Podcasts about Robertson Davies

To celebrate two decades of Under the Influence, Terry O'Reilly shares the five most influential books in his life; former news anchor Elysia Bryan-Baynes recommends three books about leaving your home country to live and work abroad; Montreal musician Lubalin on aliens, existentialism and song-writing fuel; and what makes iconic television personality Jeanne Beker feel the most Canadian on this episode of The Next Chapter.Books discussed on this week's show include:To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper LeeFifth Business by Robertson DaviesTaken at the Flood by John GuntherTicket To Ride by Larry KaneCreativity, Inc. by Ed CatmullThe Three-Body Problem by Liu CixinWe Meant Well by Erum Shazia HasanTo Tell the Truth: My Life as a Foreign Correspondent by Lewis M. SimonsThe War We Won Apart by Nahlah AyedHeart on my Sleeve by Jeanne BekerYoko by David Sheff

Do you ever feel like the evidence for your worst fears is everywhere? Whether it's comments on social media or your own inner dialogue, it can feel impossible to escape the idea that you'll never heal, your relationship is doomed, or you're simply unworthy of love. But here's the truth: what you're experiencing isn't reality, it's confirmation bias. In this episode, we're breaking down how confirmation bias works, how it keeps you stuck in cycles of fear and self-doubt, and most importantly, how to break free. You'll learn practical steps to challenge fear-driven thoughts, see situations more clearly, and replace negativity with balanced perspectives that fuel growth and healing. If you're tired of being trapped by your fears, this episode will show you how to take back control. Key Points & Takeaways: What is Confirmation Bias? A cognitive shortcut where we subconsciously favour information that supports our existing beliefs, even if those beliefs are harmful or untrue. Quote: "The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend." — Robertson Davies. The Impact of Confirmation Bias: Keeps you stuck in cycles of fear, self-doubt, and guilt. Reinforces harmful beliefs like, “I'll never recover,” or “This relationship is doomed.” Blocks opportunities for growth and healing by ignoring evidence that contradicts your fears. Breaking Free from the Fear Trap: Awareness: Notice when you're seeking out proof of your fears instead of truth. Challenge the Thought: Ask yourself, “Is there evidence against this belief?” Seek Balanced Perspectives: Surround yourself with voices and resources that encourage growth, not just validation of negativity. Big Idea: What you focus on grows. By challenging confirmation bias, you can break free from fear-driven cycles and embrace healing and personal growth. This week, challenge yourself to catch one fear-driven thought and ask: Is there evidence against this belief that I'm ignoring? What's one positive perspective I can explore instead? What would I tell a friend in my situation? Share your experience with me in the After the Affair Community on Facebook, or message me on Instagram. Let's work on breaking these patterns together.   Connect with Luke: Website: www.lifecoachluke.com Instagram: @mylifecoachluke Email: luke@lifecoachluke.com Join the After the Affair community at www.facebook.com/groups/aftertheaffaircommunity

In our sixth installment of our #BookCast mini-series, we discuss Fifth Business, by Robertson Davies. The novel builds upon childhood events and grows into a personal epic spanning decades of national and world history, centered through the perspective of an older academic looking back over his life. The story begins, and the main characters all originate from, Deptford, a fictional town based on the real community of Thamesville, Ontario.  Join us as your hosts Garth Casbourne, Meghan Voll, Mark Ambrogio, and Scott Walters dive into some of the book's main themes, including spirituality, ageing & changing perspectives, and socioeconomics. The podcast edit features an extended discussion by Mark on the concept of unreliable narrators, and Meghan reveals the next title in our ongoing series. Aired December 5th at 11 AM on Radio Western, 94.9 FM in London, Ontario. Recorded on November 27, 2024 Produced by Scott Walters Theme song provided by https://freebeats.io/ Produced by White Hot

There are works of weird fiction that dispense their strangeness so subtly that many readers never pick up on it, books that allow themselves to be pass for mundane, the better to haunt us after we put them down. Donna Tartt's debut novel The Secret History, published in 1992, is such a work. On the surface, it is a brilliant, yet completely naturalistic, telling of the lead-up and aftermath of a murder. But The Secret History is also a work of the depths, and readers who go in seeking the Weird will find it lurking on every page. More than a masterpiece of psychological exploration, it is a story about the resurgence of the old god Dionysus, and a chronicle of fate; fate conceived, in the manner of the Ancient Greeks, as a cosmic force. Support us on Patreon (https://www.patreon.com/weirdstudies). Buy the Weird sountrack, volumes 1 (https://pierre-yvesmartel.bandcamp.com/album/weird-studies-music-from-the-podcast-vol-1) and 2 (https://pierre-yvesmartel.bandcamp.com/album/weird-studies-music-from-the-podcast-vol-2), on Pierre-Yves Martel's Bandcamp (https://pierre-yvesmartel.bandcamp.com) page. Listen to Meredith Michael and Gabriel Lubell's podcast, Cosmophonia (https://cosmophonia.podbean.com/). Visit the Weird Studies Bookshop (https://bookshop.org/shop/weirdstudies) Find us on Discord (https://discord.com/invite/Jw22CHfGwp) Get the T-shirt design from Cotton Bureau (https://cottonbureau.com/products/can-o-content#/13435958/tee-men-standard-tee-vintage-black-tri-blend-s)! REFERENCES Donna Tartt, The Secret History (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9781400031702) Robertson Davies (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robertson_Davies), Canadian novelist Weird Studies, Episode 98 on Exotica (https://www.weirdstudies.com/98) M. R. James (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M._R._James), English author Weird Studies, Episode 3 on “The White People” (https://www.weirdstudies.com/3) E. R. Dodds, The Greeks and the Irrational (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9781773239187) Jean Cocteau, La Machine Infernale (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9782253009160) John Crowley, Little, Big (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9780061120053) Star Trek: The Next Generation, “The Outrageous Okana” (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0708816/) Weird Studies, Episode 110 on “The Glass Bead Game” (https://www.weirdstudies.com/110) Gabriel Faure, Nocturne No. 11 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8vrmePFUdg) Pierre-André Boutang, L'Abécédaire de Gilles Deleuze (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyXMmx2Ofgs) Donna Tartt, The Goldfinch (https://bookshop.org/a/18799/9780316055444)

…aaaaand we're back! So excited to bring you another season of What'd You Do This Weekend? a podcast about the things that happen between Friday night and Monday morning! For the premiere of Season 2 we chatted with none other than New York's greatest reporter Anne Kadet of ! If you don't already subscribe to her newsletter, I'm telling you it's a must read! Over her weekend Anne fell in love with the work of the late Robertson Davies (particularly his novel The Manticore), spent a whole day in Flushing and volunteered at her meditation center! Plus: Derek reports that his husband is now obsessed with crocheting and Hilary discovers The Jalopy in Red Hook. New to this podcast? You can browse previous guests like Kate Micucci and Jeff Hiller here! This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit cartoonsbyhilary.substack.com/subscribe

My novelist friend, Brad Whittington and I share a deep and abiding love for the colorful canvases of Robertson Davies, a Canadian writer who paints pictures in the mind."Oho, now I know what you are. You are an advocate of Useful Knowledge.... Well, allow me to introduce myself to you as an advocate of Ornamental Knowledge. You like the mind to be a neat machine, equipped to work efficiently, if narrowly, and with no extra bits or useless parts. I like the mind to be a dustbin of scraps of brilliant fabric, odd gems, worthless but fascinating curiosities, tinsel, quaint bits of carving, and a reasonable amount of healthy dirt. Shake the machine and it goes out of order; shake the dustbin and it adjusts itself beautifully to its new position." – Robertson DaviesUseful knowledge is intellectual. Ornamental knowledge is artistic, fascinating, emotional. But please don't feel that you need to choose between the two. Just as air and water are both essential to your physical wellbeing, Useful knowledge and Ornamental knowledge are both essential to your happiness.Useful knowledge is hard to share. Short sentences are required. There is no room for wordplay when 20/20 clarity is your goal. Writers who can write clearly are needed and needed badly. How is it that every instruction manual is written by a Loquacious Luke who insists on using 27 words when 1 will do? Give me 10 people who can write the truth simply, sharply, and clearly, and I will remove half the frustration from the world.Writers of Useful knowledge communicate clearly and quickly.Writers who share Ornamental knowledge splash splendid colors in the mind to produce vivid visions.But there is a third writer for whom there is no place, no purpose, no need. This is the writer of Adspeak, that empty language of fluff and feathers favored by people who have nothing to say.Adspeak in the boardroom is known as 'Business-dude lorem ipsum'.Charlie Warzel writes for The Atlantic. Here's what Charlie said on August 31, 2022:"'Business-dude lorem ipsum' is filler language that is used to roleplay 'thought leadership' among those who have nothing to say: the MBA version of a grade-school book report that starts with a Webster's Dictionary definition. Advanced business-dude lorem ipsum will convey action ('We need to design value in stages') but only in the least tangible way possible. It will employ industry terms of art ('We're first-to-market or a fast follower') that indicate the business dude has been in many meetings where similar ideas were hatched. Business-dude lorem ipsum will often hold one or two platitudes that sound like they might also be Zen koans ('value is in the eye of the beholder') but actually are so broad that they say nothing at all."Weird Al Yankovic has a video on Youtube called "Mission Statement" featuring a delightful song made of 100% 'Business-dude lorem ipsum'. These are some of the lyrics:"We must all efficiently operationalize our strategies, invest in world-class technology and leverage our core competencies in order to holistically administrate exceptional synergy. We'll set a brand trajectory using management philosophy, advance our market share vis-à-vis our proven methodology, with strong commitment to quality, effectively enhancing corporate synergy. Transitioning our company by awareness of functionality, promoting viability, providing our supply chain with diversity, we will distill our identity through client-centric solutions... and synergy."Write colorfully, or write clearly, but please never become so vapid and shallow that you resort to Adspeak and 'Business-dude lorem ipsum'. You are smarter and better and more resourceful than that. You have the courage and wit to drive the snakes out of Ireland, shoot arrows from a rooftop, and land a fighter jet in a field.Maybe you didn't know those things about yourself, but they are...

Evoking the past and how it shapes the present has been the hallmark of some of the greatest writers in history. This year's winner of the International Booker Prize is “Time Shelter” by the Bulgarian novelist Georgi Gospodinov and it's been hugely successful not just in its Bulgarian homeland but also abroad. The character at the center of the book is a mysterious crypto-philosophical doctor who opens a clinic for Alzheimer's patients which allows them to immerse themselves in a replicated era which they best remember, a way for them to reconnect with their memories. One reason that the book got such visibility and recognition is in large part thanks to my guest today, Angela Rodel who is the translator of the book and a long-time collaborator of Georgi Gospodinov. As translator, she is the co-winner of the International Booker Prize. Angela is originally American, from Minnesota, and as she explains in the episode, she ended up in Bulgaria almost by chance thirty years ago and has built a real understanding of that country's culture and language. Here are a list of books Angela mentioned in the interview: Great Bulgarian book: Wolf Hunt, by Ivailo Petrov (1986) Favourite book I've never heard of: “The Deptford Trilogy” by Robertson Davies (early 1970s) Best book of last 12 months: “Paradise” by Abdulrazak Gurnah The book she found over-rated: “In Search of Lost Time” by Marcel Proust The book she would take to a desert island: “Crime & Punishment” by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1866) The book that changed her mind: “On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous” by Ocean Vuong

This week we're discussing Robertson Davies' novel, "The Manticore," and surprisingly one of us liked it and the other did not. Division on the podcast! And finally, we pick a June book from a list of nominations that are out of left field. We go through a good list of books we wouldn't normally nominate in the hopes of trying something new. Where we end up may surprise you....Nicholas Sparks is that you? (Side note; in classic fashion we mispronounce our selection for the entire podcast. Oh well.) As always loads of tangents, featuring Taylor Swift, Adele, and audiobooks. Enjoy! Nominations: The Bridges of Madison County by Robert James Waller City of Bones by Cassandra Clare The Fault in Our Stars by John Green Leaving the Atocha Station by Ben Lerner Nights in Rodanthe by Nicholas Sparks Can You Keep a Secret? By Sophie Kinsella The Man You'll Marry by Debbie Macomber Another Woman by Penny Vincenzi Contact Us: Instagram @therewillbbooks Twitter @therewillbbooks Email willbebooks@gmail.com Goodreads: Therewillbebooks ko-fi.com/therewillbbooks patreon.com/therewillbbooks

Welcome to the Instant Trivia podcast episode 656, where we ask the best trivia on the Internet. Round 1. Category: African Americans 1: Crispus Attucks, called the first American to die for independence, was killed in this 1770 incident. the Boston Massacre. 2: This Harlem-born singer-dancer-actor was a member of the 1960s "Rat Pack" with Frank and Dino. Sammy Davis, Jr.. 3: An award for African-American authors and illustrators is named for this wife of Martin Luther King Jr.. Coretta Scott King. 4: "I cannot offer you money, position or fame", he said when he offered George Washington Carver a job at Tuskegee. Booker T. Washington. 5: 8 years before she won Olympic gold, this gymnast was a 2004 Virginia State champion. Gabby Douglas. Round 2. Category: 4-Letter Words 1: Bacall's last word on how to whistle. blow. 2: From Greek for "single", a single man who lives in a monastery. monk. 3: This word commonly follows cuff or missing. link. 4: A boy who bears a bride's train, or a bellboy calling out a name. page. 5: A collection of tales by Nathaniel Hawthorne were "Twice" this. Told. Round 3. Category: Authors' Native Lands 1: Godot waiter Samuel Beckett. Ireland. 2: "The Remains of the Day" novelist Kazuo Ishiguro. Japan. 3: Gabriel Garcia Marquez, chronicler of a death foretold. Colombia. 4: Celebrator of imperialism Rudyard Kipling. India. 5: Deptford trilogist Robertson Davies. Canada. Round 4. Category: Let's Eat Italian! 1: Served before the pasta, it's an appetizer plate of meats, cheese, fish and vegetables. antipasto. 2: Long, very thin pasta called capellini is also known by this "divine" name. angel hair pasta. 3: This blue-veined cheese is named for a suburb of Milan, not a snake-haired monster. Gorgonzola. 4: From the Italian for "knot of wood", these potato dumplings may have cheese or spinach in them. gnocchi. 5: It's a layered ice cream dessert usually containing chopped fruits and nuts. spumoni. Round 5. Category: Sports 2004 1: These big cats gave the Patriots all they could handle in Super Bowl XXXVIII. the (Carolina) Panthers. 2: All "Hale" this 58-year-old who won his fourth Senior PGA championship by a str--a shot. Hale Irwin. 3: He was the winning pitcher in the clinching game of all 3 series in the Red Sox' magical run. Derek Lowe. 4: Women from this country won tennis' Wimbledon and French and U.S. Opens. Russia. 5: This team's Chauncey Billups was MVP of the NBA Finals. the Detroit Pistons. Thanks for listening! Come back tomorrow for more exciting trivia! Special thanks to https://blog.feedspot.com/trivia_podcasts/

I love the old prayer that I learned from novelist Robertson Davies, "Oh dear lord don't let me die stupid."  Well unfortunately a lot of people are going to do that, but hopefully not you.  As I have said for the last few days it's time to celebrate the coming new year which occurs next week. So may I ask you one of my favorite questions, are you serious?  And your response might be about what.  And my response would be tell me what the things are that you are serious about. And are you serious about the important things.  And indeed it may be time to be serious about dealing with your death that may happen this year.  Nothing morbid, in fact it's quite liberating and I think you'll find it and also a bit challenging.  Give me 15 minutes and both of us will be smarter and brighter for it,

This episode has it all, a story from Matt's childhood, Peter starts a new project, and we discuss a fantastic book. The main course for tonight is Robertson Davies' novel, "Fifth Business." The beginning novel of the Deptford Trilogy, we were recommended this novel from our listeners and boy were they right. We break down the plot and the themes and our favorite passages before discussing the fantastic ending. High recommend from us both. Enjoy! Contact Us: Instagram @therewillbbooks Twitter @therewillbbooks Email willbebooks@gmail.com Goodreads: Therewillbebooks ko-fi.com/therewillbbooks patreon.com/therewillbbooks

“To go for it, or not to go for it?” That is the appealing question that drives For the Love of the Bard, the debut novel from author Jessica Martin, which is being published just in time to go to the top of your summer reading list, especially if you're a Shakespeare nerd. The story involves our heroine Miranda Barnes returning to her hometown of Bard's Rest, New Hampshire, and helping to run the theater festival run by her parents. But once there, Miranda struggles with her feelings for Adam, the hunky veterinarian who spurned her in high school but also looks great with his shirt off. Martin discusses an early pumpkin-related success led to her passion for writing; how writing gets easier only by doing it; how the book's fantasy works on so many levels; the surprisingly tricky aspects of writing urban fantasy; how she started writing, how she came to Shakespeare, and how she came to write about Shakespeare; shout-outs to both Robertson Davies's Tempest-Tost and the Hogarth series of Shakespearean novels; and how people who don't like Shakespeare puns are sad and to be pitied. (Length 17:32) The post Summertime Shakespeare Rom-Com appeared first on Reduced Shakespeare Company.

In the early 1980s, the University of Alberta funded a series of experimental literary radio programs, which were broadcast across the province on the CKUA community radio network. At the time, CKUA station had just been resurrected through a deal with ACCESS and was eager for educational programming. Enter host and producer Jars Balan – then a masters student in the English department with limited radio experience. For five years, Balan produced three radio series, Voiceprint, Celebrations, and Paper Tygers, which explored the intersection of language, literature, and culture, and he interviewed some of the biggest names in the Canadian literary scene, including Margaret Atwood, Maria Campbell, Robert Kroetsch, Robertson Davies, and many others.This episode is framed as a “celebration” of those heady days of college radio in the early 80s. In it, clips from Jars's radio programs, recovered from the University of Alberta Archives, supplement interviews with Balan and audio engineer Terri Wynnyk. Special tribute will be given to the recently departed Western Canadian poets Doug Barbour and Phyllis Webb through the inclusion of their in-studio performances recorded for Balan's own Celebrations series. By looking back on the pioneering days of campus radio, this episode sheds light on the current moment in scholarly podcasting and how the genre is being resurrected and reimagined by a new generation of “academics on air.”Special thanks to Arianne Smith-Piquette from CKUA and Marissa Fraser from UAlberta's Archives and Special Collections, and to SpokenWeb Alberta researcher Zachary Morrison, who worked behind the scenes on this episode.SpokenWeb is a monthly podcast produced by the SpokenWeb team as part of distributing the audio collected from (and created using) Canadian Literary archival recordings found at universities across Canada. To find out more about Spokenweb visit: spokenweb.ca . If you love us, let us know! Rate us and leave a comment on Apple Podcasts or say hi on our social media @SpokenWebCanada. Episode Producers:Ariel Kroon is a recent graduate of U of A. Her PhD thesis studied narratives of crisis in Canadian post-apocalyptic science fiction from 1948-1989, and what contemporary Canadians can learn from them. She is interested in the ways that the attitudes of the past shape our future-oriented imaginaries and actions in the present. She has published in SFRA Review and The Goose, and is currently a non-fiction editor at Solarpunk Magazine. Research interests of hers include post-humanist feminist theory and philosophy, ecocriticism, and solarpunk. Connect with her on YouTube, at Academia.edu, or her personal blog.Nick Beauchesne (U of Alberta) completed his doctoral studies at the University of Alberta in 2020. He currently works remotely as a sessional instructor at the U of A, and in-person at Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops, BC. His speciality is in twentieth century occult literary networks and modernist magazines, and he is also a vocalist and synthist performing under the pseudonym of Nix Nihil. As a SpokenWeb RA, he is currently preparing to present at the upcoming Symposium on Campus Radio at U of A in the 1980s and its contribution to debates around sexist language.Chelsea Miya is a Postdoctoral Fellow with the SpokenWeb research team at the University of Alberta. Her research and teaching interests include critical code studies, nineteenth-century American literature, and the digital humanities. She has held research positions with the Kule Research Institute (Kias), the Canadian Writing Research Collaboratory (CWRC), and the Orlando Project. She co-edited the anthology Right Research: Modelling Sustainable Research Practices in the Anthropocene (Open Book Publishers 2021), and her article “Student-Driven Digital Learning: A Call to Action” appears in People, Practice, Power: Digital Humanities outside the Center (MIT Press 2021). Sound FX/MusicBBC Sound Effects. “Communications - Greenwich Time Signal, post January 1st 1972.” BBC Sound Effects, https://sound-effects.bbcrewind.co.uk/search?q=07042099.BBC Sound Effects. “Doors: House - House Door: Interior, Larder, Open and Close.” BBC Sound Effects, https://sound-effects.bbcrewind.co.uk/search?q=07027090.BBC Sound Effects. “Footsteps Down Metal Stairs - Footsteps Down Metal Stairs, Man, Slow, Departing.” BBC Sound Effects, https://sound-effects.bbcrewind.co.uk/search?q=07037171.BBC Sound Effects. “Industry: Printing: Presses - Electric Printing Press operating.” BBC Sound Effects, https://sound-effects.bbcrewind.co.uk/search?q=07041078.Bertrof. “Audio Cassette Tape Open Close Play Stop.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/s/351567/.Constructabeat. “Stop Start Tape. Player.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/people/constructabeat/sounds/258392/.Coral Island Studios. "28 Cardboard Box Open" Freesound, https://freesound.org/people/Coral_Island_Studios/sounds/459436/.Gis_sweden. “Electronic Minute No 97 - Multiple Atonal Melodies.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/people/gis_sweden/sounds/429808/.GJOS. “PaperShuffling.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/people/GJOS/sounds/128847/.IESP. “Cage Rattling.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/people/IESP/sounds/339999/.InspectorJ. “Ambience, Children Playing, Distant, A.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/people/InspectorJ/sounds/398160/.Johntrap. “Tubes ooTi en Vrak.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/people/johntrap/sounds/528291/.Kern PKL. “Limoncello.” Blue Dot Sessions, https://app.sessions.blue/browse/track/104864.Kyles. “University Campus Downtown Distant Traffic and Nearby Students Hanging Out Spanish +Some People and Groups Walk by Steps Cusco, Peru, South America.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/people/kyles/sounds/413951/.Lillehammer. “Arbinac.” Blue Dot Sessions, https://app.sessions.blue/album/9f32a891-6782-4a63-8796-cafa323b711e.Michaelvelo. “Packing Tape Pull.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/people/Michaelvelo/sounds/366836/.Nix Nihil. “Vocal Windstorm.” Psyoptic Enterprises, 2016.Oymaldonado. “70's southern rock mix loop for movie.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/people/oymaldonado/sounds/507242/.Psyoptic. “Forest of Discovery.” Thought Music. Psyoptic Enterprises, 2006.Sagetyrtle. “Cassette.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/people/sagetyrtle/sounds/40164/.Suso_Ramallo. “Binaural Catholic Gregorian Chant Mass Liturgy.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/people/Suso_Ramallo/sounds/320530/.tonywhitmore. “Opening Cardboard Box.” Freesound, https://freesound.org/s/110948/.Ziegfeld Follies of 1921. “Second hand Rose” [restored version]. George Blood, LP. Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/78_second-hand-rose_fanny-brice-grant-clarke-james-f-hanley_gbia0055858a/Second+Hand+Rose+-+Fanny+Brice+-+Grant+Clarke-restored.flac Archival AudioCarlin, George. "Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television.” Indecent Exposure. Little David Records, 1978.“Dorothy Livesay.” Celebrations. Dept. of Radio and Television and CKUA, 8 Feb. 1984.“Douglas Barbour.” Celebrations. Dept. of Radio and Television and CKUA, 10 Oct. 1983.“Margaret Atwood.” Celebrations. Dept. of Radio and Television and CKUA, 12 Oct. 1983.“Marian Engel.” Celebrations. Dept. of Radio and Television and CKUA, 18 Jan. 1984.“Linguistic Taboos and Censorship in Literature.” Voiceprint. Dept. of Radio and Television and CKUA, 8 April 1983.“Phyllis Webb.” Celebrations. Dept. of Radio and Television and CKUA, 16 Nov. 1983.“Poetry: The Sullen Craft or Art.” Paper Tygers. Dept. of Radio and Television and CKUA, 1 Jan. 1982.“Robert Kroetsch.” Celebrations. Dept. of Radio and Television and CKUA, 23 Nov. 1983.“Rudy Wiebe.” Celebrations. Dept. of Radio and Television and CKUA, 21 March 1984.“Stephen Scobie.” Celebrations. Dept. of Radio and Television and CKUA, 26 Oct. 1983.“Women's Language and Literature: A Voice and a Room of One's Own.” Voiceprint. Dept. of Radio and Television and CKUA, 4 March 1981.“Speech and Its Characteristics.” Voiceprint. Dept. of Radio and Television and CKUA, 18 March 1981. Works CitedThe Canadian Communications Foundation, https://broadcasting-history.com/in-depth/brief-history-educational-broadcasting-canada.Bashwell, Peace. “Weird and Wonderful Scenes from the Bardfest.” The Gateway, November 10, 1981, pg. 13. Peel's Prairie Provinces, http://peel.library.ualberta.ca/newspapers/GAT/1981/11/10/13/.The Canadian Communications Foundation (CCF). “CKUA-AM.” History of Canadian Broadcasting, https://broadcasting-history.com/listing_and_histories/radio/ckua-am.Fauteux, Brian. “The Canadian Campus Radio Sector Takes Shape.” Music in Range: The Culture of Canadian Campus Radio. Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2015, pp. 37-64.Kostash, Myrna. “Book View.” The Edmonton Journal, 17 Jan. 1981.Kirkman, Jean. “CKUA: Fifty years of growth for the university's own station.” University of Alberta Alumni Association: History Trails, March 1978, https://sites.ualberta.ca/ALUMNI/history/affiliate/78winCKUA.htm.Remington, Bob. “Banning of Radio Show Called Cowardly.” The Edmonton Journal, 26 May 1983. Further ReadingArmstrong, Robert. “History of Canadian Broadcasting Policy, 1968–1991.” Broadcasting Policy in Canada, Second Edition. University of Toronto Press, 2016, pp. 41-56.The Canadian Communications Foundation (CCF). “A Brief History of Educational Broadcasting in Canada.” History of Canadian Broadcasting, https://broadcasting-history.com/in-depth/brief-history-educational-broadcasting-canada.Deshaye, Joel. The Metaphor of Celebrity : Canadian Poetry and the Public, 1955-1980. University of Toronto Press; 2013.Gil, Alex. “The User, the Learner and the Machines We Make” [blog post]. Minimal Computing, 21 May 2015, https://go-dh.github.io/mincomp/thoughts/2015/05/21/user-vs-learner/.MacLennan, Anne F. “Canadian Community/Campus Radio: Struggling and Coping on the Cusp of Change.” Radio's Second Century: Perspectives on the Past, Present and Future, edited by John Allen Hendricks, Rutgers University Press, 2020, pp. 193-206.Rubin, Nick. “‘College Radio': The Development of a Trope in US Student Broadcasting.” Interactions: Studies in Communication & Culture, vol. 6, no. 1, Mar. 2015, pp. 47–64.Walters, Marylu. CKUA: Radio Worth Fighting For. University of Alberta Press, 2002.

Extraordinary people survive under the most terrible circumstances and they become more Extraordinary because of it. Robertson Davies

Robertson Davies: „Der Fünfte im Spiel“ | Übers.: Maria Seifert | Dörlemann Verlag 2019 | Preis: 25,-- Euro

It was high time for me to catch up with my former improv class buddy Kate Britt. She enthusiastically recommended Fifth Business, the first in the Deptford Trilogy. And she knows stuff because she is a LIBRARIAN. I didn't realize how bad I had been missing smart witty IN PERSON conversation during these cold ass wintery lingering pandemic days and it was just so much fun. The 't nana' I refer to a couple of times during the episode is the 'Tropicana Banana' strain that was grown by an awesome caregiver in Michigan. Yum. How had I not heard about Robertson Davies until now?! I love the fictional village of Deptford and it's inhabitants and the circumstances that affect their whole lives as seen through the eyes of Dunstan Ramsay. It was just what I needed. I felt like I was sitting beside an awkward wonderful storyteller learning about how he came to be the man he is. If you are looking for a novel to just sweep you up and carry you along on these cold days, go get it. I've already started the second one!

In the virtual Shed the Dogs anachronistically yet contemporaneously predict the outcome of the 2021 federal election in Canada. What is RJ's new doctor really trying to say in his introductory letter to his new patients? Spit it out. Now, cough! In an epic 'splainer PJ draws back the curtain on the mighty machinery of the electoral process and shares his new and hard-won insights into why federal elections cost so much. All three Dogs arrive at a hopefully clearer understanding of what is and is not insider trading. We close with a shout out to newlyweds Chroner and Deb of Duncan as well as a precise (if temporary) understanding of what the “cis” prefix means. This compact episode is a great deal when calculated on a per minute basis!Links: Shed Dogs; Robertson Davies; COVID tests in BC; the 2021 federal election.Theme music by Voodoo Jazz!

Jeff and Dave bring the first show from Vomitorium West, where they take a close look at the sophist Gorgias (483–375 BC). When he wasn't hitting the Olympia/Delphi orators circuit for some cool drachmai, Gorgias was in Athens claiming to be able to answer any question anyone one might put to him. Who was this guy? Did he actually believe his own press? In this work, G defends Helen of Troy so convincingly you'll be fist-pumping. That is, until he pulls the rug out from under the whole project with the work's final word. Oh, and make sure you know your millihelens from your terahelens before you wander down to the harbor with Robertson Davies and Isaac Asimov. Then again, you probably don't exist (G says nothing does), so don't sweat it. Finally, check out Jeff's smoove beatbox.

In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll explore some curiosities and unanswered questions from Greg's research, including a novelist's ashes, some bathing fairies, the mists of Dartmoor, and a ballooning leopard. We'll also revisit the Somerton man and puzzle over an armed traveler. Intro: Amanda McKittrick Ros is widely considered the worst novelist of all time. John Cummings swallowed 30 knives. Sources for our notes and queries: The Pony Express ad is quoted in Christopher Corbett's 2004 history Orphans Preferred: The Twisted Truth and Lasting Legend of the Pony Express. It appeared first in Missouri amateur historian Mabel Loving's posthumous 1961 history The Pony Express Rides On!, but she cites no source, and no one's been able to find the ad. The anecdote about John Gawsworth keeping M.P. Shiel's ashes in a biscuit tin appears in John Sutherland's 2011 book Lives of the Novelists. "The comedian and scholar of nineteenth-century decadent literature, Barry Humphries, was (unwillingly) one such diner -- 'out of mere politeness.'" Sutherland gives only this source, which says nothing about the ashes. (Thanks, Jaideep.) Henry Irving's observation about amateur actors and personal pronouns is mentioned in Robertson Davies' 1951 novel Tempest-Tost. Joseph Addison's definition of a pun appeared in the Spectator, May 10, 1711. Theodore Hook's best pun is given in William Shepard Walsh's Handy-Book of Literary Curiosities, 1892. Richard Sugg's anecdote of the Ilkley fairies appears in this 2018 Yorkshire Post article. The proof of the Pythagorean theorem by "Miss E. A. Coolidge, a blind girl" appears in Robert Kaplan and Ellen Kaplan's 2011 book Hidden Harmonies: The Lives and Times of the Pythagorean Theorem. They found it in Elisha Scott Loomis' 1940 book The Pythagorean Proposition, which cites the Journal of Education (Volume 28, 1888, page 17), which I haven't been able to get my hands on -- the Kaplans couldn't either, until they discovered it had been mis-shelved in the stacks of Harvard's Gutman Library. Neither Loomis nor the Kaplans gives the proof as it originally appeared, and neither gives Coolidge's age at the proof. The anecdote of the Dartmoor fog appears in William Crossing's 1888 book Amid Devonia's Alps. The Paris fogs of the 1780s are described in Louis-Sébastien Mercier's Tableau de Paris (Chapter CCCLXIV, 1:1014), a 12-volume topographic description of the city that appeared between 1782 and 1788, as quoted in Jeremy Popkin, ed., Panorama of Paris: Selections From Tableau de Paris, 2010. "I have known fogs so thick that you could not see the flame in their lamps," Mercier wrote, "so thick that coachmen have had to get down from their boxes and feel their way along the walls. Passers-by, unwilling and unwitting, collided in the tenebrous streets; and you marched in at your neighbour's door under the impression that it was your own." The anecdote about Charles Green and his ballooning companions appears in John Lucas' 1973 book The Big Umbrella. The best image I've been able to find of the Dobhar-chú, the "king otter" of Irish folklore, accompanies this 2018 article from the Leitrim Observer. Does a photo exist of Grace Connolly's entire headstone? According to WorldCat, G.V. Damiano's 1922 book Hadhuch-Anti Hell-War is held only by the New York Public Library System; by Trinity College Library in Hartford, Ct.; and by the Center for Research Libraries in Chicago. If it's available online, I haven't been able to find it. The incident of the dividing typewriters is mentioned in this article from the Vancouver Sun, and there's a bit more on this Australian typewriter blog. The anecdote about Enroughty being pronounced "Darby" appears in the designer's notes for the wargame The Seven Days, Volume III: Malvern Hill. This 1912 letter to the New York Times affirms the pronunciation, and this 1956 letter to American Heritage gives another explanation of its origin -- one of many. A few more confirming sources: Robert M. Rennick, "I Didn't Catch Your Name," Verbatim 29:2 (Summer 2004). Parke Rouse, "The South's Cloudy Vowels Yield to Bland Consonance," [Newport News, Va.] Daily Press, Feb. 23, 1989, A11. Earl B. McElfresh, "Make Straight His Path: Mapmaking in the Civil War," Civil War Times 46:4 (June 2007), 36-43, 5. But even if it's true, there's no consistent explanation as to how this state of affairs came about. Listener mail: Daniel Keane and Rhett Burnie, "The Somerton Man's Remains Have Been Exhumed — So What Happens Next?" ABC News, May 19, 2021. Hilary Whiteman, "The Somerton Man Died Alone on a Beach in 1948. Now Australian Scientists Are Close to Solving the Mystery," CNN, May 31, 2021. "Operation Persist Enters New Phase," Crime Stoppers South Australia, Jan. 30, 2019. "Most-Wanted Iraqi Playing Cards," Wikipedia (accessed Jul. 9, 2021). Leon Neyfakh, "An Ingenious New Way of Solving Cold Cases," Slate, Feb. 1, 2016. Jean Huets, "Killing Time," New York Times Opinionater, Sept. 7, 2012. "1863 Complete Set of Confederate Generals Playing Cards (52)," Robert Edward Auctions (accessed July 10, 2021). James Elphick, "Four Ways Americans Have Used Playing Cards in War," History Net (accessed July 10, 2021). "WWII Airplane Spotter Cards," The Museum of Flight Store (accessed July 11, 2021). "Vesna Vulovic," Wikipedia (accessed July 4, 2021). Richard Sandomir, "Vesna Vulovic, Flight Attendant Who Survived Jetliner Blast, Dies at 66," New York Times, Dec. 28, 2016. "Yeast Hunting," myBeviale, June 1, 2020. This week's lateral thinking puzzle was contributed by listener Sarah Gilbert, who sent this corroborating link (warning -- this spoils the puzzle). You can listen using the player above, download this episode directly, or subscribe on Google Podcasts, on Apple Podcasts, or via the RSS feed at https://futilitycloset.libsyn.com/rss. Please consider becoming a patron of Futility Closet -- you can choose the amount you want to pledge, and we've set up some rewards to help thank you for your support. You can also make a one-time donation on the Support Us page of the Futility Closet website. Many thanks to Doug Ross for the music in this episode. If you have any questions or comments you can reach us at podcast@futilitycloset.com. Thanks for listening!

This episode we explore the secret world of Psychics, looking at the vast and colourful history, comparisons to modern day religion, and get first hand insights from 2 very different psychics with incredible abilities. Psychic secrets will make you question, what do you believe? “The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend.”- Robertson Davies, Tempest-Tost.

Comentari de la novel·la i tancament de les intervencions --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/bibliotecadesalou/message

Mark interviews writer, director, playwright and actor, Rod Carley and they talk about his new novel Kinmount. Prior to the interview, Mark shares a personal update as well as a word from this episode's sponsor. You can learn more about how you can get your work distributed to retailers and library systems around the world at starkreflections.ca/Findaway. During their conversation, Mark and Rod talk about: How, when he was young, Rod would come home from school every day and work on a picture book Joining a musical as part of the chorus in grade 9 Theater offering a sense of collaboration and inclusion Having Canadian poet bpNichol as a creative writing instructor in university, and how this legendary writer was a huge influence The work Rod did adapting and editing Shakespearean scripts into modern settings by finding more recent historic parallels to moments, themes, and events from the original plays Writing musicals based on the history of Northern Ontario An overview of the premise and setup for Rod's first novel, A Matter of Will Rod's latest novel, Kinmount, which is about a theater director trying to put on a Shakespeare play (Romeo & Juliet) in a small town The common mis-perception of Romeo & Juliet as a romantic story rather than a tragedy How Romeo & Juliet is, in many ways, a tragedy of toxic masculinity Balancing humanity with hilarity in the writing of this book The subtle elements of magic realism in Kinmount and A Matter of Will and how it has to come from an organic place in the story One of the things Rod has done when directing MacBeth ("the Scottish play") to break the curse/spell associated with that play How the first week of July in North Bay there is a massive shadfly infestation Launching a novel during the 2020 Pandemic Pivoting to a virtual book launch, and hiring a small local marketing firm to assist with that One of the pros of having a virtual book launch, which allowed for attendees from afar Getting onto the long-list for the Stephen Leacock Medal and the support Rod received from Terry Fallis Some of Rod's influences that include Robertson Davies, Mordecai Richler, David Sedaris, Kurt Vonnegut, and more How Rod prepares for doing a live (or virtual) reading of his work The way Rod's work in theater has informed his ability to compose dialogue Modern adaptation (what Rod calls "responsible adaption") of Shakespeare's society and how, back in Shakespeare's day, people were used to speaking and listening a lot more rapidly, so a typical Shakespeare play wasn't as long in duration as a modern version And more... After the interview, Mark reflects on the adaptations that can happen with creative work and how authors might consider their own work re-adapted to different formats.   Links of Interest: Rod Carley's Website Instagram Twitter Facebook Kevin Closs Music Episode 29 - Terry Fallis on Writing with Authenticity, Humor, & Passion Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour Patreon for Stark Reflections Wide for the Win Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books This Time Around (Short Story) A Canadian Werewolf in New York Stowe Away (Novella) Fear and Longing in Los Angeles Fright Nights, Big City   Rod's first novel, A Matter of Will, was a finalist for the 2018 Northern Lit Award for Fiction. His non-fiction short story, A Farewell to Steam, was featured in the anthology, 150 Years Up North and More. His literary fiction short story, Botox and the Brontosaurus, is featured in Cloud Lake Literary's inaugural online review. Rod is also an award-winning director, playwright and actor, having directed and produced over 100 theatrical productions to date including fifteen adaptations of Shakespeare. He is the Artistic Director of the Acting for Stage and Screen Program for Canadore College and a part-time English professor with Nipissing University. Rod was the 2009 winner of TVO's Big Ideas/Best Lecturer competition. KINMOUNT is his second novel.   The introductory, end, and bumper music for this podcast (“Laser Groove”) was composed and produced by Kevin MacLeod of www.incompetech.com and is Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

Intro.(1:37) - Start of interview(2:19) - Jon's "origin story." He started as a sports journalist, later became press secretary to then NYC Comptroller Jay Goldin. His transition to asset management, founding his firm Sinclair Capital and leading the Investor Responsibility Research Center Institute (IRRCi) (succeeded by the Weinberg Center) focused on ESG and capital market issues.(4:48) - His experience with the NYC pension funds, CII and how he addresses the different "stages of governance" described in his book "Moving Beyond Modern Portfolio Theory: Investing That Matters." His historical perspective on corporate governance from the Dutch East India Company (1602). HBS Professors Myles Mace: "Boards are ornaments on a corporate Christmas tree" and Peter Drucker: "The one thing that all boards have in common is that they do not work." His experience with Creditors Committee at WorldCom. Corporate governance in the 1980s changed for two reasons:In a capitalist society whoever has capital, has power. By the 1980s, institutional investors became very influential with more assets under management.This was prompted in part by the greenmail scandals. In one year (1983-1984) this practice extracted $4bn from US corporationsThat prompted the formation of the Council of Institutional Investors (1985).(13:04) -  The disagreement is not over corporate governance, but rather over "optimal" corporate governance. This is so because capital is changing. "75%-94% of your returns is due to the systematic nature of the markets." The problem with MPT.(17:41) - The concept of "Beta Activism"(19:54) - The focus of his book "Moving Beyond MPT": "This is not a modest book: we are trying to redefine what investing is." "Stewardship for the benefit of the marketplace as a whole, to deal with systematic risk issues that  that we can't deal with mere diversification." More holistic and long term vision of how to improve the risk return of the market as a whole.(21:41) - Shareholder activism on ESG and sustainability ("Beta Activism"). Examples: Engine No.1 on Exxon, Climate Change. "There will also be changes on how shareholder resolutions will be crafted." For example: Yum Brands  on the systemic effects of the use of antibiotics in its supply chain by the end of 2021 (proposed by Paul Rissman and the Shareholder Commons). From individual companies to global/industry levels. Another example, new safety standards after the Vale scandals. "The problem is that somehow in the 1990s/2000s the shareholders figured out how to be first and last in the line."(26:16) - Debate on corporate purpose (shareholder primacy / stakeholder capitalism / benefit corporations). "I think the person who jumpstarted this discussion was Lynn Stout with her book the shareholder value myth." "You have to care about how companies are dealing with the health of the system as a whole." "But I still think that the governance of a company needs a final decision: that's the shareholders [on how to maximize the residual benefit but taking care of everyone else to do that." "I've always thought it was a false dichotomy [to think about shareholder primacy vs stakeholder capitalism.]" Alex Edman's book "Grow the Pie": shareholder value as a subset of societal value. Shareholders are at the back of the line.(30:30) - His perspective on international corporate governance trends. Cross-influence between the US and Europe. Asia. Taking into accounts culture. The last US administration tampered down ESG in the last 4 years.(35:29) - His take on public vs private companies (Wall Street vs Silicon Valley). The advent of dual class shares in Silicon Valley: "founder syndrome." There are different risk desires and appetites for smaller growth companies vs larger mature companies.(39:43) - His thoughts on western vs authoritarian vs the next dominant economic paradigm. "Confucian curse of living through interesting times."(43:15) - His favorite book: Fifth Business, by Robertson Davies (1970)(43:41) - His favorite play: As You Like It, by William Shakespeare(45:45) - His mentors:His sister (personal)Jay Goldin (professional)(47:38) - His favorite quote: "It's better to be approximately right than precisely wrong" and "Work hard and be nice to people" (new Michael Franti song)(48:30) - His "unusual habit": He loves to cook.(49:26) - The living person he most admires: his wife.(49:56) - His views on the future of NY post pandemic.Jon Lukomnik is the Founder of Sinclair Capital. Jon chairs the audit committee of the Van Eck mutual funds, is a core member of the Funston Advisory team, and serves on the Deloitte Audit Quality Advisory Committee. He has a long track record in corporate governance having served as an investment advisor for the New York City’s pension funds, a managing director of a top ten hedge fund and a director for public and private companies, non-profit corporations and litigation trusts. His new book, co-authored with Professor James Hawley, is “Moving Beyond Modern Portfolio Theory: Investing That Matters”. If you like this show, please consider subscribing, leaving a review or sharing this podcast on social media. __Follow Evan on:Twitter @evanepsteinSubstack https://evanepstein.substack.com/Music/Soundtrack (found via Free Music Archive): Seeing The Future by Dexter Britain is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License

Once a year, Canadian literary giant, Robertson Davies, would write and perform a ghost story for his students and colleagues at the University of Toronto. This wonderful tradition carried on for 18 years. In the episode, we share one of the best examples of his spooky and side-splitting stories that blur the lines between fact and fiction.

On this week's Sunday Morning Matinee, Matt and Adam are joined by Tim Hughes to discuss, magic, identity, and Derek Delgaudio's In and Of Itself. in the first segment, the group discusses Delgaudio's popular stage show that is part magic, part performance art, and part group therapy. Diving deep into the show, the conversation searches out themes of belonging, identity, deception, and the artifice of church worship. In the second segment, the group discusses the intersection of the lectionary passages for March 21st and In and of Itself. Finally, to tend the show, Matt thinks about an online SXSW and Adam talks about Robertson Davies.

In our new Christmas Eve tradition, I present a reading of ghost story, this one from Canadian novelist Robertson Davies, entitled "Revelation From a Smoky Fire." You can find it in his collection "High Spirits," which collects the stories he wrote to read at the annual Christmas celebrations for Massey College at the University of Toronto.

Inspired by the Berko Speakeasy, this week we present a festive tale by Canadian novelist Robertson Davies, from his slim volume High Spirits: A Collection of Ghost Stories. Abridged and read by Austin Tichenor. Featuring: ghostly visitations; poor relations; spectral elitism; Norwegian sneering; drafty accommodations; phantom arthritis; and something called…a rumpus room. (Length 24:34) The post Holiday Ghost Story appeared first on Reduced Shakespeare Company.

Earning Freedom: Conquering a 45-Year Prison Term by Michael Santos. Chapter 8.3   Julie and Tim agree to finance my tuition and book expenses with the understanding that I’ll reimburse them from my earnings. When the mailroom delivers my coursework for first-year law, the stack of textbooks reaches halfway up my thigh. As I fan through thousands of fine-print pages optimism surges through me. I’m making progress, feeling a renewed energy, convinced that these books will change my life. I create a new daily schedule, committing myself to wake and to begin studying after the guards complete the 3:00 a.m. census, allowing myself three hours of reading and note-taking before I exercise. Then I can study again from 9:00 a.m. until 8:00 p.m. By the end of 1998, I’ll finish my first-year courses. The self-imposed structure brings the illusion that I’m back in control of my life. A scandalous affair between President Clinton and a young White House intern dominates the news, but I barely notice. I have tunnel vision again, devoting all of my energies toward mastering a new vocabulary, learning how to research the law, and writing lengthy papers. After sending in my first batch of assignments, I move on to the next course. It’s early morning, still dark outside, and I’m studying in bed. My tiny book light is clipped on the metal chair beside my rack, illuminating the thick textbook propped upon my thighs. Eleven other men sleep nearby, but my earplugs muffle the sound of their snores. I’m invigorated by the work. Instead of wasting time, I’m developing skills that can never be taken away. Later in the week, when I open the envelope containing my first graded assignments, I’m deeply disappointed. Because of my experience at Hofstra and Mercer, I expected these law professors to challenge me, to expose flaws in my reasoning, to show an interest in my work. I invested more than 100 hours reading and writing nearly 50 pages of carefully researched reasoning and arguments. Despite the efforts I made, the professor only drew a red circle around the “A” in the top right corner of the first page, and that letter grade represented the extent of his commentary. I toss the envelope to the bottom of my locker in disgust, doubtful that anyone read what I wrote. Now I understand what Bruce meant when he said this law degree would cheapen my other degrees. The costly tuition appears to cover the expense of a diploma, not for an education in the law. But I didn’t enroll to receive another piece of paper to frame and hang. I could’ve simply purchased the books and studied on my own. Although I wouldn’t earn a degree, I would gain the same knowledge through a completely independent study. Nevertheless, I’ve paid the non-refundable fee for the first year so I continue. *  *  *  *  *  *  * It’s 4:00 a.m., and I’ve found a quiet room where I’m finishing my final assignment for the term. My legal dictionary, a book on case law, and two supplementary texts lay open on the table. When the door behind me opens I turn around, surprised that anyone else is awake at this hour. It’s Gary, one of the 400 prisoners assigned to my unit. Wearing gray sweats, slip-on shoes, and carrying a plastic mug with steaming coffee, he makes his way through the room with quiet footsteps and stands in front me. We’ve never spoken before. Although I recognize faces, I prefer to remain cloistered in my own space, absorbed with my books and studies. I cherish the early morning solitude and Gary’s intrusion annoys me. “I heard you study law,” he says in a strong Russian accent, looking down at me. I lean back in my chair, lock my hands behind my head and yawn as I stretch. “That’s right,” I answer, finally making eye contact with him. “I need some help with my case.” “Can’t help you. I’m wrapped up with school. You should check out the law library. A few guys do legal work there.” Gary moves around the table and stands beside me, sipping his coffee, looking at my books. “I’ve watched you. Very serious. You study all the time. Don’t talk much. Are you almost finished?” “I’m finishing first year. I’ll need two more years to complete the program.” “Read my case,” Gary proposes, taking another sip from his coffee mug. “I want your opinion. My lawyer sent boxes of paper from my appeal. I don’t understand. You could help.” “No. I can’t. I’ve got too much to read.” Gary nods his head. “Help me. I’ll pay you well.” His offer to pay is a novel concept to me and I inquire further. “What is it that you want me to read?” “I lost my appeal. Now my attorneys want to file a new motion in court. Why?  I want to know.” “I can’t answer that question without reading all of your transcripts, your appeal, and researching the court’s rulings. That would take weeks and I can’t afford to take that time away from my studies.” “I don’t want those guys in the law library. I want you. Money’s no object. Name your price.” I stretch again, thinking of a number that will send him away, or, if he accepts, make the effort worth my while. “Two thousand dollars.” “Okay. Give me instructions on where to wire the funds.” “No wire. I’ll give you an address. Think about it, because all I’m going to do is read everything, then tell you my opinion. I’m not filing any motions or writing any briefs. If the check arrives, I’ll come by, pick up the boxes and start reading. If not, I’ll know you changed your mind.” “Give me the address.” *  *  *  *  *  *  * “Do you know someone from New York?” Julie asks during our phone call. “Why?” “Because I received a check in the mail from a New York address. A note says it’s for Gary’s case. We don’t know anyone from New York who would send us $2,000. I figured it must be someone you know.” A week has passed since Gary visited me in the quiet room. Expecting him to be as full of hot air as most other prisoners, I didn’t forewarn my sister that she might receive a check. News of the money’s arrival makes me smile. For the first time since I’ve been in prison, I’ve got money of my own. “Yes, I know Gary. Sorry I didn’t write you about it before. I’ll send you a letter this week explaining everything.” “Well what am I supposed to do with the check?” “Do you need it?” “We don’t need it. Do you want me to save it for you?” “If you don’t need it, I want you to open an online brokerage account. Make it a margin account. We’re going to use it to buy stock. I want to start building a stock portfolio that can grow during the rest of the time I have to serve.” “What should I buy?” “When the account’s open, buy Yahoo!.” “How many shares?” “Buy as much as you can.  If you open a margin account, the broker will let you borrow against the stock to double up, enabling you to purchase $3,000 worth of the stock. We’ll add to the account over time.” “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” My sister doesn’t have any experience investing in stocks and she’s worried about exposure. “Just call the broker and open the account.  He’ll confirm that you can do this.”  I know that Julie will help. I don’t have access to computers, but I’ve been reading about the Internet in the Wall Street Journal for several years. I’ve seen the phenomenon of such companies as Netscape, America Online, and Amazon.com. I’m certain the Internet will change the world, influencing people’s lives more than the telephone, television, and radio combined. Although I may not be able to use it until I’m free, I want a stock portfolio that will allow me to own a slice of the companies I expect will dominate the Web, and I intend to start with Yahoo!. *  *  *  *  *  *  * I walk into Gary’s room to invite him for a walk. He’s sitting on his bunk, leaning back against the wall, reading The Deptford Trilogy by the Canadian novelist Robertson Davies. He reads novels to improve his English, which he speaks well. He’s also fluent in Spanish, French, and Russian. I’ve read every page of the transcripts from Gary’s trial, as well as all accompanying documents that he gave me. Court papers have a tendency to portray defendants in an unflattering light. Gary’s papers, on the other hand, expose a remarkable history of a self-made man. After earning tens of millions as a mining entrepreneur in Russia, Gary relocated to the United States where he began accumulating blocks of commercial real estate. Criminal charges led to his trial, and although a jury convicted Gary of one count related to complexities with his businesses’ accounting, the jury acquitted him of several others. He has served two years since his conviction and faces one more. “You’ve read through everything?” He hops down from the rack and laces up his sneakers. “I’ve read everything. But let’s talk outside.” The summer of 1998 brings high humidity to the East Coast. It’s against prison rules to take off our shirts, so within seconds of stepping outside my tank top is damp with sweat and stuck to my back. Both of us carry plastic water bottles and wear sunglasses. Under his white baseball cap Gary looks much younger than 36, too young to have built and operated all the businesses his court papers describe. “My lawyers want another hundred grand to file the last motion,” he says. “I’ll bet you never thought justice cost so much.” Gary waves his hand. “I’m tired of all this, with the trial and the appeal going on and on. This mess has already cost me more than a million. I just want it over.” “You’ve already served two years. No one can take that away.” “But I’ve served every day thinking it would be my last, that I’d win something and be released.” “There comes a time, Gary, when it’s easier to let go, to accept the sentence and focus on the future you can control, rather than hanging on to the past you can’t change.” I explain to Gary my interpretation of his case. The only mechanism available for him to seek relief is a habeas corpus petition. Statistics show that courts refuse to grant relief through those petitions nine out of ten times, and at least nine months would pass before he received a hearing. “With less than 12 months before release,” I explain, “I don’t think it makes sense to put yourself on that emotional roller coaster, not to mention the cost of another legal motion.” “I don’t care about the money.” “Your lawyers must know that.” “Why do you say that?” “They represented you through trial and on your appeal. It’s not like they’ll have to read all the papers again. The price they’re asking to prepare the motion seems about ten times too high.” “Could you write the motion from here?” “I wouldn’t want to try.” “Why not? I’d rather pay you than them.” I’m silent, thinking, as gravel crunches beneath our steps. Gary’s offer isn’t lost on me. I know he’s in the prisoner mindset of desperation, clinging to hope that something will free him and he’s willing to pay for that delusion. “Gary, you don’t have any upside to filing this motion. You’ll be out by the time a judge hears it, and even if he does hear the motion, you’ll probably lose. I’d rather show you strategies that will help ease the last 12 months you’re going to serve.  Regardless of what you pay, the reality is that you’re going to serve your time. I’ll serve it with you.” Gary takes his ball cap off and scratches his head. We walk alongside bleachers where several hundred prisoners cheer for the teams playing softball. “So there’s nothing we can do?” “I wouldn’t say that. With the right frame of mind we can figure out a plan to make your last year pass easier than the first two. It will pass. If you keep waiting for something to change through the courts, on the other hand, this last year will hang over your head like a dark cloud, making you miserable.” “I can’t believe you’ve done 11 years. How can you put up with this for so long without going crazy?” “I’ve got a deliberate plan. Every day I work hard to prepare myself for the time when I’ll go home.” “But 45 years? How do you prepare for that?” “I won’t serve that long. The only way I’d serve that long would be if I lost good time from disciplinary actions, and I haven’t lost any yet. I know what I’m doing. I completely understand prisons and the way to avoid problems. Since I’m always working toward the next goal, time passes quickly.” “How much time do you have left?” he asks. “I’m supposed to get out in 2013. Fifteen more years.” “Fifteen years! You say it like it’s nothing, like you’re asking for a glass of water. I’d rather hang myself.” “No you wouldn’t. You’d find your way. Anyone can serve time in prison. The challenge is to serve it in a way that will make you emerge stronger than when you started.” “How can you stay strong through 15 more years of this?” “By owning it. I know where I am and I know the problems that await me. I spend every day working to prepare for what’s ahead. That strategy makes me feel like I’m the captain of my own ship. It’s the reason I’m studying law. To prepare.” “To prepare for what? To be a lawyer?” “I’m never going to be a lawyer. But by studying law I can make myself useful in here. I’ll earn money by helping other prisoners who want to fight their cases. You were the first person to pay me. When I walk out of here, I intend to have enough money saved to build a life for myself.” “Two thousand dollars?” Gary scoffs. “You’ve been in here too long, my friend. That isn’t enough for one dinner bill.” “For you, maybe. Remember, I’m starting from zero, and I’ve got 15 years for the money to grow. You paid me seed money. I intend to keep adding to it through my work. It’s already tripled. By the time I’m released, I’ll have enough to buy more than dinner. I’ll be able to start my life.” “What do you mean it tripled?” “I used it to buy stock.” “In the stock market?” “That’s right.” “How do you do that from here?” As we round the soccer field, I explain. “I spoke with the prison’s head of security, the captain, and he confirmed that I was within my rights to advise my sister on stock purchases. By using the $2,000 from you, and borrowing another $1,000 from the brokerage house on margin, Julie purchased 50 shares of Yahoo! at $60 per share. Then the stock split two-for-one, giving us 100 shares. Those shares now trade at $70, giving our portfolio $7,000 in value. With the $1,000 we owe in margin debt, the account now has $6,000 in equity. That’s triple the $2,000 you paid me.” “I’ve been involved in every kind of business, but I’ve never understood the stock market. If you would have had $2 million and you made the same purchase, are you telling me you would’ve had $6 million now?” Leveraged trading intrigues Gary. I laugh. “Theoretically. But if I had $2 million, I wouldn’t have made the same purchase.” “Why not?” “Like you said, $2,000 isn’t much money. My brother-in-law suggested I sock it away in a Certificate of Deposit. It would’ve been safer, but I was willing to take more risk. The company I bought stock in is new, and most investors say it’s overpriced because the Internet is all hype. If the Internet grows, on the other hand, then this company will grow with it, causing the stock price to surge. I could take the risk with $2,000, but if I had $2 million, I’d choose safer investments.” “You’re too young to be making safe investments. That’s the problem with this country. Too many people are afraid of risk. Remember one lesson from a man who knows: the timid never make fortunes.” “I’m not trying to build a fortune. All I want is enough in the bank so that I’m not desperate for an immediate paycheck when I get out.” “So write my motion. I’ll pay you a hundred grand if you can get me out of prison.” “I can’t get myself out of prison, and writing a motion isn’t going to get you out either, I’m sorry to say. Instead of thinking about getting out, why don’t we figure out what you can do while you’re here to pass the time more easily?” Gary shakes his head. “I can’t serve 12 more months.” “Yes you can,” I laugh. “I’ll serve it with you, and when you go, I’ll be another year closer to home.” “How about you teach me about the stock market?” “I can tell you what to read and how I learned over the years, but I don’t have time to teach.” “I’ll make you a deal. I’ll send you the hundred thousand I was going to spend on this motion. You won’t owe me anything. Just show me what you’re going to buy, how much, and explain the reason why. The only condition is that you don’t play it safe. I want you to take the same risk that you took with the $2,000. Try to triple the money I send, turn it into $300,000. If we lose, we lose. If we win, we split the profits.” “What about the taxes?” “You pay the taxes. We’ll split the profit after the taxes.” “Gary, I read how much you earn. To you, $100,000 is pocket change, but to me, where I am at this stage in my life, that may as well be all the money in the world. I couldn’t speculate with it the same way I’d speculate with $2,000. In order to turn the $2,000 into $6,000, I had to borrow against the equity by using margin. The leverage I used is what made the investment triple.” “So use leverage.” “I could do that, but if the market goes the other way, and it could, I’d either have to dump the stock in a down market to raise cash, or you would have to put up more money for the margin call in order to hold the position.” “Too many details. I believe in people, and you’re my guy. I’m betting on you to play it smart enough for both of us. Yes?” he nods his head. “Be aggressive. If you lose everything, not to worry. You won’t owe me a dime, and I’ll send you $50,000 more that you can use to start your life. How does that sound?” He puts out his hand. “Deal?” “Okay.” We shake hands.

Welcome to Episode 44! Conrad Life Report is a podcast about life, including digital media, music, books, food, drink, New York City, and more. Episode 44 topics: Intro theme: none, mask-wearing in Brooklyn Bridge Park, exercise with masks, recording Cumberland Blues for the Barton Hills Choir, possible car buying, virtual DJEAD NIGHT 5/14, NYT The Daily podcast, JGB 9/16/89, Oliver remote schooling, art class, Fifth Business by Robertson Davies, outro music: none.

I listened to MakeWorkWork (MWW 22: Kinda Wild But Also Fun) for the first time today and thoroughly enjoyed it. It's a talk show by by Hrefna Helgadóttir (Habbi) & Hailley Griffis. They chatted about books in this episode and I was inspired to jump in with some recommendations. So, here goes. Firstly, the podcast I mentioned is The Incomparable. Here's a book episode mentioned one my my book recommendations: 33 Percent RuleThe Calculating StarsNovel by Mary Robinette KowalFifth Business(The Deptford Trilogy #1)by Robertson Davies,The Golem and the Djinniby Helene WeckerJonathan Strange and Mr NorrellSusanna ClarkLord Foul’s BaneFirst Chronicles of Thomas Covenantby Stephen DonaldsonA Prayer for Owen MeanyJohn IrvingGrapes of Wrathby John Steinbeck–I'm a fledgling channel, a startup in the parlance of or times, and am struggling with making a living with my content and as a social media startup. It would mean the world to me if you would consider supporting me. If you find my content valuable in any way, please consider supporting me with $1 a month on Patreon. You may of course donate more than that, but a dollar a month will go a long way to helping me to keep going. Click this link to find out how to help me that way. Another option is to consider using affiliate links when you purchase from Amazon. If you use one of those links to visit Amazon, anything you buy during that visit will trigger a small commission for me that would help me out. I'd really appreciate your consideration. You can also see what gear I'm using to make my content if that sort of thing interests you. I know I enjoy looking at what other creators are using! Here is my gear.Thank you. ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Author Robertson Davies passed away on this day in 1995 at the age of 82. To learn more we spoke with author of "Robertson Davies: an Appreciation" Elspeth Cameron.

“The word ‘artist' is not applied to writers as readily as to musicians or sculptors or painters, because the medium in which they work – our language – is used by everyone without any particular thought or regard for economy or form. Language is the common drudge of every sort of experience and it does not enter the heads of most people to use it with any conscious skill or effectiveness.” “But the serious writer is an artist and language is his medium, and the way he employs it is of the greatest interest. Graham Greene has said that ‘creative art seems to remain a function of the religious mind,' and it is this quality of awareness of another world…” – Robertson Davies, The Merry Heart, p. 115 “When Cervantes invited a new generation of readers to follow his knight into the Sierra Morena, they discovered through their tears of laughter that they had entered a new world. For the writers and readers to come, the pages of a book could never again stand like foreign objects of wonder, to be admired from a distance. From now on, opening a book would mean stepping into a space more like one's own, a Sierra Morena next door instead of a mythical wood or mystic crag, and even those places of mystery or magic, from Never Never Land to Hogwarts, would always be places in which other versions of our own selves would go to for relief from the pressures, pain, or simply the boredom of our daily lives.” – William Egginton, The Man Who Invented Fiction, p. 136 “In my life as a writer I often remind myself – comfort myself – with what William Faulkner said about The Sound and the Fury. The whole novel, he claimed, hung on one image, the glimpse of a little girl's muddy underpants seen from the ground as she climbed a tree. How can an entire world spin off so small and incidental a hub? Can it be possible that Faulkner conceived his masterpiece from this thin, grubby moment?” “I imagine most writers of novels begin with such a fragment, a shard of experience so compelling, so troubling and unavoidable – always there, on the periphery of consciousness – that around it he or she must construct an elaborate world. This world, this novel, is not merely a container or a means of filing the image away but an attempt to make it comprehensible, and to guard its power.” – Kathryn Harrison, When Inspiration Stared Stoically from an Old Photograph “Fiction is usually seen as escapist entertainment… But it's hard to reconcile the escapist theory of fiction with the deep patterns we find in the art of storytelling… Our various fictional worlds are– on the whole– horrorscapes. Fiction may temporarily free us from our troubles, but it does so by ensnaring us in new sets of troubles– in imaginary worlds of struggle and stress and mortal woe.” – Jonathan Gottschall, The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human “Go, then – there are other worlds than these.” – Stephen King If you want us to see a different world, it will be your choice of tools that defines you. Oscar Wilde was a playwright. He put his words, like a ventriloquist, into the mouths of actors on the stage. http://wizardofads.org/partners/ (Ad writers,) screenwriters and novelists differ only in their ventriloquist's dummies, the masks they hide behind. Some ventriloquist's dummies are called “newscasters,” and they are no different than the actors in any other fiction. The question we must ask ourselves is, “Who is hiding behind that mask, and what imaginary world are they trying to sell us?” Roy H. Williams PS – At a 1962 dinner for 49 Nobel laureates, President John F. Kennedy quipped that the event was, “the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever gathered at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.” Thomas Jefferson was a famous hater of newspapers, though I...

After four failed IPOs, we’re sure this one will work! Dan McCoy discusses Robertson Davies’s Fifth Business (1970). Host Dan McCoy.

Steven Temple is an antiquarian bookseller who, after operating shops on Queen Street in Toronto for forty years, moved to Welland, Ontario in 2014 where he now does business out of his home. He continues to specialize in literary books, especially Canadian literary books, general Canadiana, and select out-of-print and rare books in various fields.  We met at his home in Welland, where we discussed, among other things, his passion for finding "lost" Canadian literature, parasites on the Internet, the urgency to buy, poet Frank Prewett, rarity, utility bills, stories about books, examples of lost Canadian literature, Watters's Checklist of Canadian Literature, Steven's criteria for buying books, Robertson Davies, William Golding, Graham Greene, Alice Munro, Margaret Atwood, collecting the Governor General's Award for Fiction winners, G. Herbert Sallans's Little Man, artist Fred Varley, Canadian book design, being a pioneer, and patronizing Canada Post. 

It’s getting cooler, the leaves are changing, time to curl up with a good book. It’s our Bookshelf Revisit for Fall 2018, an eclectic conversation that covers: Wild children and cults.WWII and China.Robertson Davies.It makes no sense, except that it’s Literary Disco! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Is the Holy Grail a crushed beer can in the gutter? JF and Phil consider the implications of Philip K. Dick's line, "the symbols of the divine initially show up at the trash stratum." Gnosticism, Aleister Crowley's Thoth tarot, Thomas Ligotti's "The Order of Illusion," Jack Smith's glorification of moldy glamour, saints' relics that look like beef jerky -- all this and more in the first of a two-part conversation. REFERENCES Aleister Crowley, The Book of Thoth (https://hermetic.com/crowley/book-of-thoth/index) Phil Ford, "What Good News Do You Bring?" (https://dialmformusicology.com/2015/03/11/what-good-news-do-you-bring/) Philip K. Dick, The Exegesis (https://www.amazon.com/Exegesis-Philip-K-Dick/dp/0547549253/) Philip K. Dick, VALIS (https://www.amazon.com/VALIS-Valis-Trilogy-Philip-Dick/dp/0547572417) Stanislav Lem, Microworlds (https://www.amazon.com/Microworlds-Stanislaw-Lem/dp/0156594439) Jonathan Haidt, The Righteous Mind (http://righteousmind.com/) Robertson Davies, The Rebel Angels (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/74405.The_Rebel_Angels) Thomas Ligotti, Noctuary (https://www.amazon.com/Noctuary-Thomas-Ligotti/dp/1596064706) Friedrich Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/51356) Frank Darabont (dir.), The Shawshank Redemption (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0111161/) Weird Studies podcast, On Tarkovsky's 'Stalker' Part 1 (http://www.weirdstudies.com/14) and Part 2 (http://www.weirdstudies.com/15) Richard Wagner, Parsifal (http://www.monsalvat.no/index.htm)

Glenn Horowitz is an agent in the sale and placement of culturally significant archives to research institutions nationwide. Among the many authors, artists, musicians, designers, and photographers he have represented are Norman Mailer, James Salter, Deborah Eisenberg, David Foster Wallace, Vladimir Nabokov, Philip Grushkin, the Magnum Group, Nadine Gordimer, and Danny Fields, to name but a few. I met Glenn in his Manhattan offices. We talked about, among other things, the imaginative "packaging of authors' archives, the maturing of research institutions, kaboosing like collections, natural sympathies, technology coming on line, letterpress printing as a nostalgic gasp, the shift to digital, Bob Dylan's archive, the Woodie Guthrie Center, the transformation of Tulsa, the Kaiser Foundation, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, Watergate and the University of Texas, the importance of the creative process, New Criticism, identity politics, the melting of textual studies, the growing importance of ancillary material; Bernard Malamud, Bob Giroux, Strand Bookstore, envy, small versus major research institutes, Michael Ondaatje, Canada's lack of interest in its writers' papers, Margaret Atwood, Robertson Davies, Conrad Black, FDR, and archives as a non-traditional market. 

Thank you for tuning in to Episode 139 of the Down Cellar Studio Podcast. Full show notes with photos can be found at www.downcellarstudio.com/139   This week's segments included:   Off the Needles On the Needles Brainstorming From the Armchair Knitting in Passing In my Travels KAL News Events On a Happy Note Quote of the Week   Thank you to this episode's sponsors: A Simple Homestead, Knits4Comfort & Celestial Sews    Off the Needles Bergere de France Socks Yarn: Bergere de France Goomy 50 - Imprim Beige Needles: US 1 (2.25 mm) Pattern OMG Heel by Megan Williams 283 meters   Blue Stripey Socks Yarn: Patons Kroy Stripes: Coastal Stripes Needles: US 1.5 (2.5 mm) Pattern: OMG Heel by Megan Williams 273 meters   Scrappy Halloweeny Socks Yarn: Leftovers of black, white, gray, orange, yellow, tan Needles: US 1.5 (2.5 mm) Pattern: OMG Heel by Megan Williams 302 meters   Chevron Baby Blanket Pattern by: Daisy Farm Crafts (blog) Yarn: Sprightly Acrylic Worsted Yarn from Craftsy in Navy, White and Silver Grey Washed and dried the finished blanket in washing machine. It's so squishy soft! 926 meters   Imprim Bleu Socks Yarn: Bergere de France Goomy 50 in the Imprim Bleu colorway Pattern: OMG Heel Needles: US 1 (2.25 mm) 296 meters Baby Blue Barley Hat Yarn: Sprightly Acrylic Worsted (Craftsy) Needles: US 6 & US 8 Pattern: Barley Hat by Tin Can Knits 59 meters (1/3 of the skein)   Dan's Dress Socks Yarn: Dragonfly Fibers Djinni in the Rocky Top Colorway Needles: US 1.5 Pattern: OMG Heel by Megan Williams Reknit toe after it developed a hole 368.7 meters   Holly Jolly Christmas Socks Yarn: Dancing Dog Dyeworks Twist Sock in the Holly Jolly colorway Needles: US 1.5 (2.5 mm) Pattern: Fish Lips Kiss Heel 252 meters 3840 meters for Stash Dash as of this recording     On the Needles   Gray-dient Dragon Belly Shawl   Yarn: Woolbearer's Gradient Sets purchased at Vogue Knitting Live a couple years ago. 5 mini skeins, 700 yards fingering Put two sets together using 8 of the 10 mini skeins. (140 yards per mini x 8= 1120 yards) Pattern: Dragon Belly Shawl (free crochet pattern) H hook   Poison Ivy Socks Yarn: Twisted Owl Fiber Studio in the Poison Ivy Colorway (red/green variegated) Pattern: Non-Euclidian Heel Needles: US 1 (2.25 mm) Brainstorming ML164 Flatter Me Vest by Maddy Cranley $6.95 Ravelry Download Thoughts? I have some Knit Picks Brava Bulky in stash to use up (7 skeins, 952 yards) I'm also considering holding that gray yarn with rainbow mini skeins in stash to do granny stripe or another chevron? Market Bag by Poppy and Bliss Free Crochet pattern Rafa's Hat by Joji Locatelli Dawn to Dusk Triangle Scarf by Jess Coppom - free crochet pattern. I purchased 3 skeins of  Lion Brand Mandala- DK weight Acrylic color changing yarn for this (enough to make 3) Good Old Fashioned Bunting free crochet pattern by Matt Farci and Dennis Marquez From the Armchair Margaret from Teaching Your Brain to knit came over to the Episode 134 thread to say-- "Thanks for the shout out for the TYBTK podcast. Since we recorded that episode about colorwork I discovered Roxanne Richardson’s video podcast on multiple colorwork. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORTtv5Vl6zg It was so informative. If you’re getting good gauge, I wouldn’t change it."   Thanks for sharing, Margaret!!   Knitting in Passing   Man on the train one morning ask- how many things do you make in a year. First time I’ve gotten that one. Funny timing since I’m in productivity mode right now. Maybe that was all over my face. He and the women he was standing with seemed to know I was crocheting but it got her talking about a mutual friend whom she described as a rabid knitter. He didn’t seem to think those terms jived. But I assumed him there were many of us out there. In My Travels I had a fun night visiting a local brewery- Barrel House Z- with my knitting friends a couple weeks ago. I made a trip to the Pints & Purls (Thursday night event) at Gather Here in Cambridge, MA KAL News Slay the Stash 2018 Each month you can declare a skein of yarn to knit/crochet/weave to its very end. Let’s use up those older special skeins that are soooo pretty we don’t want to touch them. In 2018, we are turning those sacred skeins into beautiful projects you can enjoy-- and maybe win a new beautiful skein of yarn from one of our sponsors along the way! Full details and rules can be found here. June Post Check the show notes to see if you won in the month of May. Use and follow #slaythestash2018 on Social Media Don't forget you can double dip with Splash Pad Party, Stash Dash or any other KAL you participate in as long as you meet criteria. Slay the Stash 2018: Sponsor List January: KnitCircus February: Kathryn Frank Fiber Arts March: Blue Skin Yarns April: BlueberryChick Yarn May: Legacy Fiber Artz June: Knitters Brewing Co July: Fish Belly Fiber Works August: SixandSevenFiber September: Fibernymph Dye Works October: Marigold Jen November: Dyenamixx Yarns December: Sunsoaked Yarns The Splash Pad Party KAL     Runs June 1-July 31 Rules can be found here Prizes and Exclusive Items & Coupons posted in Ravelry Group. Check out details and chat with us here! This year one of the fun challenges within the Splash Pad is a 8 part challenge we're calling the X Games. If you wish to participate, give it a shot! Rules can be found here. Check out the Mark it Monday thread Pro Shop Sponsors AdoreKnit Celestial Sews Designs of Acadia Fibernymph Dye Works Just Run Knit Designs Knit Circus Yarns Knit Style Yarns Knits4comfort Knitters Brewing Company Lilliput Yarn Love Bird Lane Pearl and Plum Plum Deluxe Prairie Bag Works A Simple Homestead Stitched by Jessalu Sunsoaked Yarns Twisted Owl Fiber Studio Yarnandewe YumiYarns Snack Shack Be Ewe Fibers Brenda Castiel Designs & Good Stuff Crafts Daizie Knits Heddi Craft Designs Imagined Landscapes Jennifer Lassonde Designs Knit/Wit Designs Knit-by-Bit Designs Knitty by Nature Shop Progress Keepers by Meliabella Mrs U Makes Remade by Hand V Yarn Windswept Designs Events 2018 Box O' Balls Round Robin Mini Swap: sign up anytime during 2018.  Shipping cost of $13.50 (within US; have option to send Internationally) The contents will include: at least 20 mini yarn balls (each ball will be minimum of 5g/ 20 yards) to choose from, a handwritten note or card and a small gift. Find all of the details in this thread in the Ravelry Group.   Stash Dash- Knit Girllls Podcast KAL that runs May 25-August 27th. Find Stash Dash Rules here. PAL KAL hosted by Michelle of the Actually Knitting Podcast I am sponsoring so if you knit one of my shawl patterns it will count. Stitching the High Notes 2nd Annual Summer Garment MAL Batter Up KAL Hosted by Kristi from In a Sknit Podcast   On a Happy Note Dan and I are taking ballroom dance lessons I've been freshening up our deck where we spend a lot of time in summer- I bought a new rug and a table at a yard sale. Birthday weekend fun included Riley and Millie's dance recitals, lunch with my family and drinks with friends at another friend's surprise party. My friend Claire gifted me some handspun from her sister who is a new spinner I took some photos of my niece Hattie is is now 4 months old Loveable boys- I share stories about my nephew Oisin and our friend's son, EJ! Quote of the Week "Every man makes his own summer. The season has no character of its own, unless one is a farmer with a professional concern for the weather. Circumstances have not allowed me to make a good summer for myself this year... My summer has been overcast by my own heaviness of spirit. I have not had any adventures, and adventures are what make a summer." -Robertson Davies, "Three Worlds, Three Summers," The Enthusiasms of Robertson Davies   ------ Thank you for tuning in!   Contact Information: Ravelry: BostonJen & Down Cellar Studio Podcast Ravelry Group Twitter: Instagram: BostonJen1 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/downcellarstudio Sign up for my email newsletter to get the latest on everything happening in the Down Cellar Studio!    

配乐：《Silent Partner - Spring In My Step》欢迎点赞，赞赏，转发，评论！免费教材领取请见最底部免费教材领取请见最底部免费教材领取请见最底部1入 住（F: Frontdesk G: Guest）F: Welcome to the Beachside Inn. How may I help you?欢迎来到海边酒店。能为您做点什么吗？G: I'd like a room, please.我要住店。F: Would you prefer a single or a double?你是要单人间还是双人间呢？G: A double, please. How much is that?双人间，价格是多少？F: It's $145.00 a night. How many nights will you be staying?145美元每晚，你要住几晚呢？G: Just tonight.就今晚。F: OK. One night comes to $145.00 plus tax. May I have your name please?一晚含税总共145美元。您的名字是？G: It's Davies. Robertson Davies.我是达维斯。F: And how do you spell that, sir?怎么拼写呢？G: It's D-A-V-I-E-S.是D-A-V-I-E-S。F: So that's D-A-V-I-E-S. How would you like to pay for the room?好的，你想要如何付款？G: Do you take VISA?能用VISA卡吗？F: Yes, we do. We take VISA,Mastercard, and American Express.可以，我们接受VISA卡，万事达卡，美国运通。G: Great. I'll pay with VISA then.What time is checkout?我用VISA付款，退房时间是？F: Checkout is at 10 o'clock. Your room number is 505. Is there anything else you would like to know?10点退房。您的房间号是505。您还有其他疑问吗？G: And is there a restaurant?有餐厅吗？F: There are restaurants on the 3rd floor and there's a café next to the lobby.3楼有餐厅，有一个咖啡厅在大厅旁边。G: Is there a pool here?有游泳池吗？F: Yes, there is. It's on the 2nd floor. But you have to bring the towel from your room.有的，在2楼。但是需要自己带毛巾。G: Great. What time does the restaurant close?餐厅什么时候关门呢？F: They both close at 10:00 P.M. 餐厅和游泳池都是10点。G: 10 P.M.? Thanks. Oh! And can I get a wake-up call for 6:30 A.M.好的，6：30能够叫醒我吗？F: Sure. No problem. Wake-up call for 6:30 A.M. Enjoy your stay. 没问题，叫醒服务6:30，希望您住的愉快！How many nights will you be staying?你要住几晚呢？免费教材领取：《张满胜英语语法新思维》视频教程全集（共463M）领取方式：进入“笨笨口语”公众号输入关键字“走近语法”即可获取下载链接你的一个赞赏，可以让我高兴很久很久...欢迎点赞，赞赏，转发，评论！长按图片识别小程序赶紧试试！

配乐：《Silent Partner - Spring In My Step》欢迎点赞，转发，评论！1入 住（F: Frontdesk G: Guest）F: Welcome to the Beachside Inn. How may I help you?欢迎来到海边酒店。能为您做点什么吗？G: I'd like a room, please.我要住店。F: Would you prefer a single or a double?你是要单人间还是双人间呢？G: A double, please. How much is that?双人间，价格是多少？F: It's $145.00 a night. How many nights will you be staying?145美元每晚，你要住几晚呢？G: Just tonight.就今晚。F: OK. One night comes to $145.00 plus tax. May I have your name please?一晚含税总共145美元。您的名字是？G: It's Davies. Robertson Davies.我是达维斯。F: And how do you spell that, sir?怎么拼写呢？G: It's D-A-V-I-E-S.是D-A-V-I-E-S。F: So that's D-A-V-I-E-S. How would you like to pay for the room?好的，你想要如何付款？G: Do you take VISA?能用VISA卡吗？F: Yes, we do. We take VISA,Mastercard, and American Express.可以，我们接受VISA卡，万事达卡，美国运通。G: Great. I'll pay with VISA then.What time is checkout?我用VISA付款，退房时间是？F: Checkout is at 10 o'clock. Your room number is 505. Is there anything else you would like to know?10点退房。您的房间号是505。您还有其他疑问吗？G: And is there a restaurant?有餐厅吗？F: There are restaurants on the 3rd floor and there's a café next to the lobby.3楼有餐厅，有一个咖啡厅在大厅旁边。G: Is there a pool here?有游泳池吗？F: Yes, there is. It's on the 2nd floor. But you have to bring the towel from your room.有的，在2楼。但是需要自己带毛巾。G: Great. What time does the restaurant close?餐厅什么时候关门呢？F: They both close at 10:00 P.M. 餐厅和游泳池都是10点。G: 10 P.M.? Thanks. Oh! And can I get a wake-up call for 6:30 A.M.好的，6：30能够叫醒我吗？F: Sure. No problem. Wake-up call for 6:30 A.M. Enjoy your stay. 没问题，叫醒服务6:30，希望您住的愉快！How many nights will you be staying?你要住几晚呢？

If you’ve ever had the pleasure or misfortune of getting stuck in a conversation with me, you might notice one thing. I most always say, “Well, I think.” or “Well, I’m pretty sure.” I don’t tend to talk in certainties. It may be because I am more concerned about being wrong rather than being right. My belief system is a perfect example of my ambivalence.  “Is there a God? Maybe?” I wouldn’t want to completely discount it. Either way, the day I finally find out the answer to that question no one will be able to say that I was entirely wrong. I just hedged my bets. And then in one scenario I will definitely be sent to purgatory. This maybe surprising, but working in the food industry has pushed me to double down on my “Well, I think” and “Well, I’m pretty sure.” It is an intentional pushback against all of those fellow co-workers and customers who over the years have talked in absolutes. GMOS. Bad. Vaccines. More Bad. Bone Broth heals everything. Reishi Mushrooms cures cancer. Absolutes that always seem to be based on anecdotes and not scientific consensus. Perhaps, for those of us who are not doctors or scientists should be a bit more humble in our certainties when it comes to areas where we have no expertise. For sure, I am not completely immune to the random moment of righteousness. A couple of years ago, after I moved back to my home province of Ontario and started a new job I found myself on the wrong side of a pesky, yet not an inconsequential debate. What is a sweet potato? And, what is a yam? For my new co-worker, the orange skin and orange flesh elongated root was a sweet potato. For me, it was a yam. I explained that I was a produce queen. I had spent the last three years knee deep in organic produce splendor. Sunchokes, kiwi berries, burdock, broccoli leaves, passion fruit, persimmon, you name it I’ve tried it. With a few caveats.  I gently explained, perhaps, with a bit of a condescending tone that I had already had the yam / sweet potato conversation with a produce distributor, and that they explained that the yam was the orange skin and orange flesh root, and that the sweet potato was the purple skin white flesh root. So, yeah, my apologies, but I’m right. Well, I was wrong. Which brings us to this week’s episode: The Unfortunate Case of the Sweet Potato and Yam Debacle. You know once in awhile I wonder if the time and money I put into my English Degree was worth it, and then more often than you would think as I do research on my next podcast a book will come up, and I say to myself, “Wait a minute. I’ve read that book. I have that book. That book is upstairs.” This was one of those times. The book is called, “Things Fall Apart” and the author is Chinua Achebe. Now, let’s be clear I remember precious little about this book other than the fact that I liked it. That goes with pretty much every single novel I read throughout my university career. Robertson Davies was my favourite author. Why? I don’t remember. In “Things Fall Apart,” which is set in Nigeria, there is a chapter that describes “The Feast of the New Yam.” In the book, the festival is held every year prior to the harvest, to honour the earth goddess and the ancestral spirits of the clan. The festival marked the season of plenty and a new year. Old, shriveled up, fibrous yams would be disposed of, for the new year must begin with new, fresh yams. Needless to say, spiritually and culturally, the yam is interwoven into West African culture. A variant of the word “yam” in some tribes actually means “to eat.” So, yeah, if it’s synonymous with the act of eating then it must be important. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHS4CpLMddY The yam is a tuber, similar to a potato. And, a tuber, is basically a storage vessel that grows from the root system to then create another plant. A sweet potato is a root. They are not related.  The yam originated in West Africa and Asia, and the sweet potato came from South America. So,

REFLECTION QUOTES “I say that the world in itself is so fantastically mysterious, so challengingly marvelous, that not to realize that there is more than I see, that there is endlessly more than I can express or even conceive in just being underdeveloped intellectually.” ~Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972), rabbi and leading Jewish thinker “Past secular creeds were built on the 18th-century enlightenment view of man as an autonomous, rational creature who could reason his way to virtue. The past half-century of cognitive science has shown that that creature doesn't exist. We are not really rational animals; emotions play a central role in decision-making, the vast majority of thought is unconscious, and our minds are riddled with biases. We are not really autonomous; our actions are powerfully shaped by others in ways we are not even aware of.” ~David Brooks in the New York Times 2-3-2015 “We must allow the Word of God to confront us, to disturb our security, to undermine our complacency and to overthrow our patterns of thought and behavior.” ~John R.W. Stott (1921-2011), noted English clergyman and theologian “What a man considers indecent is an important clue to his character.” ~Robertson Davies (1913-1995), Canadian novelist, playwright, critic, journalist, and professor “You can't lead the people if you don't love the people. You can't save the people if you don't serve the people.” ~Cornell West, American academic and activist “There is only one thing, Olympias, which is really terrible, only one real trial, that is sin; and I have never ceased continually harping on this theme. But as for all other things, plots, enmities, frauds, calumnies, insults, accusations, confiscation, exile, the keen sword of the enemy, the peril of the deep, warfare of the whole world, or anything else you like to name, they are but idle tales. For whatever the nature of these things may be, they are transitory and perishable, and operate in the mortal body without doing any injury to the vigilant soul.” ~St. John Chrysostom (c. 349-407), suffering in exile, to Olympias the Deaconess, also in suffering exile for her support of John SERMON PASSAGE Genesis 11:10 – 12:9 10 These are the records of the generations of Shem. Shem was one hundred years old, and became the father of Arpachshad two years after the flood; 11 and Shem lived five hundred years after he became the father of Arpachshad, and he had other sons and daughters. 12 Arpachshad lived thirty-five years, and became the father of Shelah; 13 and Arpachshad lived four hundred and three years after he became the father of Shelah, and he had other sons and daughters. 14 Shelah lived thirty years, and became the father of Eber; 15 and Shelah lived four hundred and three years after he became the father of Eber, and he had other sons and daughters. 16 Eber lived thirty-four years, and became the father of Peleg; 17 and Eber lived four hundred and thirty years after he became the father of Peleg, and he had other sons and daughters. 18 Peleg lived thirty years, and became the father of Reu; 19 and Peleg lived two hundred and nine years after he became the father of Reu, and he had other sons and daughters. 20 Reu lived thirty-two years, and became the father of Serug; 21 and Reu lived two hundred and seven years after he became the father of Serug, and he had other sons and daughters. 22 Serug lived thirty years, and became the father of Nahor; 23 and Serug lived two hundred years after he became the father of Nahor, and he had other sons and daughters. 24 Nahor lived twenty-nine years, and became the father of Terah; 25 and Nahor lived one hundred and nineteen years after he became the father of Terah, and he had other sons and daughters. 26 Terah lived seventy years, and became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran. 27 Now these are the records of the generations of Terah. Terah became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran; and Haran became the father of Lot. 28 Haran died in the presence of his father Terah in the land of his birth, in Ur of the Chaldeans. 29 Abram and Nahor took wives for themselves. The name of Abram's wife was Sarai; and the name of Nahor's wife was Milcah, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah and Iscah. 30 Sarai was barren; she had no child. 31 Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran, his grandson, and Sarai his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife; and they went out together from Ur of the Chaldeans in order to enter the land of Canaan; and they went as far as Haran, and settled there. 32 The days of Terah were two hundred and five years; and Terah died in Haran. Chapter 12 1 Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go forth from your country, And from your relatives And from your father's house, To the land which I will show you; 2 And I will make you a great nation, And I will bless you, And make your name great; And so you shall be a blessing; 3 And I will bless those who bless you, And the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.” 4 So Abram went forth as the Lord had spoken to him; and Lot went with him. Now Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran. 5 Abram took Sarai his wife and Lot his nephew, and all their possessions which they had accumulated, and the persons which they had acquired in Haran, and they set out for the land of Canaan; thus they came to the land of Canaan. 6 Abram passed through the land as far as the site of Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. Now the Canaanite was then in the land. 7 The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your descendants I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord who had appeared to him. 8 Then he proceeded from there to the mountain on the east of Bethel, and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east; and there he built an altar to the Lord and called upon the name of the Lord. 9 Abram journeyed on, continuing toward the Negev.

Karen Joy Fowler's We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves is one of 2014's most memorable and lauded novels. Having received rave reviews across the world, it won the Pen/Faulkner in the United States and then became one of the first works by an American to be shortlisted for the Man Booker. ----more----Our narrator is Rosemary Cooke, an introverted college student drifting through life. Slowly, she reveals that her isolation springs from her unconventional upbringing. Her father is an animal behaviourist, her mother is traumatised, her brother has gone Awol and her sister, Fern, has vanished entirely. The implication that Fern’s disappearance lies at the heart of her dysfunction is explained in a beautifully judged twist, not so much in the tail as the head. I talked to Karen on the day We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves was published in the United Kingdom. She was in suitably celebratory mood, sipping prosecco as we discussed (in part one): the origins of the story, how her father and her daughter helped shape the novel, how formative experiences playing with rats in her father's lab informed the book,that title, the real scientific experiment that inspired the story,twists in the tale,how to structure a narrative,humour,Kafka, Robertson Davies and literary other allusions,Bob Dylan's lyrics,and how Chewbacca is discriminated against in Star WarsThere was also a false start and the distinct sound of bubbly being drunk. Part two to follow. Karen Joy Fowler's website is: here.

Douglas Gibson is the author of "Stories About Storytellers". He talks about his encounters with many writers; including Alice Munro, Robertson Davies, Barry Broadfoot, Brian Mulroney and Pierre Trudeau.

Douglas Gibson is the author of "Stories About Storytellers". He talks about his encounters with many writers; including Alice Munro, Robertson Davies, Barry Broadfoot, Brian Mulroney and Pierre Trudeau.

A small college cannot hope to have a large library, but if it sets to work along the right lines it may aspire to the possession of a fine one… A book may be a thing of beauty, and an example of a great craft which we must not allow to die. The means of craft and the aspiration toward beauty live on in our College library. — Robertson Davies, the Founding Master Since its inception in 1963, the Library at Massey College has developed special collections in the History of the Book as well as supporting a working nineteenth-century hand printing shop.  The holdings of books and manuscripts include material on the history of printing, papermaking, bookbinding, palaeography, calligraphy, type design, book collecting, and bibliography. The examples of book production range from the fifteenth century to the present, with a particular strength in nineteenth century colour printing and publishers' bookbindings represented in the Ruari McLean Collection. The collections also include the papers of Canadian graphic designer Carl Dair. In 1981, the Library was named for the Founding Master of the College, Robertson Davies, and contains editions and translations of his writings. At the time of this interview Marie Korey was Librarian at The Robertson Davies Library, and a scholar of the history of the book. We met to talk about collecting books in this field. I assumed the role (difficult) of a rich book collector (easy) with a passion for books about books (very easy) who had retained Marie to help him acquire the best of the best possible books and materials related to the development of the book.   Here's a list of some of the 'essential' books mentioned by Marie: Bury, Richard de (1287-1345) Bishop of Durham, wrote “Philibiblon” which survives in many manuscript copies as well as printed editions.   “Dialogue” on Calligraphy and Printing in the sixteenth century, attributed to Christopher Plantin; this contains one of the earliest descriptions of typefounding. There was a facsimile done, with an English translation by Ray Nash published in 1964 under the title: Calligraphy & Printing in the sixteenthe century. Dialogue attributed to Christopher Plantin.    Moxon, Joseph (1627-91), hydrographer, instrument maker, author and printer. He began publishing his “Mechanick Exercises” in monthly parts in 1677; the second volume, issued in 1683-84, was devoted to printing and type-founding. It is the first comprehensive manual on the subject in any language.   Bosse, Abraham. Traicté des manieres de graver en taille douce. Paris, 1645. Early manual on copperplate engraving.   Senefelder, Alois. A complete course of lithography. London: Printed for R. Ackerman, 1819.

I interviewed Canadian critic/editor/writer John Metcalf on his love of Books and Book Collecting. The same afternoon we also talked about the process of book reviewing, whether or not the use of insult and/or invective is ever justified and if so, when. John is known as a ‘blunt' critic; one who tells his un-sugared truths directly, who is not reticent to attack ‘with savagery' books he feels 'insult' him. The conversation refers, among other things, to the Salon des Refuses exercise undertaken by Canadian Notes and Queries and The New Quarterly magazines, personal slights, the problem of awarding the same prizes to authors of widely varying talents, and the importance to healthy literary culture of truth-telling critics. (Lengthy sentence alert): There are predictable attacks on M.G. Vassanji, Ann Marie MacDonald, and Robertson Davies here, and there is praise too for many young Canadian short story writers, but perhaps the most evident feature of this discussion is Metcalf's anger, precipitated, I'd say, primarily by a combative dedication to serving a cause larger than himself – excellence in literature – aggravated in small part both by the perceived inability of Canadians to recognize literary greatness, and personal rejection at the hands of  this country's ‘literary establishment' – bolstered by a natural taste for confrontation and a glee in the fighting of a good fight.

Wayne Johnston "The; Colony of Unrequited Dreams" (Doubleday); "The; Divine Ryans" (Anchor) In each of these novels a secret is revealed-a secret history in one, a family secret in the other. But why has this Canadian novelist, of the quality of Robertson Davies or Margaret Artwood, remained a secret to Americans?