Salon News

September forwards 2014: Proust, Faulkner, Durrell, Woolf

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absalom

STARTING IN SEPTEMBER
In Search of Lost Time Vol. I The Way by Swann’s by Marcel Proust 8 weeks £120 meeting times offered: Tuesday afternoons, Wednesday evenings (starting week of Sept. 8th)
Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner 4 week study Monday afternoons or evenings, £65

STARTING IN OCTOBER
The Alexandria Quartet by Lawrence Durrell (Monday evenings)
4 week study of Virginia Woolf’s The Waves

Starting in January: 20 week study of James Joyce’s Ulysses

Proust, Faulkner, Joyce: the names may be weighty, but once in the work, the beauty of the language and the provocation of ideas and deeper contemplation buoys us up. I hope you can join us for these dynamic studies.

Any given moment–no matter how casual, how ordinary–is poised, full of gaping life…

–Anne Michaels, Fugitive Pieces
Last week in the mad dash before leaving London, I had added events & published the Salon newsletter only to have the website crash inexplicably the morning I flew. With limited access, limited time and much more limited skills, I turned to the technical support friends who have helped me with this difficult work– and so I am re-sending this newsletter with the events back in place… thanks to all for your patience and apologies for the frustrations — please let me know if you have any questions or if anything is unclear…
See you in the pages..

Summer Reflections

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The hardest part is first: the choice to jump or dive, the purposeful, against base instinct launching into air towards a chill, shimmering, unknown surface. The body knows once the choice has been made, nothing will remain the same- submersion is never partial and the motion, once started, cannot be halted. But then you are in the water, and every surface receptor, your facial skin, arms, belly, skull cries out with the exquisite change in temperature and sensation and you are reborn.

Before I left London last week I went swimming at the Women’s Pond in the Heath with a lively gang of women awake (I emphasize that as it was before most folks have rolled out of bed, these women regularly hit the trails then the water in a breath – drawing ritual of immersion) to the wonders of the world around them.

As I travel and prepare  new studies coming in London and Paris, I am so sharply aware of place and self-propulsion, the launching out, the sensitivity to where I am, the way in which the widening circle around you is a keen interaction of what you create and offer melded to an awareness of where you are.

My younger students gifted me Wild Swimming by Daniel Start to join my collection of books celebrating the electrifying experience of plunge into live waters.  This joins Wild Swim by Kate Rew,  a beautiful testimony to all the lovely outdoor swims available in England- reading her descriptions of great swims across this Island makes me want to stay here forever–or at least until I have done all these swims. The introduction also got me thinking about how the act of plunging into water is that recurring, almost cliché metaphor for committing to a thing. Going more deeply (please excuse the punning- I cannot help myself), I think about how the moment of diving in means crossing boundaries, from our air-filled world to a watery realm, from the known experience of earth and stable objects to the fluidity and flux of moving liquid. My body knows I cannot live there, but I am hungry for the immersion, for the testing of time under water, for the discovery of what I cannot see on the surface, for the change in light and smell and feeling. How apt for any new undertaking, for any project or experience that requires the whole-hearted commitment of oneself without seeing where you will land!

So without having all the pieces in place, without knowing if it will work, we dive in– to new relationships, towards new goals, to new projects…the Salon offering a program for a dating service? Teaching Ulysses  in the psycho-therapeutic community? Offering a Salon to a community in need healing? The fear and the possibility of the new…

Will it work? Can we do it?  Too late- the body arcs, the earth is left behind.

I will be out of London from mid-July into August- travelling, writing, reading and swimming with Madeline- but will check email regularly. Please email me if you have questions, comments or feedback of any sort.

See you in the pages…

June Paris Salons–Alice Munro Short Stories

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Fluide by SandJo

PARIS SALONS JUNE 6-7th– use the links to register
June 6th 7-10 PM– Short story Salon: the final four stories from Alice Munro’s most recent collection: Dear Life

Last chance to register– three spaces remaining

From Opening notes for Dear Life Salon

I am always a bit astonished by how casually Munro uses her artistry to illuminate the everyday—the superficially banal experience of life in small-town Canada in the middle years of the 20th ct. (I know, spoken like an arrogant urbanite)—while gesturing towards the open veins of unspoken truths & sudden transcendence.  One minute you are reading about a silver fox farm used to produce skins and next, you are examining the quiet mental violence of gender education. This is, for me, the most succinct response to the subtle art of the short story. If I am drifting through a short story and interested in the What Happens, the story is a lovely flavor that becomes difficult to describe the day after—even though I feel something has shifted in my awareness from the time in the story’s world. It is in Munro’s work that I am quickly aware that although I am right there with her narrators, registering the quiet shocks and frustrations of growing up and coming to awareness, I am also travelling much more profoundly below the surface of the complicated maps of human relationships and self-knowledge.

June 7th 5:30-10 PM– Thomas Mann’s Magic Mountain the final assault –SALON FULL

Heading into summer–the days are stretching out, schedules shifting and a different mood–one of possibilities and bursts of warmth are invigorating my soul. Although these studies are right around the corner  the only one open to subscription is the Alice Munro Short Story study– which offers a manageable read in preparation. I hope to offer the Fall Salon schedule by mid-June– I welcome all suggestions and requests (both works to study and preferred weekends)…See you in the pages…

A few weeks ago, a lively group gathered in Paris to explore an early work of Alice Munro’s along with her literary mentor, Eudora Welty. We were so taken with the intricacy and subtleties, the beauty and richness of her language that we decided to consider her most recent works. She describes the last four stories in  Dear Life as 

…not quite stories. They form a separate unit, one that is autobiographical in feeling, though not, sometimes, entirely so in fact. I believe they are the first and last–and the closest–things I have to say about my own life.

 

Happening Salonistas in Paris

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I celebrate the professional and creative (and mostly, professionally creative) activities of members of the Salon community…pass on the good works!

Happening Salonistas in Paris 

 parisgargoyle

  • Long term Salonista and writer extraordinaire Lizzie Harwood has a revamped website: www.editordeluxe.com share the news with anyone looking for editing services or help with their writing and publishing goals.

 

  • The talented and compassionate Helene Larisch has started her own enterprise teaching English to folks with limited vision—her lessons combine literature with spoken English practice in thoughtful and inspiring lessons:   contact :helene.larisch@wanadoo.fr     L’association Tout en Parlant propose à partir de janvier 2014 un cours d’anglais pour les personnes concernées par la basse vision. L’objectif est d’améliorer la compréhension et la pratique de la langue orale avec une méthode adaptée. Le cours a lieu tous les lundis de 14h00 à 15h30 au Centre Social Le Pari’s des Faubourgs, 12 rue Léon Schwartzenberg, 75010 Paris, métro Gare de l’Est.

 

  • Another friend of the Salons, Nathalie Vigier offers a variety of cultural events celebrating language and cultural diversity as well as English and French courses adapted to individual needs. natalievigier@yahoo.fr  and http://www.petitmusc.fr/

Salon Review by Salonista

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By far the most thrilling reading experiences of my life have centred in Kentish Town, in a cosy sitting room in the home of Toby Brothers, the gifted director of the London Literary Salons. Each of the books we read was rich and challenging, but the thrill came from the distinctive style that Toby has evolved for guiding readers through a given text.

Labrynth Tielman

Deeply engaged with and knowledgable about literature, Toby is highly developed as an agile guide, a careful instructor, and perhaps most important, a sensitive and infinitely patient facilitator to the small group of ‘students’ in her charge. She can unite participants of wildly varying levels of education, experience and interests, and help each to bring him or herself to bear upon the study of great works of literature. The thrill comes from the sense of discovery, adventure, and sheer good fun we get from our mutual exploration of a given writer.

 

A lifelong bookworm, I knew there were some works I just wouldn’t get the full meat of on my own – ranging from a slim and perhaps deceptively straightforward-seeming book like ‘Wide Sargasso Sea’ to novels like ‘Invisible Man’ with its deep racial themes, to Shakespeare’s plays, up the granddaddy of all English-major holy grails, Ulysses, by James Joyce. Toby and the London Literary Salon have been invaluable to fully tucking into these and many more. For each, I came away with meat andpotatoes — a careful read bolstered by a side plate of critical insight and nuance unobtrusively provided by Toby.

 

But even better was the unexpected and satisfying savour of the personal and often marvellous insights that Toby draws out of fellow salon participants.

Incidentally, many friendships have bloomed during salon studies and their associated adventures, such as travelling to Dublin for the annual, often raucous celebration of Ulysses and its creator.

 

The American novelist John Williams, author deplored the notion that literature is something to be picked apart, as if it were a puzzle – to be studied rather than experienced. ‘My God, to read without joy is stupid,’ he said. The  London Literary Salon will help readers to experience great books with joy.

Kentishtowner explores what exactly we do

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Getting underneath the best literature
Getting underneath the best literature

The Kentishtowner asked if I would attempt to explain:
So what exactly is a literary salon?
Misplaced your love of literature somewhere along the line? Rediscover it this year with a “spa for the mind”
– See more at: http://www.kentishtowner.co.uk/2014/01/06/exactly-literary-salon/#comments

The comments are the best part…thanks London and Paris Salon folks for getting it said….

 

Teaching and learning should be an opportunity for great generosity – not an intellectual pissing contest.

With that in mind, what then is a literary “salon”? The answer is actually quite simple: it’s an informal study of a particular work of literature, either as a single intensive session or longer weekly series of meetings. Some even describe the experience as “a spa for the mind”. But mostly it’s where we laugh, express our frustrations, query meaning and purpose, and discover great depth in the language and vision of the writer.

My London Literary Salon actually started in Paris, back in 2004, where my partner and I had moved rather abruptly from California. I found myself at a loose end: after working as a mentor teacher and counsellor and unable to find a job teaching in the French system, I was meeting other English-speaking adults who, while loving la vie Parisien, were looking for further intellectual stimulation.

After a particularly heady party, the idea of the salon burst forward. I ran my first study in our apartment with a group of eight women on Beloved by Toni Morrison, a wrenching, complex book with a multi-level narrative. At the end of our five-week study, everyone said, “What’s next?” And so the salon began.

We moved here in 2008. Now based on Falkland Road in Kentish Town, I hope the salon brings to the surface the deepest questions about who we are — and without offering answers, help us understand life’s mysteries. What, for example, does it mean to be human, in different times or different skin, various genders and a spectrum of struggles?

Relaxed: inside the salon

Relaxed: inside the salon

I believe — with the passion of a southern minister that is part of my inheritance — that the best learning is not hierarchical but shared discovery. But a teacher or facilitator can only guide; in a room full of learners you have a vast array of experiences and world views, all of which can enrich the learning experience. This is the basis of the salon: adults that join may be highly educated or not, but all have ideas and insights that expand our study.

We can also discuss issues that are harder to bring up in casual conversation. Take racism and identity, for example: Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man gives us an (apparently) objective platform to get inside the skin of one who is positioned as other – and glimpse how the world looks from there.

Then there is the writing: to grapple with the linguistic pyrotechnics of James Joyce — to enter into his exploration of the body, mind and street-life, to sit in awe of his allusions, musicality and thematic developments – is to expand the possibilities of the written word. To do this with a group of other curious readers who are also struggling allows each to enrich their own understanding many fold.

As facilitator I offer historical context, a biography of the writer, literary criticism, and other areas that the literature engages: the workhouses and debtors prisons of Dickens’ time, for example, or breakdown of Southern aristocracy in Faulkner’s world. The fees are for the physical and metaphorical space provided, the background and discussion notes and the atmosphere of flexibility combined with clear purpose and direction. It is also my responsibility to ensure a balance in the discussion and I do redirect when necessary. I try to keep the salons affordable to encourage a diverse group of participants.

But most of all? I celebrate the variety of participants who choose the Salon: I have seen friendships and relationships grow, and people come to a greater understanding of themselves and others. Reading literature does not need to be an isolating experience: through the salon and other local, grassroots book clubs (MeetUp, for example), there are authentic communities forming from the energy we have for the pure exploration of ideas — and how that connects us deeply.

 

Martin Wednesday 8 January 2014 at 10:30 pm #

Are there any drinks?

– See more at: http://www.kentishtowner.co.uk/2014/01/06/exactly-literary-salon/#comments

 

 

Salon participants describe the Salon

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powerofbooks
The meetings are immensely productive – thanks as ever for steering them so deftly and for drawing the best out of everyone.
London Ulysses, Sound & the Fury, The Magic Mountain

 

The Salon is distinctive in that it truly engages with literature in a way which is sympathetic to both the texts and their readers. It offers a heady mix of discovery in the company of new friends, creative re-engagement with loved (or hated) past reading, and a fulfilling level of intellectual challenge between sensitive and consenting adults.
London Ulysses, Absalom, Absalom, Passion of New Eve…

 

Stimulating. Supportive. Sociable. Multiply those three terms by at least a million and what do you get? Toby Brothers’ Literary Salon, that’s what. A galvanising gateway to some of the most challenging – but rewarding – works in the modernist canon (and before and beyond); a much-needed meeting point for quick, quirky minds of all ages, shapes and backgrounds. In short, Ms Brothers is gifted with a strange and lovely alchemy that transforms the torpor of a typical Tuesday evening into something intriguingly torrid and tantalising…
London Ulysses, Sound and The Fury, To the Lighthouse

I’ve really enjoyed it. particularly the fact thats its enabled me to access a book i wouldnt otherwise get to penetrate. and its made so much easier and enjoyabel abd informative to do so with other people. some of whom i have to say formidably smart. thats the other side iver enjoyed is the group. v generous warm group. occassional spikiness which is always welcome for the added frisson. not sure that i see it as educational forum. although that is what it is i gguess. look forward to joining other salons at some point. I also love how its spun me out in totally different directions and looking into other books etc that i wouldnt otherwise have got it.

London Ulysses 2013, Dante’s Divine Commedia 2011
Joining the Ulysses salon was one of the best things I have ever done. A book I had wanted to read for years but never got past the first section. I had no idea what the salon would be like and was very apprehensive about joining up.  But Toby so skilfully guided us through it, her knowledge of the text seemingly inexhaustible, that with her warmth and generosity and sensitivity she got everyone involved and the satisfaction of participating in the salon and in getting an understanding of this marvellous work was immense.
London Ulysses 

I just discovered William Faulkner through the London Literary Salon. His writing is exhilarating, brilliant, challenging and many-layered. Reading and thinking in preparation for the study session as well as joining in meant I got so much more out of the stories than if I had been reading purely for leisure. Toby Brothers’ opening notes help alert you to hidden themes and her orchestration of the Salon discussion ensures that everybody has a chance to say and hear the insights of themselves and others, exposing and questioning the deeper layers of meaning. A nice touch: we take it in turns to read aloud. Such a pleasant change.
“The Bear”, The Sound and The Fury London 2012-13

As with other salons I have not necessarily liked the book, but I have liked both the quality of the writing and primarily the quality of the conversation.When I have mentioned the salon, I have been challenged as to why I would pay to attend a book club, when surely these are free. I guess for me the key differences are:

  • The books have been selected for reasons, other than 1 book club members personal choice.
  • The sessions are guided, rather than everyone just saying what they liked and did not like.
  • The sessions are more like seminars, than a book club session and I have always learned a great deal from your and others perspectives.
  • It trains your mind to read in a different way.
  • I like the chance to eat and chat too.

Wide Sargasso Sea, The Wasteland, Richard III London 2013

I loved the one evening on TS Eliot ( we did meet a 2nd time) but it seemed perfect match of time, atmos and material.
Similarly, the Angela Carter, The New Eve, worked really well in the 3 meetings you scheduled. Really managed to get the work done and feel stretched but not hurried.
ILLIAD was brave but I think it worked in the time we had.  I enjoyed it.
 I’d love to do more poetry, especially Elliot.  I learn so much from the others and from you and there was time.
Wasteland, Passion of New Eve, Iliad London 2012-13
I love the salon for providing an opportunity to read and discuss works of fiction in a warm and welcoming environment.  I can thoroughly recommend the salon as a life-affirming and mind-expanding experience.  Toby is an experienced facilitator who manages to elicit the best of all participants, welcoming debate and even disagreement, but always in a civilised and thoughtfully mature manner.
Paradise Lost London 2012, Ulysses 2012

Moving towards the Magic Mountain by the Lighthouse; visiting Alice Munro along the way…

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Upcoming Salons–Register now to get the opening notes and start reading…

Having survived the Wide Sargasso Sea, we are going to climb Mann’s Magic Mountain and go to The Lighthouse– visiting the peculiar and gorgeous realm of Alice Munro along the way…of course, some of us are still embroiled in the Sound and the Fury….

There is room for another intensive study in the coming months: if you have a request, please contact us….

Coming Studies  for more information about each of the following, please visit the Events page

Alice Munro Short Stories One night study November 4th 7:30-10 PM
Munro’s award of the Nobel Prize for literature is the perfect excuse to offer a study based on two of her short stories. We will look closely at “Runaway” and “Boys and Girls” in this single meeting and consider her unique voice in probing the intimacy and peculiarities of the human heart. That’s Alice Munro in the picture below– reminding us of the need for laughter in the midst of our contemplations.

alice munro

Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann
Starting week of November 12th
Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain has been grouped with the two other giant Modernist classics Ulysses and Remembrance of Things Past as the formative novels of the Modernist era. A first dip in to the text reveals an accessible, lilting narrative that once in, you find yourself considering time, society, passion, memory from the strange angle of remove that characterises the perspective of the invalid. Mann’s work is also deeply political; placed before WWI but written between WWI and WWII, MM engages questions of Nationalism and nostalgia with the shadow of future events shifting the weight of the ironic stance that Mann employs.

We will need some time to encounter the richness and length of this work: the study will extend over three five-week sessions ( a total of 15 weeks). Meetings start the first week of November; we will break for the holidays.
Day time meetings: 12:30-2:30 Tuesday afternoons    four spaces remaining
Evening meetings: 8-10 PM Wednesday evenings        five spaces remaining

Recommended Edition Everyman’s Library (2005) translation by John E. Woods (available at Owl Bookshop Kentish Town)

To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf One Day Salon Intensive London
In this exquisite work, Woolf seeks to break through the restraints of language to access the interior voice of passions, fears, unspeakable thoughts and human dynamics. By employing stream of consciousness narrative and the early stirrings of the modernist aesthetic, Woolf gives insights into the nature of relationships and the formation of self in relation to others that will be recognizable – and revealing to each reader.
Choice of two dates–each a one day intensive: November 10th or November 29th

Salon Folks in the News

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All those who have passed through the Salon offer themselves in the integrity of their ideas; there are also some exciting happenings in the offerings Salon participants make to our  cultural richness:

  • Published: Lynn Kramer, winner of the Ashram Award for her short story, was published by Virago in a collection of women writers exploring travelling: Once Upon a Time There Was a Traveller   edited by Kate Pullinger
  • Awarded: Ursule Thurrnherr was named ‘Human Racer of the Month‘ after a gruelling charity ride raising money and awareness around breast cancer and local Women and Health community  centre..
  • Blogged (deliciously): Julia Leonard, writer, foodie and all-round smart one has a wonderful blog that just gets you excited about cooking: http://thechiletrail.com   She also published lively interviews with some of the best food writers this weekend in The Independent.
  • Exhibited: Sandrine Joseph will be bringing her eclectic vision of Hampstead Heath to Burgh House from November 13th- 29th– email me if you would like to join the private viewing.

Sunrise-on-Parliament-Hil-001

Wide Sargasso Sea, Fury and Magic in November…

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COMING SALONS
2012 06 05 016

THIS WEEK THE SOUND AND THE FURY STARTING TUESDAY 01.10 (four week study–only two places available) “Clocks slay time… time is dead as long as it is being clicked off by little wheels; only when the clock stops does time come to life.”

NEXT WEEK: WIDE SARGASSO SEA ONE meeting study; 5:30-10 PM Friday 11th October
“You can pretend for a long time, but one day it all falls away and you are alone. We are alone in the most beautiful place in the world…”

As I am preparing the wide Sargasso Sea study, I am immersed in Antoinette’s exotic and crumbling world of colonial Caribbean. Race relations are shifting under the strain of an anxious imperialism, the certainty of Western dominance fails in this world of blended cultures and desires. Bronte’s shadow falls on this work, but Rhys is not simply telling the back story of the Madwoman in the Attic. Wide Sargasso Sea explores passion that slips from love to hatred, the danger of roles and masks–acting and being; the imprint of place on a struggling identity, the roots of madness….all in a short work that weaves narrative voices and perspective, leaving stories open and motifs that point to resolution and answers without any finality. The lyric text will frame our discussion: the work provokes and we will gather all perspectives to illuminate this Gothic, postmodern novel.

Coming up:

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