Talk to Me from WNYC

In 1976, the New York premiere of Philip Glass and Robert Wilson’s “Einstein on the Beach” captivated audiences, polarized critics and put both artists on the map of contemporary performance art. In four-and-a half hours, its famously reductive score, enigmatic text and limpid, tensile choreography (by Lucinda Childs) teases out the meaning of the time/space continuum. The work’s first New York revival in twenty years opens Friday evening as part of the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Next Wave Festival. On Wednesday, Philip Glass talked about the work—and a range of other pieces that have been performed at BAM over the years—with a former protégé, the composer Nico Muhly. Affectionately coaxed by Muhly, speaking composer-to-composer, Glass reflected on his major operas, his work in collaboration with artists from other cultural traditions, and the evolution of his own musical style, which Muhly pointed out has become more lush, and (clearly jokingly) “decadent.”  For a man who is indeed an icon, Glass is somewhat bashful about his own place in the musical pantheon, and clearly bemused to be in a position to look back on a work that is entering its 37th year.   “As composers, we don’t really write for posterity,” he says wryly.  “You’re writing for this year’s repertoire, you’re writing for what you’re doing right now. I think it never occurred to Bob and I that thirty-seven years later we’d still be doing this piece.” Glass also commented on the ease and confidence with which younger musicians approach his works, because they have grown up on them. “I was the lunatic who was always there,” he notes. And “Einstein?” This is the first time the piece has received a major revival without any of the original creators performing, so Glass has actually had a chance to watch it, and reflect on intentions of his younger self. “It seems like someone I used to know once.”  With three new operas and a film in development, this is clearly as elegiac as Glass, at 75, is prepared to get. Bon Mots On new music: "There’s a performance practice that goes with a piece of music…for a piece of music to be truly new, there has to be a new way to play it." On collaborations: "The reason I was doing it to begin with was to understand my own language better; and I found that when I had to embrace somebody else’s language, I had to find a common place where we could work together." On the change in his own musical style: "It just comes from having written music for a long time.  My brain got re-wired; I don’t have to sound like Philip Glass any more."

Geoffrey Rush is one of Australia’s most celebrated exports, a protean character actor whose roles have ranged from the mentally frail pianist David Helfgott (his Oscar-winning performance in “Shine”) to George VI’s speech therapist Lionel Logue (“The King’s Speech”) to the Marquis de Sade (“Quills”).    Courtesy of the 92nd Street Y He most recent film, in which he is pictured above, is “The Eye of the Storm,” directed by Fred Schepisi, and also starring Judy Davis. The film is based on a novel by the Nobel Prize-winning writer Patrick White, about a domineering matriarch and her alienated adult children. Last Wednesday, Rush paid homage to this less well-known Australian genius as part of the 92Y’s long-running film screening and discussion series, “Reel Pieces.”  Rush, director Schepisi, and Schepisi’s daughter Alexandra, who has a featured role in the film, were interviewed before a live audience by Dr. Annette Insdorf, the head of undergraduate film studies at Columbia University.   Bon Mots Geoffrey Rush on Patrick White:  "Here was somebody writing about the Australian landscape and the Australian psyche with big, bold, fat novels." Fred Schepisi on White’s characters:  "Patrick White believes that everyone is an actor, that you’re one way with your family, another way with your friends, another way with your work colleagues.  You present all those different faces to the world." Geoffrey Rush on Australian films of the 1970s:  "There were a lot of pioneering films.  Guys used to have to be on horseback with their shirts off, with picks." Fred Schepisi on his cast:  "It was a great collaboration, and by the end I really did love them all." To listen to an excerpt from the “Reel Pieces” talk, click on the player above.

Host and curator Amanda Stern concluded this season’s Happy Ending Music & Reading series at Joe’s Pub on July 11 with an evening themed around “communication.”  Stern’s themes are almost always designed to resonate ironically and this program was no exception, as the authors Rajesh Parameswaran, Alex Shakar and Nell Freudenberger delivered variations on the idea of wanting what you can’t have, and don't know how to ask for. Parameswaran read from his collection “I am an Executioner” — a story in which a captive tiger falls in love with his zookeeper and things do not go well. Shakar offered an excerpt from his novel “Luminarium.”  His protagonist Fred is beset by a Job-like pile of woes, and spends an afternoon with a Hollywood wannabe who claims to have achieved enlightenment.  Nell Freudenberger’s novel “The Newlyweds” features a 21st-century version of the mail-order bride; in the excerpt heard here, she finds her arranged (by her) wedding more light-hearted than she anticipated. Musical guest Ana Egge helped set the mood with a set of dark rock/folk songs about — well, wanting what you can’t have. This show was the last at Joe’s Pub.  The series will continue in the autumn. For further information check Stern’s website at http://amandastern.com/happy-ending/ To hear excerpts from the readings, and Egge’s performance, click on the player above. Bons Mots A tiger in love.  “Where was my hunger?  Where was all the gloom and trouble of the day?  It was all gone.  Kitch was here.” -- Rajesh Parameswaran, “The Infamous Bengal Ming.” Unlikely prophet at a Universal theme park.  “’So I heard you attained Nirvana or something,’ Fred mumbled…’what’s that mean?’…’beyond the slum of human reality. It means free, Freddie, just free.’”—Alex Shakar, “Luminarium.” Wanting it the way she wants it.  “In ‘Desh you make your plans and they usually do not succeed.  But in America you make your plans and then they happen.”— Nell Freudenberger, “The Newlyweds.” 

“If you are going to go through hell, keep going.” This is just one of the many robust adages coined by Sir Winston Churchill during World War II. A new exhibition at the Morgan Library & Museum called “Churchill:  The Power of Words,” which showcased his long, celebrated career as a statesman, writer, and orator, opened on Friday. Churchill's inspirational speeches and radio broadcasts helped to guide England from its darkest to its finest hour during the long years of fighting and the constant threat of attack and invasion by the Nazi forces. As noted by the journalist Edward R. Murrow in an introduction to Churchill's collected speeches: "Now the hour had come for him to mobilize the English language, and send it into battle, a spearhead of hope for Britain and the world.” The exhibition at the Morgan kicked off with a lecture by Churchill’s granddaughter, The Hon. Celia Sandys, who has written extensively about him. During the talk, Sandys asserted that Churchill’s combination of clarity, command, courage and charisma make him a much-needed model for leadership in our own dark times. Indeed, she pointed out that a renewed interest in Churchill began at the time of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, as world leaders looked for ways to console and inspire their citizens. The Sandys talk also included a video of iconic Churchillian moments in war and peace, accompanied by examples of some of his most vivid utterances, and the purposeful, magnetic voice that bound a nation together. The lecture is part of the Winston Churchill Literary Series, a program of The Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College, and The Writing Center at Hunter College. Sandys was introduced at the Morgan by the series patron, Tina Santi Flaherty. Click on the link above to hear the talk. "Churchill: The Power of Words" runs at the Morgan through September 23. Bons Mots from Sandys On Churchill’s integrity: “Even today ... you can listen to my grandfather’s words without ever wondering, ‘What on earth did he mean by that?’” On the fact that Churchill employed no speech writers: “Modern leaders’ speeches often betray their origins in committee.” On Churchill as inspiration: “It’s been said that Hitler could persuade you that he could do anything, but Churchill could convince you that you could do anything." Bons Mots from Churchill On assessing historical events (in light of a military failure): “Of this I am quite sure, that if we open a quarrel between the past and the present, we shall find that we have lost the future.” On the need for good intelligence: “Facts are better than dreams.” On his own reputation as a bon vivant: “I am a man of simple tastes, easily satisfied by the best.”

The PEN America Center’s organizational focus is the effect of world events on the safety and freedom of expression of writers, so the topic of war naturally looms large in its cultural consciousness. As part of the recent PEN World Voices Festival, Polish journalist and author Wojciech Jagielski was interviewed by Joel Whitney, a founding editor of Guernica: A Magazine of Art & Politics.  Jagielski began his career on assignment in the former Soviet Union and then spent a decade in Afghanistan. He became particularly interested in how countries with trenchant ethnic divisions seem so often to wind up in the midst of seemingly irresolvable conflicts. His most recent book, The Night Wanderers, is on Uganda and the problematic resistance leader Joseph Rao Kony, a now recognizable name thanks to a wildly circulated viral video. The PEN World Voices event took place at the Brooklyn Public Library on May 2 and was introduced by Meredith Walters, the director of exhibitions at the library. Listen to the talk between Jagielski and Whitney by clicking on the link above. Bons Mots: Jagielski on becoming a foreign correspondent: "It was easy choice because in the '80s, when we [Poland] were the colonist country, writing about Poland and politics in Poland, it was not the job for the journalist, it was the job for the politician, the activist." Jagielski on child soldiers: "The scenario was always the same. At night the guerillas were attacking a village … and they were taking hostages, the children. It was planned action because it was easier for children to be made a soldier. I was even told the best age to be kidnapped … to be made a future guerilla, was eight to 10 years." Jagielski on Idi Amin: "The stereotype was created in Western media. The real Idi Amin was not the same person that we have from the movies, from the books."

The 2012 PEN World Voices Festival ended with a talk about censorship at the Cooper Union by novelist Salman Rushdie (Midnight's Children, The Satanic Verses). After the speech, the PEN festival founder had a conversation with writer Gary Shteyngart (The Russian Debutante's Handbook, Super Sad True Love Story). Peter Godwin, the president of PEN American Center, and Laszlo Jakab Orsos, PEN World Voices Director, introduced Rushdie before he gave the Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture that traditionally wraps up the festival.   Listen to and download Rushdie's 17-minute talk by clicking the audio link above. Bon Mots: Rushdie on censorship: "If writing is Thing, then censorship is No-Thing. And as King Lear told Cordelia, 'Nothing will come of nothing.' Think again. Censorship changes the subject. It introduces a more tedious subject and creates a more boring world." Rushdie on liberty: "Liberty is the air we breathe...in a part of the world where, imperfect as the supply is, it is, nevertheless, freely available—at least to those of us who are not black youngsters wearing hoodies in Miami, and broadly breathable—unless, of course, we’re women in red states trying to make free choices about our own bodies." Rushdie on originality: "Great art, or, let’s just say, more modestly, original art is never created in the safe middle ground, but always at the edge ... Originality is dangerous. It challenges, questions, overturns assumptions, unsettles moral codes, disrespects sacred cows or other such entities. It can be shocking, or ugly, or, to use that catch-all term so beloved of the tabloid press, controversial." Watch a video of Rushdie speaking at the talk.

Comparisons are invidious, but Hugo Hamilton is clearly a successor to the late Frank McCourt, author of the celebrated “Angela’s Ashes,” in the tradition of Irish memoir.  Hamilton read from his book, “The Speckled People,” as part of the PEN World Voices Festival on May 3. The event was held at Ireland House, a handsome mews building off Washington Square Park that is home to NYU’s Irish studies department. Hamilton was introduced by John Waters, head of the university’s Irish literature program. In the competitive world of memoir writing, a bizarre childhood is almost de rigueur. But Hamilton’s was even more bizarre than most. His father was an ardent Irish nationalist, married to a German woman. In protest against what he viewed as the British “occupation” of his country, he refused to allow any English to be spoken in his home.  As a result, Hamilton grew up as a virtual émigré in his own country, speaking primarily Celtic and German. The two languages also came to delineate the very different temperaments of his parents — an angry, pessimistic father and a nurturing mother with a sense of humor. To further complicate matters, Hamilton and his siblings still had to go to the local school in his English-speaking community, so that life was “a daily form of emigration.” As if to emphasize the polyglot nature of the PEN festival, the evening at Ireland House included a discussion between Hamilton and the Basque philosopher Fernando Savater, who spoke through a translator. Click on the link above to hear Hugo Hamilton comment on and read from “The Speckled People.”  Bon Mots Hamilton on not speaking English at home: "The feeling we had was that we weren’t in the right country somehow." Hamilton on writing memoirs: "As a child, you collect very strong memories. As an adult, you go back and reclaim your own story." Hamilton, recalling what his mother said about baking and life: "If you bake a cake in anger, it will taste of nothing."

Earlier in May, Jacob Weisberg, editor-in-chief for the Slate group, and author Jennifer Egan discussed Egan’s Pulitzer Prize-winning, genre-busting novel A Visit from the Goon Squad, and her writing process at The New School. Their conversation was part of the annual PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature. Bon Mots Weisberg on the incredible likability of A Visit from the Goon Squad: “The thing about this book is I don’t know anybody who disliked it. You can get an argument going at any dinner party if you just say ‘Jonathan Franzen’ and at least somebody will take the contrary position. But I have yet to find somebody who read this and wasn’t impressed by it." Egan on the mysterious P.M., to whom she dedicated A Visit from the Goon Squad: “You’re killing me with these questions! I feel as though I really should have had a warning. I am going to come out and answer that … It is my long-time therapist.” Egan on developing her characters: “I’m really bad at trying to use people I know. I wish I could use them. But I’m sure most people I know are [so] happy that I can’t!” Download the audio of the talk above or watch a video of the talk:

One of the highlights of this year's PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature was a talk between writers E.L. Doctorow, Margaret Atwood and Martin Amis. New York Times chief film critic A.O. Scott asked the authors about America and its role in the global political culture at The Times Center. The Sunday before the talk, Doctorow (Homer & Langley, Ragtime), Atwood (The Blind Assassin, Alias Grace) and Amis (Time's Arrow, The Rachel Papers) had written essays for The Sunday Review section of The Times on the subject. Doctorow's was called, "Unexceptionalism: A Primer"; Atwood's was titled, "Hello, Martians. Let Moby Dick Explain"; and Amis's, "Marty and Nick Jr. Go to America." Roughly 100 writers from 25 countries were in New York City from April 30 to May 6 for this year's PEN festival. Bon Mots: Doctorow on why America is becoming increasingly unexceptional, "in terms of our secret warrant-less searches of people's homes and businesses and records, and our data-mining, and all the subversions of what we think of as life in the United States."  Atwood on what America should be: "I think with a lot of countries, you don't ask the question, 'What should it be?' But America has always had that question, 'What should it be?' because it did start as a utopian community. So it is always examining, 'What should it be?' as opposed to 'What it is.'" Amis on Trayvon Martin and American law: "Is it possible to confess to the pursuit and murder of an unarmed white 17-year-old, white 17-year-old, and be released that evening without charge? And I wanted to be told, 'Yes.' But in fact, as we all know -- it's one of the public secrets of America -- is that this happens all the time." Atwood on Herman Melville's Moby Dick: "I think that Melville designed it very carefully to represent a number of different segments of American society. It wasn't for nothing that he named the ship after an extinct native tribe and put three harpooners in there from different parts of the empire and made the owners two hypocritical Quakers." Doctorow on Edgar Allan Poe: "Did I ever tell you I was named after him? [Atwood: No.] I think it was my father's idea. He was philosophically inclined but he was busy supporting us during the Depression and couldn't give vent to his literary and philosophical being but he named his child after a writer he admired ... A few years before my mother died, I finally asked a question, I said, 'Do you realize you and Dad named me after an alcoholic, drug-addicted, delusional paranoid with strong necrophiliac tendencies?'" Atwood on being a smart, but not necessarily an intellectual, politician: "What you probably want is somebody who's got some political smarts or somebody who's at least smart enough to avoid sinking the entire fortune of a country in some really ill-advised, unnecessary war." Amis, responding to Atwood's point: "And anti-intellectualism exists in many English-speaking countries, but the American variant is worship of stupidity." Atwood: "And that's a different thing." Amis: "It is an entirely different thing." Click the link above to hear the full PEN festival talk, which took place on May 2 and opened with remarks from Carol Day. Or watch a video of the talk below.

Queen Elizabeth II celebrated her 86th birthday on April 21, and the entire Commonwealth is preparing to honor her on the occasion of her Diamond Jubilee on June 5. So a look at the future of the British monarchy is timely, and one take on this rich topic was offered at Bonham’s New York auction house on April 30 by a very privileged observer: former Royal Naval Officer Patrick Jephson, who served for eight years as private secretary and chief of staff to the late Princess of Wales. Jephson said that his family’s history of service to the crown goes back to the 13th century, and his talk managed to combine respect and affection with a shrewd assessment of the Windsor “brand,” and what those who will succeed the Queen need to do to succeed in the coming years as a relevant part of British life and a resonant symbol of a vital monarchy in an increasingly diverse and globalized society. The glimpse Jephson gives us of the royal family, particularly those two very private-in-public women, HRH Queen Elizabeth, and Diana, Princess of Wales, reveals a perhaps surprising earthiness, and in the case of the Princess of Wales — that bird in a gilded cage — enormous humility.  For example, her response to being named “International Humanitarian of the Year” in 1994 was to say that, “she didn’t deserve the award, but she was working on it.” By contrast, Jephson deplores the rise of royal spin doctors and cautions that what the monarchy needs to survive and thrive for another 60 years and beyond is to gain and keep the belief of the people in their authenticity and sense of duty. Trust, he says, is Queen Elizabeth II’s greatest legacy. Photo of and by former Royal Naval Officer Patrick Jephson. He served for eight years as private secretary and chief of staff to the late Princess of Wales. Listen to Jephson’s talk at Bonham’s by clicking the link above. He is introduced by the historian and journalist, Sir Harold Evans, former editor of The Times of London. Bon Mots Former Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin on monarchy: “The throne is bigger than the man.” Patrick Jephson on the family business: “If you’re in the dynasty business, your job is to survive, and to keep the business in the family.” Patrick Jephon on core values: “Because the British monarchy is a very human institution, it’s always going to have flaws, but the flaws will always be forgiven if the virtues of modesty, integrity, and duty are always associated with it in the public mind.”

New York City has no shortage of sites that have a direct connection to the Titanic. (See our handy map of some of them below.) One such landmark is the Jane Hotel, formerly known as the American Seamen’s Friend Society Sailors’ Home and Institute, which on April 19, 1912 was the site of a memorial service for surviving sailors rescued from the Titanic. The brick neo-Classical building on the West Side Highway and Jane Street was built in 1907-'08 by a Presbyterian group called the American Seamen’s Friends Society. William A. Boring designed the sailors' home. Boring was the former partner of Boring & Tilton, which designed the immigration station on Ellis Island. "One of the identifying characteristics of the building is this wonderful octagonal tower in the corner which used to have a light beacon on top so it looked like a lighthouse," said Andrew Berman, the executive director of the Greenwich Village Society for Historical Preservation. "It both symbolically and practically was meant to be a place that sort of called out to sailors as a safe port. And in this case, it was a safe port for the crewmembers of the Titanic who were rescued from the disaster." On a recent Thursday night, more than 100 people gathered in the Jane's decadent ballroom to understand the connection between the Greenwich Village spot and the ship's surviving sailors. The event, called "Titanic & The Village," was organized by the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation and featured a talk and book-signing by Titanic scholars Jack Eaton and Charlie Haas. Learn about the Jane's history and connection to the Titanic by clicking the audio above. Also check out our map of New York City Titanic landmarks based on the talk or scroll down to see some of the "bon mots" from the evening from Haas, Eaton and New Yorkers who attended the event. Bon Mots Charlie Haas, co-founder and president of the Titanic International Society, on room rates at the sailors' home in 1910: "The average seaman paid only a quarter a night and there were larger rooms at 50 cents per night for the officers and those included shower baths. You'll notice also that there were facilities here for billiards, a bowling alley, shower baths, a swimming pool, banking facilities and an assembly hall ... which I suspect may have been this room right here." Jack Eaton, co-founder and historian of the Titanic International Society, on an artifact in New Jersey that some claim is a piece of a Titanic lifeboat: "We have had to put the cease-and-desist order on this twice within the last 10 years. It is not a Titanic lifeboat. However the mystery of the Titanic and the aura make people believe with just a little urging from the entrepreneur that this is a Titanic lifeboat. Don't believe it." Long-time Titanic fan Greg Shutters on the centennial: "100 years -- it’s a big one. I was planning on throwing a Titanic party of my own, so maybe that will come to pass." Richard Currie on how he got interested in the Titanic: "My birthday is April 15 and that’s the night it went down. So I’ve had this sort of passing interest." Jeffrey Ryan, who learned about the ship from reading Walter Lord's 1955 book, "A Night To Remember," on his fandom: "I just bought something on eBay -- a deck plan of the Carpathia ... so I’m a collector." Sumi Vatsa on gathering in honor of the centennial: "I thought it was a little strange, 'Are we commemorating the disaster?' Then it was like, 'I understand what we’re commemorating.' It's actually very inspirational ... it’s definitely much more than Kate and Leo on the boat, you know?" Pat Bartels on the Jane Hotel's history: "To see the development of the Chelsea Piers and this particular building, which we’ve looked at for years saying, What a shame, it’s such a dump,' and to find out it’s such a wonderful place, is, you know, it’s really fun."

The theme for the Happy Ending Music and Reading Series at Joe's Pub in March was Strange Places. Listen to the extraordinary — and absurd — environments that authors Jessica Anthony, Amelia Gray and Heidi Julavitz conjured up their readings. Host and curator Amanda Stern was fighting through a migraine. Author Jessica Anthony had a chest cold. And half of the musical duo Kaiser Cartel, Courtney Kaiser, went into labor the day of the show, leaving Benjamin Cartel to perform on his own. Regardless of these challenges, Anthony, along with the two authors Amelia Gray and Heidi Julavits, were in the house, reading from their work as well as performing their one-thing-they'd-never-performed-on-stage-before for the audience, which is one of Stern's requirements for participating in the series. Gray, an author who funded her current book tour via the popular web site Kickstarter, read a story about a date gone horribly, viscerally, wrong: larynxes fall out of the daters' throats, arms land on the floor and "flesh is siphoned into a free standing grandfather clock" that's set on fire and rolled into the street. After her reading, Gray arm-wrestled her editor on stage. Anthony read from her first novel, "The Convalescent," about "a short, sickly Hungarian near-midget who sells meat out of a bus in Northern Virginia." Afterwards, she taught the crowd how to use sign language to perform a popular pop tune. Julavits, author and the co-editor of The Believer magazine, read what she calls "The Bachelor fan-fiction" — an imagined life of one of the bachelors who was kicked off of the show. She then performed rowdy rugby fight songs. Bon Mots: Happy Ending Music and Reading series host and curator Amanda Stern on headaches and humanity: "We are human beings. We grow people in our bodies. That's so weird. That's bizarre. So I think we actually live in the strangest place of all — where your head actually hurts. And you can't see what's causing it to hurt!" Amelia Gray reads the inconspicuous opening of a very conspicuous story: "The woman and man are on a date! It is a date! The woman rubs a lipstick print off her water glass. The man turns his butter knife over and over and over and over. Everyone has to pee. What's the deal with dates?!" Heidi Julavitz's Bachelor on how "so real" his connection to the bachelorette was: "When we were on our date on a half-finished skyscraper, which we summited with the help of a team of urban mountaineers, I said, 'This feels so real.' And Ashley had totally agreed."

The Center for New York City Affairs hosted a forum on February 2 to review the connection between child welfare and juvenile justice in New York City and the state. The event, entitled “Ties That Bind: Reimagining juvenile justice and child welfare for teens, families and communities,” was intended to coincide with the implementation of key new initiatives that would bring the administration of the intertwined child welfare, juvenile justice and foster care services under New York City jurisdiction.  Participants included Ron Richter, the Commissioner for the New York City Administration for Children’s Services; Deputy Commissioner Larry Bushing; Gabrielle Prisco, Director of the Juvenile Justice Project, the Correctional Association of New York; Mike Arsham, Executive Director, Child Welfare Organizing Project; and Angela Watson, Program Director, Juvenile Justice Initiative, SCO Family of Services in Brooklyn. The forum was moderated by Andrew White, the Director of the New School’s Center for New York City Affairs. As the speakers and panelists at the New School’s Theresa Lang Community and Student Center noted, historically, both foster placements and detention often take at-risk teens far from their families and communities, thereby making care and counseling modalities even more difficult and frustrating for those in the system. Childcare advocates also call for more involvement by parents, community representatives and non-profits in instituting programs and reforms. The two-hour forum discussed and debated the issues surrounding Governor Andrew Cuomo’s ”Juvenile Justice Services Close to Home Initiative”; the strategic plan for New York City’s Child Services Administration; and the fundamental approach to treating troubled juveniles in a way likely to produce positive outcomes.  While there was some disagreement among the group, all seemed to agree on two underlying premises: if child welfare services can be made more effective, there is a greater chance of keeping at-risk teens out of the juvenile justice system (i.e., of having them classified as actual offenders, and often incarcerated in some way), and programs that keep children closer to home are likely to be more successful. Bon Mots: Andrew White’s thought-provoking headcount: “We recently calculated that more than one-tenth of the city’s school-age children — more than 100,000 children — come into contact with either child welfare or juvenile justice services every year in New York City.” Commissioner Ron Richter on his belief in hands-on “kitchen table” social workers: “This is not a long-term intervention. They come in, like a tornado, if you will, and they help the parent get control.”  Mike Arsham on the strength of communities: “I’ve come to believe … that there is great strength and wisdom and compassion even — and maybe especially — in the most economically stressed New York City communities.” Gabrielle Prisco on striking while the iron is hot: “We have a moment where we have political attention, we have money, we have momentum, and we have people of good will.” Listen to the complete forum at the link above. During the forum, Commissioner Richter showed a number of slides featuring statistical data from the Administration for Children’s Services (ACS); the data from which these were derived can be viewed on the ACS web site.

If there is a lesson to be learned from the post-curtain talk between John Hurt — who has just finished a limited run at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Harvey Theater in Beckett’s “Krapp’s Last Tape” — and philosopher Simon Critchley, it’s that if you throw philosophy at an actor, he’ll throw it right back. The two sat down — on the very stage where Krapp obsessively listens to the tapes of his past life — on Dec. 15th, and engaged in a gentle duel of words about exactly how to interpret Beckett’s intense 55-minute play. Hurt began disarmingly by saying, “I’ve always felt that very clever people had to play Beckett,” people with “strings of letters after their names.”  And Critchley’s, “What do you think this play is about?” drew the response, “I was hoping you were going to tell me that!” But when pressed, it was clear that Hurt has very strong ideas about the play, ones that come from inside the experience, from his views on Krapp’s life choice (to abandon love for a life of the mind), to exactly what those bananas mean. “I’m a huge believer in the word,” he maintained. “I’m here to serve Beckett, and that’s absolutely all I’m here for.” Bon Mots: Hurt on interviewers: "The one thing that all interviewers want to know — they have about six questions, I reckon — and all of them are, 'How do you act?' … couched in different ways." Hurt on Krapp: "It’s an intensely private play. If Krapp for a second thought that all you wonderful people were out there watching him … he would be devastated." Hurt on Krapp’s tape: "[That spool] means so much, doesn’t it? That’s a man who loves the sound of language, and he chose that image — it’s lovely."

The Happy Ending Music and Reading series has formed a partnership with the arts colony Yaddo located in Saratoga Springs, New York, to present programs featuring writers who have been Yaddo fellows. On December 7th, curator Amanda Stern welcomed three Yaddo alums at the series’ performance home, Joe’s Pub, for a program entitled “Reality and Scandal.”  Two of the authors, Helen Schulman and Jesse Browner, read from works featuring teenage boys in emotional, sexual and social turmoil — Schulman’s “This Beautiful Life" and Browner’s “Everything Happens Today.” This has been fruitful territory ever since J.D. Salinger’s Holden Caufield made such a hash of his prep school career 60 years ago. The third writer, Walter Kirn, went engagingly off course with excerpts from his New York Magazine-approved (as in the weekly “Approval Ratings”) Bible blog. The writer inherited a well-worn study edition of the “King James Bible” from his mother, and is offering up hilariously transgressive interpretations of the narratives (example: Adam and Eve’s expulsion from Eden is about illicit drug use.)  Stern requires all her writers to “take a risk on stage,” and Kirn was eccentric here, too, inviting author Elizabeth Wurtzel, whose memoir "Prozac Nation" he savaged in a 1994 review, to come up to the stage to enact her revenge. (She didn’t.) Musical guest Mark Eitzel was the perfect foil to the authors, offering up a trio of mordant songs about marginal and desperate characters. (You’ll hear an homage to a male stripper in the excerpt above).  Stern’s requirement for musical guests is that they play a cover song and try to get the audience to sing along. There was a kind of perverse pleasure, after an evening crowded with angst and tales of sexual misconduct, to hear Eitzel bring down the house (and carry every one of us with him) with that preposterously hopeful standard, “On a Clear Day You Can See Forever.” Bon Mots: Helen Schulman, author of “This Beautiful Life,” on the burden of allure: “’You are just an idiot boy,’ said Audrey…She slung that cool bag over her shoulder and she started walking. She started walking away from Jake and all the idiot boys, walking away from the prison of her youth and beauty and into the hard-fought-for loneliness of her future.” Jesse Browner, author of “Everything Happens Today," on coming of age: "If he were ever to be a serious writer, Wes recognized, he would have to learn to embrace solitude and silence.” Novelist, critic and essay writer Walter Kirn on Genesis: "God basically made a huge mistake in creating man, and spends the first part of Genesis trying to correct himself."

The Asia Society inaugurated its new Asian Arts & Ideas series this month with “The ‘Chindia’ Dialogues,” a three-day forum that examined the confluence of the world’s two most powerful developing economies. The organizers chose an unusual point of departure for event — not a historical overview, but a conversation between Jonathan Spence, former Sterling Professor of History at Yale, and the Indian novelist Amitav Ghosh. Ghosh’s most recent book, “River of Smoke,” centers around the mid-19th century Opium Wars, and in their talk, Ghosh and Spence used the topic as a lens through which to view the early modern histories of India and China. As Ghosh notes, historians tend to segment the past in terms of their own specialties (economics, politics, culture, etc.), but, “What a novelist can do is imagine the totality of the experience.” Bon Mots Jonathan Spence on Amitav Ghosh: "The joy of reading Amitav’s work is the completely new way of reading about things I thought I knew — of asking outrageously simple questions that are so difficult." Amitav Ghosh on India and the opium trade: "India today does not recognize this past." Ghosh on learning Cantonese in preparation for writing “River of Smoke”: "It was so exciting to discover this whole world of Cantonese street slang and Cantonese obscenities, which are so inventive!” Ghosh on old (drug) money: "It’s possible to say that all old money in the major presidency cities in India really goes back to the opium trade. The same is true of Massachusetts, I should add." Hear the complete conversation by clicking on the audio player above. The image of the painting above by George Chinnery was provided courtesy of Asia House, where it is featured in the exhibit: The Flamboyant Mr Chinnery. An English Artist in India and China. The show is open through Jan 21 and its curator is Patrick Conner.

The poet Anne Sexton took her own life in 1974, but had she lived, this year would have marked her 83rd birthday. Reason enough, thought the actor Paul Hecht, to organize an elegant tribute to her at the Cornelia Street Café on Nov. 14. Two strong women — Kathleen Chalfant and Jennifer Van Dyck — took turns mapping Sexton’s somewhat fragile life through the ley lines of her verse. Even without knowing how it ended, it was possible to glimpse a conflicted mind through the shifting surfaces of her words.  Pianist Liz Magnes provided deft transitions between sections of the program, which followed a loose arc from childhood to maturity. Cornelia Street Café co-owner and host Robin Hirsch provided the introduction. Bon Mots: Verses from "Rowing": Then there was life with its cruel houses and people who seldom touched — though touch is all — Verse from "A Story for Rose": Someday, I promised her, I'll be someone going somewhere. Verses from "The Ambition Bird": The business of words keeps me awake.I am drinking cocoa,that warm brown mama. Verses from "The Black Art": A woman who writes feels too much,those trances and portents!As if cycles and children and islandsweren't enough; as if mourners and gossipsand vegetables were never enough. Use the player above to hear selections from the program.

With the three-month wait for the re-opening of newly renovated Joe’s Pub over at last, you’d think there would be cause for celebration. But Happy Ending Music & Reading series host and curator Amanda Stern decided on “frustration” as the theme of her series opener, inviting authors Seth Fried, Jesse Ball, and Paul La Farge to vent, with plangent musical guest Anni Rossi adding the low notes. Actually there was little venting, as the writers’ selections all looked at the idea of “frustration” obliquely. Seth Fried’s story, for all it was called “The Great Frustration,” invited us into a kind of ur-Eden in which all the animals are plagued by ambivalence about their own nature, and anxious inertia. Jesse Ball presented himself as a sort of living trope; in the program bio and Stern’s introduction he was described as a recently rediscovered “American writer from the '30s, '40s, and '50s.” In fact, Ball, born in 1978, bristles with decidedly contemporary sesquipedalian irony, as in the excerpt here, describing characters in a military parade viewed by a mysterious onlooker.  By contrast, Paul La Farge, although only slightly older, seems to be the grand old man of lost causes, reading from his new novel “Luminous Airplanes” a segment in which his protagonist remembers attending a spectacularly unsuccessful rally. For an excerpt from the evening, click on the player above. Bon Mots Fried on losing touch: "Why when the peacock waddles past should the lion imagine a beautiful explosion of feathers?" Ball on the parade passing by: "That is always the decision one is pressed to make — do I join the parade, or not? In certain cases the decision is easy, in others, not so." La Farge on waiting in Dolores Park: "After all the rain we had this winter, the grass shone emerald, like a patch of wet Scotland set out to dry, here on the coast.”

Two famed poets, essayists and translators — Lydia Davis and Eliot Weinberger — recently read from new work at the True Story: Non-Fiction reading series at the KGB Bar in the East Village. Davis ("The Varieties of Disturbance: Stories") and Weinberger (editor of "American Poetry Since 1950: Innovators & Outsiders"), who have been friends since high school, said they decided to call the genre in which they work "Poetry Essays." "Lydia and I were trying to talk about, 'What do we call this genre?'" said Weinberger. "If you have prose poetry, this is sort of like poetry essay. Or poem essay or something like that, because it’s non-fiction but it looks like a poem." Bon Mots: Lydia Davis on Weinberger: "I knew him when he was shorter than I was. Then, strangely, he grew. He changed. We were pals in high school and we’re still pals. He hasn’t changed much. I don’t know if I’ve changed. Coolest kid in high school I wasn’t. He was." Eliot Weinberger on Davis:  "I’ve known Lydia since I was 13. As she said, she used to tower over me. I grew taller and she grew wiser. It’s not true that I was the coolest person in high school. Lydia was way cooler. She was like 'Nadia, Woman of Mystery.'" Davis on surprising reading selections: "[I'll then read] an excerpt from what will be an even-longer poem based on found material and written, largely in 19th-century American language. So it seemed like the least appropriate thing to read at the KGB Bar. But, we’ll see. I’ve never read it out loud, partly because it didn’t exist until a few days ago." Weinberger on surprising reading selections: "We’re both doing the same thing, which is reading a work that’s totally inappropriate for the East Village or the KGB bar." From Davis' "Our Village," a closing line: "The world has been for me, even from childhood, a great museum."

While diplomats and academics met at the General Assembly of the United Nations on the East Side of Midtown Manhattan, the Asia Society hosted "Voices from Burma," an event honoring the stories of Burmese refugees and political prisoners. Actor and playwright Wallace Shawn, actor Kathryn Grody, writers Amitav Ghosh and Deborah Eisenberg, and former political prisoner Law Eh Soe read from Nowhere to Be Home: Narratives from Survivors of Burma's Military Regime. Veteran journalist, educator, and current Director of the Asia Society's Center on U.S.-China Relations Orville Schell opened and closed the event.   The stories in Nowhere to Be Home are first-hand accounts of refugees who have survived displacement within and across Burma's borders, who have witnessed the destruction of thousands of ethnic minority villages, and who witnessed their home become a country with one of the largest fleets of child soldiers in the world. The book is the seventh title in the McSweeney's non-profit Voice of Witness publication series, and executive director Mimi Lok helped curate the event. “It’s impossible not to be engaged and moved by these stories,” Lok said. “Hopefully people will be compelled to encourage the United Nations to make sure the work is being done to investigate these abuses.” The event concluded with a prayer by U Agga, a Theravada Buddhist monk and Burmese refugee. Facing the packed auditorium and joined by monks U Gawsita and U Pinyar Zawta, U Agga repeated three times: “May there be no deception of one another. May love and kindness envelope the world and may there be peace on earth.” The issue of human rights in Burma has been a long-standing debate at the U.N. Sixteen member states currently support a U.N.-led Commission of Inquiry to investigate crimes against humanity in Burma, including the United States, Australia, Canada, France and the United Kingdom. Others argue open political and economic engagement with Burma is a better strategy. Below listen to Amitov Ghosh and Deborah Eisenberg read the oral histories of Aye Maung and Fatima. Closing remarks by Orville Schell. Burmese refugee U Agga ends with his oral history narrative and Theravada Buddist prayer. Bon Mots: The words of survivor Khin Lwe on the complex beauty of Burma, read by actor Kathryn Grody: "One day when I was a child, I was playing with some fruit. My mom had never let me eat this fruit before, because she was worried I would choke on the seeds. But I accidentally broke the fruit open and I saw it was ripe, so I tasted it. It tasted so sweet. The situation in Burma is like that. The people don’t even know what the fruit is, but when they start to learn and become concerned about the issues in Burma, then they will start to understand how sweet the fruit can be." Survivor Hla Min remembers life before abandoning his post in the Burmese military. His words as read by Wallace Shawn: "While we were on the front line, our officers ordered us to completely destroy the local people. They told us that even the children had to be killed if we saw them. I saw soldiers abducting young girls, dragging them from their houses and raping them. At the time, I felt that those girls were like my sisters." Executive director of Voice of Witness Mimi Lok on publishing first-person narratives: "We approach the architecture of an oral history narrative in the same way we might approach a short story—but underpinned by our responsibility to journalistic integrity. So we make sure everything is fact checked and accurate." The Asia Society event was sponsored by the Pen American Center, the Open Society Foundations, Voice of Witness and the Magnum Foundation. Video work by Magnum photographers Chien Chi Chang and Lu Nan with James Mackay were presented throughout the evening. To watch a video from the event by Chien-Chi Chang, click here, or a video by Takaaki Okada, click here.