Lily Brett's Blog, page 42

A friend sent me this photo of a poppyseed slice from the...

A friend sent me this photo of a poppyseed slice from the Florence Kahn Boulangerie in the Marais, in Paris. I love popppyseed cake, poppyseed strudel and most of all poppyseed slices. The cakes and breads in the Florence Kahn Boulangerie all look as though they have come straight from the Jewish centers of pre-war Europe. When I looked at the photo of the poppyseed slice all of my Olympic-standard calorie-calculating ability evaporated and was replaced by a desperate desire to get on the first available flight to Paris.

My Mother's Kitchen

When we moved to New York, I brought a lot of my mother’s kitchen equipment with me. I couldn’t bear to part with it. Surrounded by her utensils, I do feel as though I have my mother in the kitchen with me.

China Bookshelf

This is my China bookshelf. China has always fascinated me. I keep on buying books about China, I will need another shelf soon.

Not the Most Cheerful Bookshelf

A small fraction of my books about Hitler and the Holocaust. Mine is not the most cheerful bookshelf you’ve seen in your life.

Manuscript

This is what some of the versions of Lola Bensky looked like in manuscript form before the final manuscript was turned into a book.

"Books that Have Had an Impact on Me" IV

I was introduced to Kenneth Rexroth’s ‘100 Poems from the Chinese’ when I was 32. I was astonished to see that these exquisite and profound poems, many of them written in the 8th, 9th or 10th century, were so contemporary. So relevant to our lives, today. A Buddhist monk who wrote poetry in the year 761, and we, who live in the 21st century, are so alike. We have so much in common. I’ve spent much of my writing life writing about the danger of seeing another person as not quite like you. The danger of deciding that someone who doesn’t share our skin colour, our culture, our language, our religion or our sexual orientation is different. It’s a short, slippery slope from other people being different to becoming indifferent to others.

I like to think of Mei Yao Ch’en who wrote, sometime between the years 1002 and 1060, in a poem called An Excuse For Not Returning The Visit Of A Friend,

”Do not be offended because/I am slow to go out. You know/Me too well for that. On my lap/I hold my little girl. At my/Knees stands my handsome little son./One has just begun to talk./The other chatters without/Stopping. They hang on my clothes/And follow my every step./I can’t get any farther/Than the door. I am afraid/I will never make it to your house.”

From “Books that have had an impact on me,” The Age (Australia) 2008

I love buying notebooks and paperclips and manila folders. I...

I love buying notebooks and paperclips and manila folders. I justify it by saying that I couldn’t bear to run out. The truth is that I would have to live to be 110 to even run low on any of these items.

Comparing the book covers of the American and German editions of...

Comparing the book covers of the American and German editions of my 2006 novel, You Gotta Have Balls.

From "In Full View"

“I’m not one of those writers who knew, from the time they were young, that they wanted to be a writer. I wanted to be slim.” —from In Full View

German Tour Dates

These are the first finalized dates for my upcoming book tour. I’ll be reading from Lola Bensky:

9/24/12 Berlin, 7 pm, Dussmann das Kulturkaufhaus, Friedrichstraße 90, 10117 Berlin
9/25/12 Cologne, 8 pm, St. Agnes church, Neusser Platz 18, 50670 Cologne
9/26/12 Stuttgart, 8 pm, Literaturhaus, Breitscheidstraße 4, 70174, Stuttgart
9/27/12 Hamburg, evening, Bucerius Law School, Jungiusstraße 6, 20355 Hamburg
9/28/12 Munich, evening, Amerika Haus, Karolinenplatz 3, 80333 Munich
9/29/12 Darmstadt, 7:30 pm, town church, Kirchstraße 11, 64283 Darmstadt