Happy Feet

Well, the thermometer hit 70 in Jersey yesterday, so it was time to break them out. Note the eye-pleasing fuschia color, the tropical design with its splashes of green and orange, and the pale lilac straps that are an exact match for the color on my toenails. And they're pretty comfy for a new pair; my toes are managing quite nicely after months of sweaty hibernation in dark socks. These two small pieces of rubber and plastic bring the promise of cool mornings and hot afternoons. Of feet propped up against the porch railing, and trips across the hot sand until the moment they can finally be kicked off and rinsed in the surf. And every step I take in them brings me that much closer to the summer that's out there waiting. Happiness at only $4.99.

♥ ♥ ♥

Mary, Mary, and Me

My stories all seem to feature grandmothers. Given that my own were so strong a presence in my own life, I think it's my way of keeping them with me. Both my grandmothers were named Mary, but two more different women you could not imagine.    One Mary was tall, big-boned, the kind of woman people termed "handsome." She started going gray in her thirties, but never dyed her hair. No matter what drama was enfolding around her, she kept her counsel and her cool. She suffered the losses of her husband and oldest son with a strength and grace I've never seen in another person.

Because she came to this country as a baby, she grew up without an accent, and Americanized herself with great success. I spent the first year of my life under her roof, and growing up, I felt extremely close to her. I have fond memories of trips to the five and dime store and the Grand Union, and I remember her endless patience as she attempted (unsuccessfully) to teach me to knit. When I got my first job, I used to go to her house on a weekly basis to do my laundry and have dinner with her. She's been gone for nearly two decades now, and I'm grateful that she lived long enough to know my oldest son.

My other Mary was pretty, petite, and unapologetically vain about her appearance--a trait I seemed to have inherited, along with her facial structure. Sharp-witted and sharp-tongued, she was unafraid to speak her mind. She was also a gifted seamstress. If you can get past the polyester, take a close look at the dress she's wearing in the top photo. Note the cute collar and the unusual seaming--her design, as were all her clothes. She made me every dance costume I ever wore, and mine were always the envy of the other girls! In many ways, I think she was a woman out of her time. She worked her whole married life, and once confessed to my aunt that she had always wanted to learn fashion design, but never had the money to go to school. It was from her I learned to sew, as well as to appreciate good tailoring. She retained her accent, her hair color, and her sassy attitude until the day she died--at the age of 102, by the way. I hope I've inherited her longevity as well. When I look at that picture above, I get a pretty good sense of what I'll look like in about 15 years. I could do worse.

I feel that Nature has played a cruel trick on me. As a middle-aged woman myself, I've come to appreciate my grandmothers in ways I never did as a young woman. I have so many questions I'll never be able to ask them, and so much to tell them in return.  In the meantime, I'll give my characters their nonnas. But I'll never stop missing my own.

                                                                                           ♥ ♥ ♥

If It’s Fifty Degrees. . .

It's warm enough to grill pizza. Throw on an old sweatshirt and get out there!  I made my first batch this week:

Grilled pizza, with its bubbly, puffy, charred-in-places crust makes even the most pedestrian ingredients (pre-made pizza dough, grocery store mozzarella, spinach from a bag) sing out loud. I did a spinach pie for me and sausage for the men in the house, and whenever I make this, I eat myself into a carbohydrate stupor. It's super easy to do so long as you watch the grill. For this reason you should have all your toppings at hand. Whether it's a homemade batch or from the grocery store, I divide the dough in half and oil it lightly. It's easier to handle in smaller sizes on the grill, as is a slightly rectangular shape. I use medium heat. Once your grill is hot, throw that dough on for about a minute, then carefully flip it over. The partially cooked side serves as the top of your pie. Before I add ingredients, I usually let the bottom crust cook for a minute or so, shifting the crust carefully to aim for even cooking. (Which won't happen, by the way. You will get some blackened spots, but I say, embrace the char!) Once your bottom crust is beginning to brown, then add whatever strikes your fancy, finishing with your cheese. Close the grill for only brief periods and watch that sucker like a hawk, because you'll go from brilliant to burnt in a matter of seconds. Figure on four to six minutes total cooking time, and let it sit for a few moments before cutting. Pair with the best cheap wine in the house. Enjoy!

♥ ♥ ♥

Shakespeare at the Movies: Twelfth Night

                                                                                               There are many things to love about this interpretation of Twelfth Night--Trevor Nunn's direction, the kick-ass British cast,  the lush, evocative sets and scenery, and the innovative costume design. Nunn cleverly frames the film with the shipwreck that Shakespeare only alludes to (director John Madden does something similar in Shakespeare in Love, but more about that in a forthcoming post!) and sets the twins up as entertainers who often work in drag. Thus Viola comes ashore in Illyria dragging a chest containing her men's clothes and a handy fake mustache, a situation pretty much unaddressed in the original play. Three performances stand out for me: Toby Stephens lends the self-involved Orlando a warm humanity, and he is lovely to look at as well. Ben Kingsley makes a sharp-witted and observant Fool, who watches from the wings while insanity breaks out all around him. He also does a terrific job interpreting the songs from the play, specifically "Come Away, Come Away Death." ( You can see it here.) But Imogen Stubbs may just be the best Viola I've ever seen. Spunky, witty, and brave, her Viola is alternately heartbreaking and hilarious as she falls deeply in love with a guy who thinks she's a boy. Her scenes with Stephens have a wonderful chemistry, and it's easy to see why Helena Bonham-Carter (as Olivia) falls in love with her. The supporting cast is terrific, filled with lots of faces familiar from the BBC and other costume dramas. I particularly like Richard E. Grant as Sir Andrew, who gives the typically flat character fully human dimensions. Best of all, the actor who plays Sebastian, Steven Mackintosh, looks enough like Stubbs that you don't have to strain your disbelief too much when one is confused for the other. But hey, that's half the fun, isn't it?

♥ ♥ ♥

HEA or HFN?

                                                                                                        

I have been re-reading Stephen Greenblatt's wonderful biography of Shakespeare, Will in the World. It's one of those books that inspires you to read passages aloud to a half-listening spouse; in fact I've been gushing about it so much that my husband now refers to the author as "your boyfriend, Stephen Greenblatt." (So maybe I have a tiny academic crush.)

What I love about this book is that Greenblatt looks at Shakespeare's life primarily through the prism of his plays. In a fascinating chapter called "Wooing, Wedding, and Repenting," he theorizes about Shakespeare's marriage to Anne Hathaway--and in fact his view on marriage in general--by looking at the couples in a number of the plays, in particular the comedies.

Greenblatt reminds us that Shakespeare's characters, even in the lighter comedies such as Much Ado about Nothing and As You Like It, voice doubts and even cynicism about marriage. The chapter's title comes from Beatrice's lines in Much Ado, yet she and Benedick marry in the end of the play, "despite the clear-eyed calculation of the consequences," according to Greenblatt. Shakespeare employs common conventions of romantic comedies, but doesn't seem to believe in his own happy endings. However, Greenblatt reminds us that the magic in these plays resides in

"the joy and optimism of each of the couples. . . .The spectators are invited into the charmed circle of love, knowing that it is probably a transitory illusion, but for the moment at least--the moment of the play--not caring."

We can't think too carefully about the fact that Demetrius only loves Helena because a love potion has been sprinkled on his eyes (Midsummer). Or that Duke Orsino is a self-involved jerk who is undeserving of the loyal, loving Viola (Twelfth Night). We might have more hopes for Beatrice and Benedick, but only if we forget that they were tricked into loving each other.

In romance parlance, HEA stands for "happy ever after," but HFN means "happy for now." What Shakespeare knew was that happy forever is an illusion. But happy for now just might be possible.

♥ ♥ ♥

Comfort Food

                                                                                                 In my first novel, my main character Bea is "between men" as she puts it, happily single, and finds solace in cooking--maybe too much. Her cousin and a friend imply that perhaps food has become a substitute for other sorts of fulfillment:

"Bea's hopeless." Marie gestured to me in the manner of a lazy hitchhiker. "She takes cookbooks to bed, you know." "I do not!" My volume rose in direct proportion to the lie. I did take cookbooks to bed. They didn't hog the covers, snore, or leave their underwear on the floor. And in the end, they afforded me lots more pleasure.

Though my heroine and I have little in common (she's younger and has better legs) we do share this one little habit. I just love curling up with a good cookbook. I browse library sales in search of them, and the older the volume the better. My pride and joy is my sixty year old Betty Crocker, followed closely by my 1964 Joy of Cooking. I also have a 1959 Pillsbury Best of the Bake-Off collection whose flyleaf features lots of ladies in black cat's-eye glasses standing in front of appliances the color of Easter eggs. My modern favorites include the seminal Silver Palate Cookbook and Queen Julia's The French Chef. I also have more Italian cookbooks than anyone would ever need, including two in Italian. The language, that is.  And the voices in these cookbooks, like those of my favorite authors, are familiar and comforting. Julee Rosso and Sheila Lukins make me feel as though I can throw the coolest party ever. Marion Rombauer's scholarly references and scientific formality help me believe in the power of culinary chemistry, and the possibility of perfection. And where would any of us be without Julia, full of warm encouragement and quick laughter, who let us drop the chicken and add the butter? But the real secret to my pleasure in cookbooks is no secret at all: in the pages of cookbooks, everything turns out right in the end. The cake rises. The flavors meld. The meat is tender and the risotto creamy. The reality, of course, is quite different. (Witness my epic Christmas Eve 2010 Lasagna Fail.) But cookbooks, just like my favorite comfort reads, always give me the happy ending I crave--even if life doesn't.

♥ ♥ ♥

Shakespeare's Sisters

                                                                                                           Having just finished Eleanor Brown's marvelous debut novel, The Weird Sisters, I have been thinking a lot about sisters in general, but more particularly, sisters in Shakespeare. Though her story is modern, Brown's trio of sisters, Rosalind, Bianca and Cordelia, each carry traits of their Shakespearean namesakes (How could I not love this book?) and themes from the plays echo subtly through the novel. The women in Brown's novel, like so many of Shakespeare's sister characters, are studies in contrasts, yet are bound by their shared histories. In Much Ado about Nothing, for example, Beatrice is elder cousin to the younger Hero. Where Hero is demure, passive, and ripe for marriage, Beatrice is outspoken, sharp-witted, and happily single. While the women aren't biological sisters, their sister-hood is evident in their affectionate banter and fierce loyalty to each other. On the other hand, Twelfth Night presents a pair of women, Olivia and Viola, whose names are near anagrams for the other. They're not related, but are actually sisters under the skin (or breeches, in Viola's case). Both women are without parents, and grieving for lost brothers; they're alone in a man's world, and they're both pining for someone they can't have. Olivia falls in love with Viola-dressed-as-a-boy because in her she finds a sympathetic listener who understands her. At the end of the play, when the two women actually become sisters through marriage, that relationship becomes explicit. My current project features a biological pair of Shakespearean sisters, Kate and Bianca Minola. When my sister asked to read the book, I said, "Okay, but just so you know--the sisters in the story are not us!" My Kate and Bianca, like their originals, resent each other and fight constantly. My sister and I never fight. (And no one ever believes us when we say this.) My fictional sisters have drifted apart, but my real-life sister and I are close. And yet. . . Like my Kate and Bianca, my sister and I couldn't be more different. She was always the risk-taker, I the cautious one. She was social, I was bookish; she's athletic, I'm. . .pathetic.  As a teenager, she drove confidently and fast, while I gripped the wheel, white-knuckled, refusing to move from the right-hand lane. And you could have drawn a chalk line down the middle of our shared bedroom, her half neatly dusted and picked up, mine looking like my closet exploded. When we ended up in the same gym class in high school, I looked to her for protection from the bigger, tougher girls who ate skinny chicks like me for breakfast. Did I mention she was a freshman at the time? Even now, our lives have gone in completely different directions, but she's my touchstone, and I'm hers. We know each other better than we know ourselves. And this truth about sisterhood, like so many other aspects of human nature, is something Shakespeare got completely right.  (P.S. Happy birthday, sis!)

♥ ♥ ♥

Greetings From Asbury Park

Asbury Park holds a place in my heart like no other. Growing up in the 60s in a family of limited means, our "vacation" each summer was a day in Asbury. We started in the morning with a trip to the Monte Carlo pool, with its cheerfully painted Adirondack chairs. We stored our stuff in a locker room that sported a sign with a 40s style bathing beauty in a red swimsuit. After a morning swim, we walked through the cool underground tunnel that led straight to the beach, where we spent the afternoon until it was time for dinner at the Homestead Restaurant. Sometimes we took a ride in the swan boats on Wesley Lake, but we always ended up on the boardwalk, riding the carousel, eating Kohr's custard and taffy from Criterion, always stopping to sit on the reversible benches--where you  could either watch the people or the ocean. I always chose the ocean.

 As you can see from the photo, going to Asbury is a tradition in my family, one that started during World War II. Most of the men in the family were away, so my grandmother, my mom and two uncles, as well as a number of assorted great aunts would spend a week in one of the more modest boarding houses. It was a women and children's vacation during the week, and on the weekends, the men who were either too young or too old to serve would come down and visit. After the war, the tradition continued into the early 50s. On the rides down during our day trips, my mom would tell me stories of Asbury's heyday. My favorite was her description of dances held around the Monte Carlo pool, where a band played out on a floating platform in the middle of the water. It was easy to imagine the ladies in their 40s updos, dancing with their soldier husbands and boyfriends to Big Band music. But the Monte Carlo pool, like many of Asbury's landmarks, is long gone. My heart broke when the carousel was dismantled, when Convention Hall and the Paramount fell into disrepair, and when the Palace Amusement building was demolished. But after years of economic decline, recent revitalization efforts in Asbury are revealing hopeful glimmers of its glory days (to quote its most famous champion, The Boss). And while Asbury is no longer the dream resort of my youth, it's a place I'll always love--even in all its shabby splendor.

A Book By Any Other Name

When I tell people I have written a book, the first question nearly everyone asks is: "What's it called?" And I hesitate to tell them every time. Because the title I have now--the so-called "working title"--is very likely not the one the book will end up with.

This is something that takes a while to learn. When I wrote my first novel, I came up with a title I loved. (More about that later.) It was short, succinct, and had a cute double entendre going for it. The trouble is, it wasn't a real indicator of what the book was about, so my agent and I brainstormed lots of titles that suggested both Shakespeare and the book's Jersey setting.

This activity soon became a kind of parlor game for my family and friends, who came up with suggestions like:

 Much A Dude About Nothing 

The Merry Ex-Wives of West Windsor

The Two Gentlemen of Verona, NJ

and my personal favorite, courtesy of my son Adam: Julius, Seize Her! or alternatively, Julius Sees Her. (Isn't this fun?)

Anyway, my current project is going out as Taming Kate, which gives a pretty clear idea of what my book is about and what it's referencing. But its very familiarity could end up working against it, and down the line it could certainly change. And there's always that frustration of coming up with what seems like the perfect title, only to find that it's already out there. The lovely, rhythmic, and oh-so-apt Much Ado About You,  for example, was off limits to me, because it already belongs to the incomparable Eloisa James. And a title I considered for my current book, Plain Kate, is a young adult book that was released in September.

And that first title I came up with? The one I loved? It's The Marriage Plot, which just happens to be the name of Jeffrey Eugenides' upcoming novel, due out in October.  Eugenides is the author of  The Virgin Suicides and Middlesex, works that are about as far from fun beach reads as you can get.

So I had to have a little going away party for my title.  (I always knew it had potential.) I wished it luck, gave it my blessing, and now look forward to seeing it on the New York Times bestseller list.

Just not with my name next to it.

Adapting Shakespeare, Part II

In many ways, Shakespeare’s plays ask essential questions about what it means to be human. In the comedies, many of those questions have to do with love, and while the plays are funny, their themes are decidedly serious. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, for example, asks if love is really just an illusion. Twelfth Night raises questions about the meaning of gender, the limits of faithfulness, and the places our journeys take us. In the comedies, it is often his female characters who struggle with such issues; they are fully realized women, and I have come to think of a couple of them as friends. Much Ado about Nothing, on which I based my first novel, features my favorite Shakespearean heroine. To me, the question in that play is rooted in Beatrice’s experience:

what happens when a seriously smart woman, chafing under the conventions of her time and station in life, meets her intellectual match in a man she claims to hate? Kate, of The Taming of the Shrew, lacks Beatrice’s “merry heart,” but shares her intellectual gifts. Unlike Beatrice, who uses humor to mitigate her situation, Kate has a white hot core of anger—but it’s an anger borne of loneliness. While it’s easy to write Kate off as a shrew, Shakespeare doesn’t give us a one-dimensional character, but a frustrated woman who resents living in the shadow of her younger, prettier, and much more compliant and conventional sister. So I asked myself: what would happen to a Kate or Beatrice or Viola in a modern setting with modern problems? Strangely enough, it’s pretty much what happened to the heroines of several centuries years ago. They struggle with finding their identities as women. They have anger with few outlets for it. Sometimes they fall in love with men who don’t deserve them. Sometimes they fall in love with men who do. And just as in real life, all of them are different people in Act Five than they were in Act One. I teach my students a simple formula about Shakespeare’s comedies and tragedies: in the tragedies, people die. In the comedies, people get married. And while I don’t marry my heroines off, I do give them what they deserve—a happy ending.