February 2012
1 post
1 tag
Keep fit for writers
My favorite part: “And rest”. Brilliant! Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
January 2012
4 posts
Magicians and Writers: truth and illusion
“Yes, I have tricks in my pocket, I have things up my sleeve. But I am the opposite of a stage magician. He gives you illusion that has the appearance of truth. I give you truth in the pleasant disguise of illusion.” Tennessee Williams in THE GLASS MENAGERIE Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
What the British say and what they REALLY mean
Anglo-EU Translation Guide via BBC America yes. oh dear. sorry. it’s pretty much dead on. Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
1 tag
the joy of books
Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
1 tag
for children: digital or paper?
See the full gallery on Posterous Research done at Temple University showed that paper books provide a more positive parent-child interaction for young children—and that electronic books dampen it. (In other words, a picture book helps a child most when it’s paper—not really any surprise to anyone who loves picture books. You know this but you love to hear it from...
December 2011
4 posts
2 tags
peanuts christmas special
Charles Schulz’ Peanuts Christmas Special had to fight to get the Peanuts Christmas Special to be what it is. Everyone told him he was crazy. Here’s what he had to convince network executives at CBS to do: — to not use a laugh track — to use actual children for the voices of the characters — and (most crucial of all) to keep the true meaning of Christmas in...
2 tags
more favorite favorite favorites
a favorite poet and a favorite poem recited by someone who has to got be one of my favorite persons reciting a poem: Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
2 tags
favorite favourite favorites
Jon Klassen is one of my favorite illustrators right now… and his very funny book I WANT MY HAT BACK is one of my favorite books — there is talk of a Caldecott for it. (Interesting review in HORN BOOK on that.) It comes from one of my favorite publishers, Candlewick. (Here’s the trailer) It takes hard work to look that easy. And a lot of time to be that simple. And...
1 tag
Bulbuous Bouffant Vestibules
I adore this it is insane and kind of reminds me of what I sometimes do with my sister/certain select friends—we can do it for hours… we love it… Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
November 2011
1 post
1 tag
good manners bulletin
Everyone is agreed. You need good manners to get on in life. Emily Post is very much in agreement (see photo: she is smiling.) (But who is that woman in the hat behind her?) Never mind that. The point is, manners are important. However, what I want to know is—good manners for you and good manners for me might be different. I mean. What if you were a pig? Would it be polite to be clean...
October 2011
6 posts
5 tags
Interview with children's writer/illustrator Shaun...
Author illustrator Shaun Tan recently won what amounts to the nobel prize for children’s literature: the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award. His book THE LOST THING was turned into a great animation (see below). He also worked as concept artist on animated films including “Wall-E”. He was interviewed by SPIEGEL and answered the questions by… drawing pictures. For instance...
Slime Molds or beauty and the blob
they look like aliens they are ancient they live on land they might be living in your next door forest, in fact under your very nose, or shoe they are… (scary music here) The slime molds. Their real name is “Physarum polycephalum” which, as you know only too well, means “many-headed slime mold” which, aside from anything else, provides us with a...
1 tag
writer's block--shakespeare style
Anna Cohen’s animated short film tells the story of William Shakespeare with writers’ block, and how his two “friends” (Romeo and Juliet) assist him in overcoming it. The animation was made using two animation techniques: stop-motion and Flash animation. Reminds me of a writer (whose name I forget) who just before bed would ask his characters to help him with...
antique scary cures/health treatments
if you were ever tempted to want to live in some distant past… you just have to look at these scary cures have a headache? look what you’d have to take instead of Advil—what if you happened to get a headache WHILE WALKING DOWN THE STREET? Sparklet Nasal— completely cures head colds, c. 1900-05 And I don’t know what she’s selling below but I...
antique scary cures/health treatments
oh dear. if you were ever tempted to want to live in the past… you just have to look at these scary cures have a headache? look what you’d have to take instead of Advil—and imagine if you happened to get a headache WHILE WALKING DOWN THE STREET? Sparklet Nasal— completely cures head colds, c. 1900-05 and I don’t know what she’s selling below but I...
3 tags
fabulous english country house libraries
See the full gallery on Posterous which one would you like? (no. you can’t have them all.) I know one thing: my english desk (i think it’s a partner’s pedestal) would fit right in and feel right at home in any one of these room—even standing in the middle of one. Especially standing in the middle of one. More fab libraries here. Posted via email ...
September 2011
3 posts
1 tag
Amazing science art: Meteorite Warhol?
The American Museum of Natural History is putting on an exhibition called Picturing Science. It’s over 20 large format images taken with advanced technology. (Which kind of doesn’t tell you much when you think about it—I mean I think I wrote this very sentence using advanced technology, didn’t I?—i.e. a mac?) The other important thing to note before we get to the...
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The story of The OREO
It claims to be the most powerful cookie in the world. 491 million sold so far… Note: the evolution of the Oreo embossing: 1912, 1924 and today Hmm. For a cookie that’s all about comfort and milk and coziness… it’s being a bit suspicious. For instance… Who invented it? No one knows. Apparently a William Turnier. But Nabisco can’t confirm he ever...
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learning to see: the barnes foundation
Did you get to see it before it shut in June? If not here’s your chance… an interactive tour of the old museum. (The Barnes Foundation was established by Albert C Barnes, opened in 1925 and is being moved to a new building.) I went there a few years ago and loved it. The gallery reminds you of those Old Exhibitions from the 19th century where the paintings covered almost the whole...
August 2011
4 posts
milky way
beautiful and awe inspiring and what is happening just above our heads as we fill them with lists and worries and doubts… Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
3 tags
mosaic of coolness
A lovely mosaic of Virginia Woolf’s covers designed by Vanessa Bell—her sister. via Woolfwriter via Maidontheshore Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
2 tags
proudly clogging up arteries + inboxes...
SPAM was invented in 1937 by Hormel Foods (found at www.spam.com). It is pre-cooked port and ham in a can and was called “Hormel Spiced Ham” originally but the name didn’t stick so they held a contest to rename the affordable meat product. The winning name was SPAM. What does it stand for? In Britain it was a popular wartime food and they called it “Specially Processed...
1 tag
favorite snacks of great writers
via Wendy MacNaughton’s sketchbook via NYT Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
July 2011
6 posts
1 tag
Americanisms and The Queen's English
The BBC did an article all about why Americanisms are so irritating (here) and then did a column (here) where people in Britain were invited to write in with their least favorite Americanisms—their pet peeves. The Economist then followed up with another one that showed that at least 20% of them were British in origin (here) In the end it seems that what all of this really shows up...
1 tag
a display of pure joy: saving a Humpback whale...
Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
2 tags
The Big Bad Handbag
It’s one of my most favorites of all… it’s probably the best of all my books to read aloud… it’s definitely the favorite with children and even though it’s out of print… I know it’ll come back one day. That is, if children have anything to do with it. It’s called Handbag Friends and it’s a book disguised as a pink handbag which has not...
1 tag
Privacy and Popularity
I’ve been thinking lately—how do you keep perspective as a writer or an artist? How do you guard your wonder, openness, vision—how do you stay true to your voice—in the face of the obstacles that want to squelch it. And you. What obstacles? Oh pesky little things like sales figures, amazon rankings, bestseller charts, finding not one single book of yours in a...
2 tags
PW like How To Get A Job
and we like PW! (thank you) “as funny as ever” Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
musical haircuts
via Jago via popchartlab.com a visual compendium of notable hair cuts in popular music (you can zoom in if you click on popchartlab.com) happy 4th! Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
June 2011
6 posts
1 tag
crimes against design
See the full gallery on Posterous via Alice Rawsthorn via NYT Arts Section “Bad design comes in many forms. Things that are unsafe. Things that don’t work properly, or are unnecessarily complicated. Things that are ethically or environmentally unsound. Crimes against design are different. They deprive us of the joy of great design, by wrecking or replacing it.” Alice...
1 tag
hooray for Teachers
teachers teachers hooray for teachers! OK so my sister is one—and yes I am biased but what would we do where would we be without them? they are unsung heroes… aritcle on this very thing here Who was the teacher in your life that made all the difference? Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
1 tag
how to be creative...
what do you do to make YOU creative? Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
1 tag
reading with sebastian junger
well. Ok. not WITH him exactly. But in the same bookstore! And… well no. not at exactly the same time. or day. But in the same month! and in the same paragraph… BookCourt in Brooklyn encourages people to read actual live physical books and the love of reading (hooray because it means book books aren’t going away anytime soon)—this is the owner Zachary Zook (Love that...
2 tags
What is a poet?
“Paul Valery said that a poet is like a man who carries huge weights up to a roof and drops them all at once on the head of a passer-by.” Jeannie Vanasco via NYT book review Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
2 tags
What is a poet?
“Paul Valery said that a poet is like a man who carries huge weights up to a roof and drops them all at once on the head of a passer-by.” Jeannie Vanasco via NYT book review Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
May 2011
15 posts
1 tag
are you ready? actual happy manhattan henge day
yes I already told you I know but that was completely deliberate and so you’d have advance warning… and be ready to go with your picnic and folding chairs at a moment’s notice. Here’s your moment’s notice. And the scoop on where to stand when. (In case you don’t know what I’m on about: two days a year, the sun sets along the east-west axis of...
1 tag
aurora...
watching this you can’t help but wonder… why is it necessary to be so beautiful? you get the feeling it’s a virtuoso performance, a fabulous show put on for our benefit… Like sunsets—these incredible paintings that appear every night… whether we notice them or not… John Calvin said: “There is not one blade of grass, there is no color in this...
1 tag
stories and skimming
James Patterson (b. 1947) said: “If you think of the story that you tell that’s your favorite personal story, or funny story, it doesn’t have flashy sentences. It doesn’t have too much detail. It just tells the story. That isn’t, for whatever reason, the way most people write books. But it seemed to me that there was no reason that it couldn’t be the way at...
1 tag
excuse me, can you watch this & NOT laugh??
didn’t think so… Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
1 tag
Happy Manhattan-Henge Day
photo: Chang W Lee via NYT two days a year, the sun sets along the east-west axis of Manhattan’s street grid. this year it’s may 30 and July 12 (so says Hayden Planetarium and she should know). so happy Manhattan Henge Day! Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
paper flower garden
Collage of a Magnolia grandflora by Mary Granville Pendarves Delany (1700-1788) First of all what about that name? Maybe today we can all call try it on for size? Good idea. Yes, nice to meet you—my name is Sally Granville Pendarves Lloyd-Jones The First (somehow it needs that end bit on). Anyway. Stop this. The point is… Mary Granville Pendarves Delany did this amazing...
bright green invaders
Rose-ringed parakeet in it’s tree—or someone else’s (wouldn’t want to mess with him) Photo: Jean-Louis Le Moigne via NYT Areas surrounding London have been invaded by a Green Lurgy. Parakeets. (There were approx 1,500 in 1995 and now there are 30,000). No one knows why the population explosion. They come from India and Sub-Saharan Africa—but they didn’t...
bright green invaders
Rose-ringed parakeet in it’s tree—or someone else’s (wouldn’t want to mess with him) Photo: Jean-Louis Le Moigne via NYT Areas surrounding London have been invaded by a Green Lurgy. Parakeets. (There were approx 1,500 in 1995 and now there are 30,000). No one knows why the population explosion. They come from India and Sub-Saharan Africa—but they didn’t...
1 tag
Granny? Grandma? GlamMa?
via NYT Who are you calling Grandma? Gwyneth Paltrow’s mother (Blythe Danner) is called “Lalo” by little Apple (she tried to be called “Woof”—unclear why— anything but Grandma I suppose). Goldie Hawn’s grandchild (and evidently she invented this herself) calls her GlamMa! How perfect is that? My Grandma on my Dad’s side was...
1 tag
How To Get A Job: OUT TODAY!
Do you know what you want to be when you grow up? Know any graduates? Are you in the job market? Do you know any children who love playing pretend? Good news. Here’s the book for you. HOW TO GET A JOB… BY ME THE BOSS She’s at it again. This time our know-it-all narrator knows everything about how to ace the interview and land the perfect job. BBC Radio 4 said her first...
happy (140th) birthday, Eeyore!
“Eeyore Alone” (as, of course, he would be on his birthday that no one has remembered) by Ernest H Shepard did you remember? no of course not but the Guardian didn’t forget and they wrote a whole entire article all about how great a literary character (archetypal is what they actually said) Eeyore in actual fact is which you can read here (which is surely...
1 tag
happy (at last) spring
what can you say? it came. it was worth the wait. photo: Angel Franco Azalea Bank of the NY Botanical Gardens via NYT Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
1 tag
happy (at last) spring
what can you say? it came. photo: Angel Franco via NYT Azalea Bank of the NY Botanical Gardens it was worth the wait. Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
1 tag
dedications
photo: Plum with his wife Ethel and daughter Leonora in Le Touquet, July 1924 P G Wodehouse (or Plum) once dedicated one of his many books: “To my daughter Leonora without whose never-failing sympathy and encouragement this book would have been finished in half the time.” Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »
1 tag
kafka covers
via Frank Chimero via Jago how cool are these covers by Peter Mendelsund? read more about the process of designing the jackets here Posted via email from s@lly l-j | Comment »