Monday
Jul. 26, 1999
Band Concert
Poem: "Band Concert," by Sydney Lea, from To The Bone: New and Selected Poems (University of Illinois Press).
It's science fiction writer LAWRENCE WATT EVANS' birthday, 1954, Arlington, Massachusetts. He's written several science fiction books: The Lords of Dus Series, The Legend of Eshthar Series, and The Three Worlds Trilogy. He says, "I write for a living because I'm not qualified for much of anything else, and because it's fun. I can't abide getting up in the morning to go to work for someone else. I have no overblown ideas about 'art,' though I try to do the best I can and give value for the money." Evans is due out with another science fiction book, Dragon Weather, this October.
It's the birthday in New York, 1928, of writer and director STANLEY KUBRICK, who made Dr. Strangelove (1964), 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), and A Clockwork Orange (1971), and other movies. Kubrick died earlier this year, just after finishing Eyes Wide Shut, which opened a few days ago.
It's the birthday in Surrey, England, 1894, of ALDOUS HUXLEY, who is best remembered for his 1932 novel, Brave New World, the story of the future in which no personal emotions are allowed, art and beauty are seen as disruptive, and the words mother and father are forbidden because everyone belongs to everyone else.
It's the birthday in Kesswill, Switzerland, 1875 of psychiatrist CARL JUNG. He came from a family of preachers, but broke with the custom to study medicine. Around the turn of the century he became a close associate of Sigmund Freud's. Jung went on to explore the world of dreams, and developed the theory that dreams came from an area of the mind he called the collective unconscious.
It's the birthday in Dublin, 1856, of GEORGE BERNARD SHAW. By the turn of the century he was the best-known and most-feared critic writing in English. He wrote Widower's Houses, Major Barbara (1905), and St. Joan (1923)— fifty-two plays in all, for which he won the 1925 Nobel Prize in Literature.
Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.®