№ 25 reading list: women only

Happy New Year! I would like to start the year with a new reading list, consisting of books by women only. As you probably know, Elizabeth Hardwick is a great favourite; her essay collection Seduction and Betrayal features female writers and women in literature. It so happens that Joan Didion, who has a book on the list, writes the introduction to the collection, which includes an essay about the Bloomsbury group and Virginia Woolf, who is also on the list.

№ 25 reading list:

1  Seduction and Betrayal  · Elizabeth Hardwick
2  Ninth Street Women  · Mary Gabriel
3  Approaching Eye Level  · Vivian Gornick
4  Intimations: Six Essays  · Zadie Smith
5  On Beauty  · Zadie Smith
6  The Waves  · Virginia Woolf [rereading]
7  Slouching Towards Bethlehem  · Joan Didion [rereading]

I have to confess that the list has been so long in the blog's draft that I have already read five of the seven books. I'm not far into the Mary Gabriel one - its snappy full title is Ninth Street Women: Lee Krasner, Elaine de Kooning, Grace Hartigan, Joan Mitchell, and Helen Frankenthaler: Five Painters and the Movement That Changed Modern Art - but can already recommend it. Gail Levin's biography of Lee Krasner was on my № 24 reading list. I can also recommend that one but if I had to choose between the two I would pick Ninth Street Women. Even though Gabriel doesn't go into details about the artists' childhoods, I find her book more enjoyable to read. It's also better designed and images of artworks are in colour. Levin's book about Krasner is obviously well researched but the text is sometimes too academic for my taste which restricts its flow. In my copy, a William Morrow paperback, the paper is of poorer quality and the images of Krasner's artwork are in black and white only.

Lee Krasner, The Seasons, 1957

images mine, the 2nd appeared on Instagram 05/11/20 | Lee Krasner artwork, Pollock-Krasner Foundation / Whitney Museum of American Art via Haus der Kunst

№ 24 reading list: rereading the classics

My autumn term is about to start and I would like to share this reading list before I get busy. A rereading of classics characterises the list. At the start of this summer, when facing restrictions due to the pandemic, I felt the urge to reread certain books, preferably on a bench in a castle garden nearby. I have finished Edna O'Brien's memoir, Country Girl, and highly recommend it. She is a wonderful storyteller. The story takes off when she leaves Ireland and writes about life in sixties London, about literature and writing. I often found it difficult to put the book down.

№ 24 reading list:

1  Country Girl · Edna O'Brien
2  Lee Krasner: A Biography · Gail Levin
3  Museum Activism  edited by Robert R. Janes and Richard Sandell
4  The Varieties of Religious Experience · William James
5  One Hundred Years of Solitude · Gabriel García Márquez *
6  Crime and Punishment · Fyodor Dostoevsky * [audiobook]
7  War and Peace · Leo Tolstoy *
8  Sense and Sensibility · Jane Austen *
9  Independent People · Halldór Kiljan Laxness *

* Rereadings.

These days War and Peace is my bedtime reading - one of my favourite novels. I don‘t understand those who complain about its length. The chapters are short and I always want to read 'just one more'. By accident, I stumbled upon an audiobook of Crime and Punishment, my first audiobook ever. I truly enjoyed it; the narrator was great. Independent People is written by Iceland‘s only Nobel Laureate. When hearing an Icelandic actor narrate it on the radio there was no turning back. Laxness had to be on the list.

Speaking of Nobel Laureates: On my birthday in July, my oldest gave me this beautiful hardcover edition of Márquez's book. A few years ago, I decided to reread his book Love in the Time of Cholera. I loved reconnecting with it but about 150 pages in my interest faded. I realised I had changed as a reader and the story no longer appealed to me. I was a bit worried the same would happen with One Hundred Years of Solitude but, fortunately, it didn‘t.

A few words about the book by William James (Henry‘s older brother). I didn‘t know anything about it until I listened to a wonderful episode on The Backlisted Podcast. Their guest was John Williams of The New York Times Book Review and they were talking about this book, which contains lectures given by James at the University of Edinburgh in 1901 and 1902. This is an interesting book, a little dry in the beginning but improves when you reach the third chapter.

I would like to thank Routledge for the museum studies textbook on the list, which deals with the notion of activism as part of museum practice. Apart from the introduction by its editors, the book contains 33 articles by more than 50 scholars in the field. Through my studies I have become aware of the editors' research; in a course on the spring term, we even read a chapter from this book.

Museum Activism, published by Routledge / Instagram

These days I‘m enjoying the annual Edinburgh International Book Festival. This year, due to the pandemic, all events are free online. What a feast for book lovers! My list of books-to-read is already longer and I'm particularly interested in Shuggie Bain, a debut by the Scottish author Douglas Stuart. It is longlisted for the Booker this year and in mid-September we will know if it makes it to the shortlist. At the beginning of the festival, the aforementioned John Williams talked to Stuart and other authors for The New York Times Book Review and this week there was another event featuring Stuart. He strikes me as a sincere writer; someone to watch in the future.

№ 20 reading list | Lee Krasner exhibition

I am sitting on the patio, under an awning, taking in the spring, the scent of purple and white lilacs from a corner of the garden. One by one, book podcasts are playing on the tablet. Let's take a look at the reading list. Last year a new translation, by poet Michael Hofmann, of the classic Berlin Alexanderplatz by Alfred Döblin was published by New York Review Books. I like their book design and have added many of their titles to my wish list. I never read the old translation and therefore, have no comparison. It's set in the underworld of Berlin, the Weimer Republic in the 1920s, and the book starts when Franz Biberkopf - shall we say the colourful? - is released from prison, determined to turn his life around. The other book I bought for the list is The Years by Annie Ernaux, which I mentioned in my last entry. The others are from the library.

№ 20 reading list:
1  The Years  by Annie Ernaux
2  Berlin Alexanderplatz  by Alfred Döblin
3  The Wife  by Meg Wolitzer
4  The Mexican Night  by Lawrence Ferlinghetti
5  The Garden Party  by Katherine Mansfield
6  It All Adds Up  by Saul Bellow
7  The Diary of Anaïs Nin 1931-1934 

Translated by: 1) The Years: Alison L. Strayer; 2) Berlin Alexanderplatz: Michael Hofmann

It has been years since I read a volume of Anaïs Nin's diaries and it felt soothing somehow to pick up the one on the list, which starts in 1931. For a long time, I have been meaning to read stories by Katherine Mansfield, having been introduced to her work through Virginia Woolf's diaries and letters. The short story collection The Garden Party starts well and the writing style already appeals to me. Mansfield was only 34 when she died and one can only imagine what she could have accomplished as a writer.

Lee Krasner, Desert Moon, 1955

This summer I wouldn't mind taking a cultural trip to London, to see the exhibition Lee Krasner: Living Colour in the art gallery of the Barbican Centre, which opens on 30 May. Lee Krasner (1908–1984) was an American artist, born in Brooklyn; a pioneer of abstract expressionism. The catalogue says that her 'energetic work reflects the spirit of possibility in post-war New York' and the exhibition 'tells the story of a formidable artist, whose importance has too often been eclipsed by her marriage to Jackson Pollock.'

This is the first major presentation of Lee Krasner's art in Europe for more than 50 years, organised by the Barbican Centre, London in collaboration with these museums: Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt, Zentrum Paul Klee in Bern and Guggenheim Bilbao. Coinciding with the exhibition is the Thames & Hudson publication of Lee Krasner: Living Colour by Eleanor Nairne.

In October, here in Germany, we can enjoy the art of Lee Krasner when the exhibition opens in the museum Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt.

Artist Lee Krasner in her studio

Lee Krasner, Palingenesis, 1971

top image by me | Lee Krasner paintings via Barbican Centre: 1) LACMA (Los Angeles County Museum of Art) 2) Kasmin Gallery, NY | Krasner in her studio: Kasmin Gallery via Artsy. © The Pollock-Krasner Foundation.