Beth Kaplan's Blog, page 190

re: the island airport and Marcus Gee

Following the photo of Paul Newman, which makes me feel so good, here's one of the most beautiful poems in the English language, about surviving the insanity of modern life:

And further to the insanity of modern life and the importance of "the presence of still water" - Marcus Gee in the Globe wrote a column attacking Trudeau's government for announcing the death of the island airport extension. I sent him what's below. Wish I'd quoted Berry's poem.
Mr. Gee, I know there’s no point responding to your angry column about the island airport, but I cannot help myself. The city does not need it, and we do not want it. Our lake is already overwhelmed with endless condos and hideous crumbling highway. Those of us who do not have cottages go to the waterfront, at least, the few bits left for public use, for a vista, the kind of calm that water provides, and instead we see Porter planes constantly arriving and departing, dawn to dusk. The last thing we need is even more traffic from a series of jets. Let international business travellers use the fine resources of Pearson. That’s what it’s there for. Hooray to Marc Garneau for setting our minds at rest, and to Adam Vaughn too.

Have not heard from him, which is not a surprise. I often write back to columnists when I agree or disagree vehemently, and I urge you to do the same. In the meantime, the group I belong to, NOJETSTO, has sent this. Nice to have something to celebrate - though remaining vigilant.
Hi Beth,
Our new federal government has been clear – no Island Airport expansion. Now let’s celebrate our victory! On Monday, November 23, join NoJetsTO supporters and endorsers to enjoy a toast to our waterfront. NoJetsTO Victory Party Monday, November 23, 7 – 9 PMStudio Bar824 Dundas Street West (near Bathurst) Please RSVP today and spread the word. Cake and appetizers will be served.This hard-fought victory is the result of 2.5 years of citizen-led action. Let’s mark the occasion together as we open a new chapter for a Toronto waterfront for all. See you on Monday,
Norman Di Pasquale
NoJetsTO Chair

A ++ for everyone

Last Ry class last night. How lucky we've been with the weather this term - still amazingly mild. Yesterday there was a man on my street in a tank top and jean shorts, and just down from him, the Korean store owners were unloading Christmas trees. Anyway, the Ry group was fascinating and diverse, and we had a great term. Mark brought his camera with a timer. I swore to myself that I would not let my face twist into some ridiculous pose just as the shutter clicked - but of course it did. A gorgeous shot of everyone except moi. Sigh.
Today I had an email from someone in the class:
I wanted to thank you again for a very inspiring course ... I came home from class with many ideas for future projects and spent several hours today roughly spinning out those ideas onto paper. I have about six story ideas now.

Most importantly, as someone who had terrible writers' block for several years, I feel liberated to write. This is really a gift as creative writing has long been my dream. Your advice and comments are helpful and provocative in the best sense of the word. I have never understood blogging, in particular, and your comments now have me very interested in starting my own blog as a way to experiment and keep the writing flowing.

Hooray! And another student wrote, You provided a warm and safe environment for us all to share our truths. I really enjoyed the class, it's really helped me focus and find my voice.

Second last at U of T today, a spectacular group of women many of whom have already registered for the next level in January. They're so comfortable and honest with each other, they may all move in together eventually. Then I went across town to Anna's; Eli has a fever so she is stuck indoors with a sick child and a fussy baby who likes to be carried at all times. I don't know how she keeps it all together, but she does; her loyal friends help a lot, just as she helps them. So I read stories and dandled the baby and did my best to make life a bit easier for her, for a few hours at least.

All this with a heavy heart as the world explodes. All that matters is family and love - and, for some of us at least, writing. And for others of us - beauty. Here's one of my own favourite beauties, a picture Chris posted on his blog yesterday. One look at that face and I'm more cheerful already.

John Oliver nails it, as usual

Here is the brilliant John Oliver speaking with his usual clarity and wit about the recent events in France, quoted in the New Yorker:

“So here is where things stand. First, as of now, we know that this attack was carried out by gigantic fucking assholes, unconscionable, flaming assholes, possibly, possibly working with other fucking assholes, definitely working in service of an ideology of pure assholery,” he said. His audience began to laugh. “Second, and this goes almost without saying, Fuck these assholes!” The audience began to cheer. “Fuck them, if I may say, sideways!” He made some definitive hand gestures. Third, he said, nothing these assholes attempt is going to work. “France is going to endure. And I’ll tell you why. If you are in a war of culture and life style with France, good fucking luck!” More cheering. “Go ahead, go ahead. Bring your bankrupt ideology. They’ll bring Jean-Paul Sartre, Edith Piaf, fine wine, Gauloises cigarettes, Camus, Camembert, madeleines, macarons”—images of these appeared behind him as he spoke—“Marcel Proust, and the fucking croquembouche!” An image of what looked like a glazed-cream-puff Christmas tree popped up. He waved his hands and pointed at it. “The croquembouche! You just brought a philosophy of rigorous self-abnegation to a pastry fight, my friends. You are fucked! That is a French freedom tower!” The crowd howled with delight.

for my students ...

What I want for my bicycle...

Seminar: superb

November 15, and there were people out in flip-flops and shorts. Warm, sunny, beautiful; we'll take every minute, thank you very much, especially with such black clouds on the horizon. I ran into a cheerful neighbour who said she thought ISIS was going to start the 3rd world war. I replied by quoting the Gwnne Dyer article in which he says many more people die in car accidents than by terrorism, the horror of which is pumped up by the media; we've got to maintain a perspective. Perspective, people!

Moving right along. I've heard from all the Parisian friends I wrote to. Daniel wrote back that this is a "war of attrition" and we just have to have patience. Not a word much loved by governments. And in the meantime, our government has been in office all of two weeks and is plunged already into international chaos.

Back here, Wayson came for lunch and we strolled in the hot sun to Yonge St. to see "Seminar," by the American playwright Theresa Rebick about a writing teacher and his battered students. It was superb; highly recommended, though I will say that I thought the production was better than the play; the play is pretty good, but the production is fantastic. Especially if you're a writing teacher in the audience watching a writing teacher on stage, but even if you're not.

At one point the writer, the superb Tom McCamus, says, "This is how you learn to write - you have an editor go through your work word by word, figuring out what you were getting at." As an editor myself, I agree. And as a writer always in need of a good editor, I agree even more. Thank you again, David Mirvish, for granting Toronto audiences the chance to see another superb small play in an exemplary production.

And then we strolled back in the sun. Missed the Santa Claus parade. Darn.

Toronto, in solidarity with Paris

Just back from Nathan Phillips Square, where hundreds of people gathered at 2 today to commemorate and honour the victims of the Paris attacks and their families, who are also victims, and their country. There was spontaneous singing of La Marseilleise, twice. The Toronto sign was red, white and blue today, there were French flags and Canadian flags, and everyone who spoke, spoke French as well as English, even our Mayor, whose French is not very good. But he tried, and he spoke beautifully about our own city, its bonds with Paris, how we will not be terrorized. Carolyn Bennett spoke on behalf of the federal government, and how grateful I was to have that government, and not the last one, to speak for us. At the end, there was a moment of silence - the huge crowd, the speakers, silent and motionless.

One person was missing: a member of the Muslim community. I wish there had been a representative there to denounce, a haut voix, these horrendous acts done in the name of Islam.

all love sent to Paris

More terrifying news from Paris. I think of my friends Paolo and Annie, Parisian Jews who last year, after the Charlie Hebdo murders, were thinking about leaving France. When will it end?

On the other side, a great op-ed in the NYT about us:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/12/opinion/an-antidote-to-cynicism-in-canada.html?mabReward=CTM&moduleDetail=recommendations-0&action=click&contentCollection=Books&region=Footer&module=WhatsNext&version=WhatsNext&contentID=WhatsNext&src=recg&pgtype=article

And here's a notice I received from FB about my All My Loving FB page. I moved up 1000% in weekly total reach - from 1 to 11! Does it get better than that? Camilla Gibb, I'm snapping at your heels.
Hi Beth,
Here's an update on All My Loving for the week of 6 November - 13 November.Insights For Your Page
See All InsightsMETRICLAST WEEKPREVIOUS WEEKTRENDPage Visits10↑Weekly Total Reach111↑1,000.0%People Engaged30↑Total Page Likes6868↑0.0%

This is happy??

I'm turning into a crabby reader in my old age. Last week I skimmed "The Folded Clock," by Heidi Julavits, which is an odd, interesting diary, filled with her day to day activities and musings. She's intriguing with a very rich life, and she's a marvellous, intelligent writer, but still, I found it episodic and unsatisfying, too quirky, like a platter of delicious hors d'oeuvres; I didn't think it was enough. But then, I thought Julavits's friend and colleague Sheila Heti's book "How should a person be?" was self-indulgent and silly, and then it was reviewed at length, favourably, in nothing less than the New Yorker. So what do I know?

Now I am reading Camilla Gibb's popular "This is happy," the memoir about her extremely painful childhood and adulthood, her years of depression and attempts at suicide, and then happiness with her lesbian partner (who we all know, though she's given a pseudonym in the book, is Heather Conway, a top level poohbah at the CBC.) As soon as she becomes pregnant in her early forties, however, her partner dumps her. She cries every day for months, all through her pregnancy. Yet somehow - how? She's a writer! - she buys a downtown house (the price of single family homes in Toronto is through the roof) and renovates it completely, including putting in an incredible garden that had me drooling, and she hires a live-in nanny who's on site and ready when the baby is born. All this while sobbing. She gives birth, has the nanny, faithful friends and her mother to help her, but is desperately waiting for her lover, who wants to co-parent, to return. And then she finds out her lover has found someone else, and she collapses in rage and grief.

She stands watching the nanny play with her child. "It should be my daughter's other parent playing peek-a-boo in this moment, me watching her lose all inhibition - becoming innocent and childlike - and welling up with love for them both. It should be my partner seeing me anew, at greater depth, as a mother, moved by the brave extent of what we are capable of as humans ..."

Etc.

And I think to myself, you're beautiful, rich, and a successful and talented writer, you own a house and a Jeep, you live with a fabulous nanny who's like a best friend, you have a perfect, healthy child - and you're going to whine about being without a partner? My daughter is the single mother of not one but two young children. She lives in a small rented apartment and she does every single thing by herself. And I have never, not once, heard her complain. Well, maybe once. I know, she wasn't heartbroken, she chose her life - though she did hope things would turn out differently with both fathers. But Anna is brave and strong, resolute and resilient, beyond anyone I know.

So right now, I have little patience for Camilla Gibb's ceaseless suffering. I know this sounds intolerant and judgemental. Well, it is. And yes, as the writer of a memoir read by a few hundred people, I'm jealous that hers has received such a lot of attention. But mostly, I think she's a very good writer, and her editor should have reigned in the self-pity flowing like a torrent through this book.

I'm only on Page 159. Maybe there's a big change by the end. I do hope she stops referring to her daughter as "the egg."

Her nanny goes off to her own friends on the weekend. "I dread the long and lonely weekends, the boredom, the hours, the exhaustion, the early mornings. The weekends are for families... I cry too much when it's just the two of us. I cry and count the hours." Oh for God's sake.

"I want to be in my pyjamas and parenting with someone together. I want to be a family. I want to be years into a relationship, in that place where you are known and knowing and loving and loved - the place I thought I was."

You know what? I wanted that too, after my divorce. My gay friend Chris who's adopted and an orphan wants that. Tons of people want that. In the end, we all want to be known and loved. No news there.

This is what Anna just wrote on FB, the closest to a complaint I've ever heard from her:
She has to have four arms, four legs, four eyes, two hearts, and double the love. There is nothing single about being a single mum. 
This one hit me in the feels tonight.
My heart is with her. 

And while I'm lauding my kids, Sam's bar Gaslight was just voted Now Magazine's Runner Up for Best Bar in Toronto. The winner is a long-established place, where Gaslight is only a year old. Woo hoo! 

Okay, I'll stop grousing now. 

Seminar the play

Just booked a ticket to see this with Wayson - the story of an angry, abusive writing teacher, fascinating, and played by the wonderful Tom McCamus. Sent a recommendation about it to my longterm students, and got this back from Chris:
I saw this on Broadway a couple of years ago with Alan Rickman in the lead role, and it was very entertaining. Coming away from it you will realize that the instructor is about as different from Beth as one can get. Also the students pay thousands of dollars to work with him and each one is a bit of a case. In the production I saw, one of the women whipped her T-shirt off in the first scene.Other than that it could be Beth's class.

See it early & save! Tickets From $19SEE IT EARLY AND SAVE!

$19/$49 Sat Nov 14, 8PM & Sun Nov 15, 2PM
$19/$59 Nov 17-Dec 4, Tue to Fri 8PM



Or call 416-872-1212 or 1-800-461-3333
Use code SEM59
Remember that grade 9 report on the Mayan civilizations that you had to read out in social studies class? We've all been in situations where we've had our work judged by others. It even happens in our adult work life.

Imagine being a young writer desperate to improve your craft and looking to a "genius" novelist for advice and insights.

How much would you pay for such an opportunity? What if the cost was $5,000 and you were one of only four students?

And what would happen if that genius also turned out to be malicious, self-involved and sex-obsessed? What if your career's success depended on his approval?

SEMINAR is a hilarious comedy about such a writing workshop. It opened on Broadway a few seasons ago and was an instant success.



Now it is finally getting its Canadian premiere. Starring the brilliant Tom McCamus, arguably one of the country's finest actors, SEMINAR recently started performances at the Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre in Winnipeg. This is what the critics had to say:

"A SNAPPY, SOPHISTICATED COMEDY with a bright, tight ensemble. Tom McCamus brings his considerable stage presence to bear as the shaggy, oversexed instructor." - Winnipeg Free Press

"SHARPLY FUNNY AND CONSISTENTLY ENTERTAINING! Playwright Teresa Rebeck has a knack for smart dialogue and writing scathing one-liners, producing moments that are simultaneously cringeworthy and laugh-out-loud funny. Tom McCamus gives a devastatingly good performance." - Joff Schmidt, CBC Winnipeg

SEE IT EARLY AND SAVE!

$19/$49 Sat Nov 14, 8PM & Sun Nov 15, 2PM
$19/$59 Nov 17-Dec 4, Tue to Fri 8PM



Or call 416-872-1212 or 1-800-461-3333
Use code SEM59
On stage Nov 14-Dec 6
Panasonic Theatre, 651 Yonge Street
Recommended Age: 14+
Strong language, partial nudity, mature content

the perfect family