as the sun rises and sets behind a stunning tree. The show also features eight other short video projects, including several that involve water in a fascinating way. And if you do decide to head to Chelsea to see these last-chance displays, be sure to stop by Julie Saul from 4:00 to 6:00, when New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast will be signing copies of THEORIES OF EVERYTHING in conjunction with the exhibition “Sad Sacks, Worry Warts, Hellions & Bad Eggs: A New Print Series,” which continues through January 9. In addition to the fun prints are several of Chast’s charmingly decorated pysanka Easter eggs. Also on view at Julie Saul is “Heads: A Group Exhibition,” featuring works by Rineke Dijkstra, Soo Kim, Gary Schneider, Tanya Marcuse, and others. Finally, if you find yourself getting tired from all the running around, do not – we repeat, do not – take a seat in any of the chairs at Sebastian + Barquet, where a little-known side of Donald Judd is being revealed through December 23. It turns out that he loved making functional furniture, and several examples of his work are on display, looking very Judd-like.

UNINHABITABLE MANSIONS

Brooklyn indie supergroup is supporting strong debut album

Tuesday, December 15, Bowery Ballroom, 6 Delancey St., $12-$15, 7:30
Sunday, December 20, Cameo, 93 North Sixth St.
www.myspace.com/uninhabitablemansions

Uninhabitable Mansions is an art collective and Brooklyn mini-supergroup that features Annie Hart from Au Revoir Simone, Danny Comer and Chris Diken from Radical Dads, Doug Marvin from Dirty on Purpose, and Robbie Guertin and Tyler Sargent from Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Their debut album is a steady stream of inventive indie pop that enjoys stopping and starting, dropping in and out and back again, with most songs developing slowly and quietly at the outset. Indeed, UM is in no hurry, which is a good thing, because the characters in their songs are often lost souls, waiting for something or someone, not knowing where they’re going. “There’s nothing here to see for miles,” they sing in “Big Kick,” which charges out of the gate with a searing guitar line that lasts for nearly a minute before the lyrics begin. (The six-strings go deliriously screechy at the end.) In the acoustic-based “Do You Have a Strategy?,” which features an infectiously quirky hook, they explain, “You say someday our bones will turn to dust / Darling, it’s true, but what’s the rush / A little rust wouldn’t hurt you / Let’s stop right here / The days will wait for us.” In the trifecta of “Do You Have a Strategy?” “Midnight Topography,” and “Maps: Not Accurate,” references are made to missing landmarks, shifting skylines, standing in thin air, and maps, over and over. They sing of escape, looking for a way out, drifting, floating, heading in the wrong direction, searching for a “place that nobody knows.” “Staring at the ceiling and you start to get the feeling that / There’s nowhere to go,” they sing in the poppy “We Already Know.” The band’s subtle, ethereal sound befits the line “We’re sick of solid ground” from the album’s opener, “The Speed Is Deceiving,” and indeed, much of the record itself is deceiving, in compelling ways. In addition to being musicians, UM also makes unique literary and art projects; for example, on their Web site, you can purchase Diken’s short story “The Killer at the Beach” paired with a trench coat designed by Sara Jones as well as T-shirts, handmade books by Guertin, and even a yardstick. On December 15, they’re playing with the Antlers and Sharon Van Etten at a sold-out Bowery Ballroom show, but there are still tickets available for their December 20 gig at the Cameo Gallery inside the Lovin’ Cup Cafe with Revival Times and Pocketknife.

SECRETARY STATE MADELEINE ALBRIGHT ON WORLD AFFAIRS

Madeleine Albrigh (center) gets ready for speech during her fiftieth college reunion at Wellesley (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

Madeleine Albright (center) gets ready for speech during her fiftieth college reunion at Wellesley (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

92nd St. Y, Kaufmann Concert Hall
1395 Lexington Ave. at 92nd St.
Sunday, December 13, $27, 4:00
212-415-5500
www.92y.org

This past June, we attended a rousing speech by former secretary of state Madeleine Albright as she discussed international diplomacy and the founding of the Madeleine Korbel Albright Institute for Global Affairs at her alma mater, Wellesley College. The inspirational Dr. Albright has a refreshing, unique take on world politics, and she tells it like it is with great candor and humor. She’ll be at the 92nd St. Y on December 13, sharing her insights in a special program moderated by Tom Oliphant and followed by a signing of her latest book, READY MY PINS: STORIES FROM A DIPLOMAT’S JEWEL BOX (Harper, September 2009). Dr. Albright will follow that up with a talk to high school groups only on December 14 at the Museum of Arts and Design, where she will show how she incorporated her brooch collection into her diplomatic methodology.

EARVIN “MAGIC” JOHNSON

whenthegamewasours

NBA Store
666 Fifth Ave. at 52nd St.
Tuesday, December 8, free, 5:30 – 7:00
212-515-6221
www.nba.com/nycstore
www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com

Local basketball fans haven’t had much to smile about this season, as the Knicks and Nets battle it out for lottery position in next year’s draft and the Knicks keep dreaming that LeBron James will be leaving Cleveland. (Note to Knicks — keep dreaming.) But if it’s a b-ball smile you’re after, then head over to the NBA Store in Midtown today to meet the one and only Magic Johnson, who can still smile like nobody’s business. Johnson is out on the road in support of his latest book, WHEN THE GAME WAS OURS (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, November 2009, $26), written with his archnemesis and longtime friend, Larry Bird. The stellar rivals redefined the game in the late 1970s and 1980s, from the 1979 NCAA championship pitting Magic’s Michigan State Spartans against Bird’s Indiana State Sycamores through classic NBA finals in 1984, 1985, and 1987. Cowritten with journalist Jackie MacMullan, WHEN THE GAME WAS OURS looks back at a very different time, when two supreme players left it all out on the court, day after day. We may never see their like again.

JUST WORKING ON MY NOVEL

The multitalented Jean Grae gets into literary criticism at the Tank

The Tank
345 West 45th St.
Monday, December 7, free, 7:30
www.thetanknyc.org
www,jeangraesblog.blogspot.com
www.russmarshalek.squarespace.com

Journalist and novelist Masha Hamilton (31 HOURS), who founded the Camel Book Drive and the Afghan Women’s Writing Project, and the unpredictable and outrageous rapper/DJ/writer Jean Grae, who is four chapters into her online collection “The State of Eh,” are hosting the latest bimonthly literary gathering known as Just Working on My Novel, in which they will read from their own published and unpublished works and critique that of others. To join them onstage and read from your own writings, e-mail russ@russcomm.net to see if there are any spots left. And you needn’t be a writer to come to this free event at the Tank, where you can offer your own opinions and marvel at the amazing Ms. Grae.