Sylvia Beach and James Joyce at Shakespeare and Company
Dear Friends & Book Lovers,
Sorry to have slipped behind schedule on our newsletter. There’s been a lot going on, as they say.
This year marks the 100th anniversary of the James Joyce masterpiece Ulysses, arguably the most significant book of the past one hundred years. Many celebrations are honoring the book and at the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas, there’s the exhibition Women Behind the Making of Ulysses. A rare interview and profile of Joyce was made by the great writer Djuna Barnes and published in Vanity Fair just a couple of months after the book’s release in 1922. As today is #Bloomsday the London Review of Books has generously taken down their paywall for William Empson’s 15,000 word two part essay on the ‘‘Ultimate Novel’.
This month we send our good wishes to all the Fathers, Grandfathers, and Great Grandfathers for a happy Father’s Day this Sunday, June 19. In added celebration, Sunday also falls on Juneteenth Independence Day. Learn more about this African-American historic tradition and now our National Holiday by reading On Juneteenth, a stellar book about this African-American freedom day. As On Juneteenth has been in high demand and selling out, copies may be available at the store, where you’ll find other books about Juneteenth on display.
Thank you to Kelsey Ronan, who sent us her lecture on Flint and on the creation of her book Chevy in the Hole, an acclaimed debut novel set in her hometown Flint, Michigan. The essay was based on a talk she gave at the Grosse Pointe Public Libraries “Books on the Lake” program last May.
Reviewer Tom Bowden has doubled his small press reviews “i arrogantly recommend…” introducing a new column: “Small Takes” where he reviews books under 150 pages.
Our reading group selection for June is Grey Bees by Ukrainian Author Andrey Kurkov, who was coincidently profiled in this months New York Times Magazine feature. Signed copies of Grey Bees are available.
Our newsletter includes a remembrance of fine art photographer Jeffrey Silverthorne, who had seven exhibitions at the Book Beat gallery between 1990 and 2007, and passed away on June 4. He was a close friend of ours and is sadly missed.
Save the date! Book Beat turns 40 on August 28. We’re planning a party and you’re invited! Details to be announced soon… This Sunday is also Record Store Day and our neighbor Street Corner Music, has purchased 33,000 used records this week -and that’s a record for them!
Stop by soon… and stay cool with books!
~Cary, Colleen and the Book Beat staff
I realized Joyce must indeed have begun life as a singer, and a very tender singer. And, because no voice can hold out over the brutalities of life without breaking, he turned to quill and paper, for so he could arrange, in the necessary silence, the abundant inadequacies of life, as a laying-out of jewels — jewels with a will to decay. –Djuna Barnes
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