“These are just the facts, Rich. I mean, I haven’t even begun to let my imagination loose on this thing.” A film about our first head librarian? Telling a tale…tale of the creation of the Cutter System (the same system Forbes Library uses to this day)? I’m afraid not… though Dylan and I are working on the second draft of the Charles Ammi Cutter Story. In theaters 2039. Rather, Cutter’s Way is a film directed by Czech New Wave pioneer Ivan Passer that stars Jeff Bridges and John Heard. Heard plays Alex Cutter, a one armed, one legged, eye patch wearing bitter Vietnam veteran who is on the verge of losing…
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Paul Taylor, Dancemaker
Paul Taylor is an innovative dancer and choreographer. He is known for his pioneering work in modern dance and his long career which began in the 1950s (he danced in…ist, and much else besides. This documentary about Paul Taylor’s career focuses on the Paul Taylor Dance company as they prepare and perform a number pieces. We see the company rehearsing and performing, but best of all, we get to see Paul work with the company as he creates new dances. We are also treated to historical footage of Paul performing as a young man. The dancing is fantastic, and the portrait of this great artist is complex. This film…
Welcome to the Monkey House
Selections from Kurt Vonnegut Jr.’s Welcome to the Monkey House, an anthology of shorter fiction, appeared on the Showtime channel in the early 1990’s. The series was on the air…stance, a soap opera actor portraying a doctor is lead into mansion that houses an elderly woman whose only original body part is her head. The actor is initially surprised, but accepts the situation within moments after the orchestrator of this scientific achievement gives his explanation in the most blasé fashion possible. Kurt Vonnegut’s stories are wonderfully captured in this series and feature performances by Madeline Kahn, Frank Langella, J…
Head
Head is a psychedelic, non-linear motion picture starring… THE MONKEES. While not participating in a traditional narrative, the film retains a cyclical structure. Cyclical, in this instance, by that one…venture film? It’s safe to say these are all correct answers. The director uses esoteric dialog and cutting edge technology (i.e. the process of coloring film… which was essentially only explored in avante-guarde cinema up until this time) to collect these disparate elements and house them in a single story. What also works in this film’s favor is that we have a collection of some of the Monkees best recorded material. Mickey Dolenz sings two lazi…
Forbes Library selects new Writer in Residence
April 29, 2015 — Naila Moreira Forbes Library has selected Naila Moreira as its new Writer in Residence. Ms. Moreira will begin a two year term in July succeeding Susan Stinson who has held…reira is an essayist, poet, and science journalist. Her work frequently focuses on themes of science and nature, drawing on her past experiences in the sciences, including her doctoral work in geology. Her articles and essays, including nonfiction for children, have been published in numerous venues, including The Boston Globe, The Seattle Times, Science News, The Common Online, and Science News for Students. She is the author of the poetry chapbo…
While Mortals Sleep
In his touching preface, writer Dave Eggars refers to Kurt Vonnegut Jr. as a “hippie Mark Twain”. Never has Vonnegut’s appeal been described so accurately. While Mortals Sleep features unpublished,…umously released collection (the first being Look At the Birdie) and it focuses solely on the author’s early work before receiving literary notoriety. In these stories, we get a preview of themes and tones that will exist later in his most famous writings: mainly bizarro science fiction and his select brand of acerbic wit and humor (this is where we mostly relate his Twain influence). In these rich stories, we encounter the mother and widow of a f…
How To Wreck A Nice Beach
The vocoder is one of the strangest devices in the music world. One only has to listen to the recent trend of “Auto-Tune” (an offspring of the vocoder) to begin…rough the invention of this vocal transmission synthesizer and its initial uses. We learn that Winston Churchill and later John F. Kennedy spoke into early modules before the vocoder was even considered to be used as a musical instrument. Tompkins gives us plenty of military, political, scientific and Cold War history side by side with the then nascent hip-hop and electro movements with tales of the Jonzun Crew, Roger Troutman and Kraftwerk to nam…
Stay On It
Composer Julius Eastman’s (1940 – 1990) music explores his identities as a gay man and Black American. Stay On It was composed in 1973 and combines minimalism with pop music….nce through one of the many organizations involved in its production: The Dream Unfinished. The Dream Unfinished is an activist orchestra based out of New York which uses classical music as a platform to engage audiences in dialogues surrounding social and racial justice….
Complete Local History/Local Novelists Reading and Lecture Series Calendar (with past events)
2014-2015 | 2013-2014 | 2012-2013 | 2011-2012 | 2010-2011 logo by Julieta Vasquez Mansilla 2014 – 2015 October 1 Strange Stories of Science! Bugs! Scandal! Fiction! Faith Deering, entomologist, Historic Deerfield Peter Kobel, author, The Strange Case of…3-2014 | 2012-2013 | 2011-2012 | 2010-2011 logo by Julieta Vasquez Mansilla 2014 – 2015 October 1 Strange Stories of Science! Bugs! Scandal! Fiction! Faith Deering, entomologist, Historic Deerfield Peter Kobel, author, The Strange Case of the Mad Professor Brian Adams, novelist, Love in the Time of Climate Change November 5 Paradise Found: A Walking and Biking Tour of Northampton, Massachusetts through poetry and art. Tom Clark, Lori Desrosiers an…
If you liked The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo…
January 13, 2014 — 61 Hours: A Reacher Novel by Lee Child Reacher arrives accidentally in a small South Dakota town, where during a dangerous winter storm he is enlisted to protect a lone…comes under suspicion again when his wife dies, apparently from natural causes, but Rusty chooses to keep her death a secret for a full day. Sequel to bestseller, Presumed Innocent. The Man from Beijing by Henning Mankell Hudiksvall, January 2006, police find eighteen people massacred in a small village. They think it’s the work of a mad man but Birgitta and August believe they were killed by the same person who killed their mother. Nine Dragons…
Genealogy Research at Forbes
Girls in tobacco field, photograph by Elbridge Kingsley Forbes Library has extensive resources for the genealogist. Online resources Recommended genealogy resources and databases Ancestry Library Edition Heritage Quest Resources in…The Hampshire Room for Local History and Special Collections, completed in 2002, houses extensive resources in local history, genealogy, and a large collection of historic Northampton photographs. Genealogists can use the account books and town papers, maps, and manuscripts in this collection. To make an appointment with a librarian who can assist you with your genealogy research please sign up on the online calendar, or call 413-587-1014 or emai…
Calvin Coolige At Home in Northampton
June 2, 2009 — Calvin Coolidge At Home in Northampton, a new book by local historian and volunteer Susan Well, is now available. Using original material from the collections at the Calvin Coolidge Presidential…life and residences of Calvin Coolidge in Northampton, Massachusetts. Well uses new sources to document the unique and interesting personal life stories of Coolidge’s landlords and neighbors. Most of the Museum’s visitors ask where the former President lived, and now we have a definitive answer for them. Susan Well will give an author talk and book signing at the Coolidge Museum Wednesday, June 17 at 7pm. The book is for sale for $16 at the Forbes…
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