Fairy Revel

This week’s musing asks…

What book do you wish you were reading right now? Where would you take it to, if you could go anywhere to read for a while?

I’d like to be reading Samuel Palmer: Vision and Landscape by William Vaughan. Right now I’m reading other, more pressing things, and the art history books (which I’ve acquired a good number of recently) are sadly still waiting on the shelf. This one is about the enigmatic artist, Samuel Palmer. His drawings, etchings, prints, and paintings in the Romantic tradition are not very well known by most people, and deal with visionary pastoral subjects.

I’d like to read this book at the Sabouru café in Jimbocho, the books district of Tokyo, preferably sitting near the fireplace with a hot chocolate and the guy I like.

This week’s musing asks…

When you walk into a bookstore — any bookstore — what’s the first section you head toward (what draws you)?

I go through phases, but right now it’s the art section. I always like to look through the books on basic drawing technique, and books on watercolor painting. They always make me feel inspired. I’m getting to the point, though, where I feel I have enough art books and I need to start using them instead of just looking at them and thinking, “How nice to be a really good artist!”

So because of that, lately I’m heading toward the mystery section more than before. I don’t know why it’s mysteries; I’ve never really read them much. I guess I’m just looking for something different, and cozy mysteries tend to be relaxing to read compared to the type of fantasy I like best — high fantasy with complex characters, rich description, hopefully some romance, and puzzle-like plots. It’s tricky to find the first volume in a series, however, and even though I hear mystery series don’t usually need to be read in order, I like to. There is some sort of progression, after all.

It’s grey and sleeting outside today, and after taking some photos this afternoon, I found myself sitting just inside the sliding door gazing out, sipping some green tea and thinking. Today is an “alone” day, unintentionally, and I always have mixed feelings about those.

I am pretty good at making sure I’m never alone. I don’t have to talk all the time; in fact, a lot of days I’d really rather not. I’m certainly not the first person to suggest a party. But I don’t like to spend whole days in total isolation, or even hours, and I have some close friends and family who make sure I hardly ever have to. Being alone means having to ask myself the hard questions and examine some things going on in my life that I’d rather not think about too much.

I think it’s critical to have time alone, though. How else can a person find the inner silence required for making wise decisions and understanding not only themselves but the people and situations around them? How else can a person hear the still, small voice of God?

It’s not always possible to find time alone. Responsibilities can make literal “aloneness” impossible. I’ve been learning to take moments to myself even when there are others around — spending a few minutes just thinking or praying quietly when there’s not much going on. In Celebration of Discipline, Richard J. Foster says,

Solitude is more a state of mind and heart than it is a place. There is a solitude of heart that can be maintained at all times. Crowds, or lack of them, have little to do with this inward attentiveness. It is quite possible to be a desert hermit and never experience solitude. But if we possess inward solitude we do not fear being alone, for we know that we are not alone. Neither do we fear being with others, for they do not control us. In the midst of noise and confusion we are settled into a deep inner silence. Whether alone or among people, we always carry with us a portable sanctuary of the heart.

I don’t normally post about clothes and things like that but . . .

I found this vintage dress on Etsy and had to get it. It’s longer than I thought so I may take up the hem a little.

The description said it’s from the ’70s or ’80s. I love the collar of creamy lace. I think this is a versatile dress that could be coordinated differently to fit into a number of different styles!

Usually, the best way for me to organize my thoughts is to make a post here. Right now I’ve got a number of small projects that I’m trying to get underway, so I think it’s time for me to lay them all out in a list. These are in addition to my main goals for the year, which are to pay off my bills, and to learn Japanese.

• Block Printing
  After seeing the charming work of Sachiko Takahashi, I’ve decided to get out the linoleum blocks I’ve had tucked away for ages and try my hand at my first block print. Just a simple botanical to start with, probably. If I don’t get in over my head like I usually do.
• Knitting
  I need to either choose a new project or pick up an old one, but I’d like to work on a knitting project to completion soon. Something small, preferably.
• Writing
  I started a short story while in Tokyo, and I’d like to finish that one. I think it needs some actual conflict of some sort before it will be interesting (obviously, but not so obvious when I’m in the middle of working on it.)
• Watercolor
  Slightly more ambitious, I’d like to make a watercolor painting from a photograph I took at Tomioka Hachiman Shrine, since the photo itself has too many elements distracting from the subject.
• Reading
  I just finished reading Darling is a Foreigner by OGURI Saori, so now I have to decide what to read next. I started Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld on the plane, so I might just finish that.

Recently, when I was looking for the extremely steep stairs leading to Atago Shrine in Atago, Tokyo, I happened upon a print shop counter displaying of some of the sweetest, most magical artwork I’d ever seen. Sachiko Takahashi is a woodblock artist whose many-colored scenes are full of fiddle-playing mantises, foxes in kimono, cat weddings, and rivers of stars. Her work is playful, but dark, too; not the darkness of death but the magical darkness of the forest at night.

Eventually I hope to be able to buy a real woodblock print by Takahashi-sensei, but for now, these postcards are cheaper and every bit as frameable!

Atago Shrine.

It’s goal setting time. (I like the word “goal” so much better than that ugly “resolutions.”) It’s not like I’m great at keeping them, but I like setting them anyway; I think I always get more done with them than without.

1. Listen to and read Japanese every day. After doing a straightforward language learning plan, I’m switching to what’s sometimes called the Input Method, where you get as much input from native sources as possible and use an SRS for repetition. So far so good.
2. Write a short story. This may seem like a ridiculously small goal since I used to make goals like, “Finish a novel.” But since I’ve never managed to do the latter (except for a fanfic and a couple of NaNoWriMo novels with sloppy, tacked-on endings), I think it might be wise to lower the bar a bit. I’ve written a few short stories, but most of the time they have the same problem as my novels: conclusions that make no sense. I would like to develop a process that I can use to consistently write stories with plots that fit together and wrap up neatly as only fiction can. I’ve decided to take writing one story at a time (though I will probably always have a novel in progress).
3. Read 50 books. The same goal we make every year, Pinky. I never actually hit the 50 mark, but each year I do a little better than the year before. Last year was especially busy and I read 18.
4. Learn to play the traditional harp (aka the folk or “Celtic” harp). I always need something tactile to do or I’m unhappy. I like knitting and will continue with that, but I love music, and want to try something that is less project-oriented and more focused on being in the present moment (you practice pieces, but once you learn one, you can play it anytime for instant gratification). I played the piano as a youngster and the times I’ve held a harp it felt very natural.

I tried to think of a fifth goal, but there’s nothing else I want this year that’s within my control. I have some wishes, but I think I’ll keep those to myself for now.

I hate to make my first post in ages a bragging post, but I need some way to break the ice. I’ve been waiting a long time to join the Folio Society. For my joining offer, I chose the four “Colored Fairy Books” by Andrew Lang, Victorian collections of fairy tales. These Folio editions pressed too many of my buttons (cloth binding, block-printed cover, magical tales, art reminiscent of the Victorian fairy tale artists) for me to say “no”. There are four more of these books and I intend to get them . . . eventually.

To the right of the Colored Fairy Books in the photo above is my first regular purchase from the Folio Society, Goblin Market and Selected Poems of Christina Rosetti, featuring suitably lush and sometimes eerie illustrations by Jillian Tamaki. Christina Rosetti is a poet I’d like more people to appreciate, so I was happy the Folio Society decided to publish this collection. The cloth binding is a loose-woven strawberry red that lets the purple paper underneath show through, giving it an iridescent quality. I flipped through the foreward, and I must be a nerd because a quick skim gave me a little thrill of delight.

Not new, but I’ll mention it all the same since it’s sort of on-topic, to the right of the Rosetti is Perrault’s Fairy Tales, a facsimile edition illustrated by one of my favorite Victorian fairy tale artists, Edmund Dulac. A lot of his illustrations are good examples of Victorian “Orientalism”, and especially interesting to me is the Beast’s Beauty wearing harem pantaloons and playing an oud.

So if you’ve been wondering where I am, I was in Tokyo for three months until the end of November, mostly to watch sumo and check out all the sights in the Shitamachi (the “low city” of Tokyo, where the craftsmen and merchant classes lived, and which is still known as being quieter and more slow-paced than the rest of the city). I’ve been home for a month now, but because of the holidays I’m just now sitting down to write a post. If you want to see my adventures in Tokyo, you can check out the blog I made for my family, Footprints in the Low City.

Oh, and that thingie in the sidebar below the LibraryThing widget? That’s a banzuke, a sumo ranking chart. It’s not pretty, but I couldn’t resist. Lots of my favorites have gone up in rank this time!