Wednesday Reads: Tis the season…
Posted: December 15, 2021 Filed under: just because 8 Comments
Happy Holidays!
Cartoons are from the Cagle website:
Some news on Covid:
Yesterday was:
Ending this post with some beautiful ballet from the Bolshoi:
You can see the full ballet performance here:
https://www.marquee.tv/watch/royalballet-winterstale
Christopher Wheeldon, Artistic Associate of The Royal Ballet, created his adaptation of Shakespeare’s late great romance The Winter’s Tale for The Royal Ballet in 2014. Building on the success of Wheeldon’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, The Winter’s Tale received ecstatic praise at its premiere, acclaimed by critics and audiences alike for its intelligent, distinctive and emotionally powerful story told through exquisite dance. It is now widely judged to be a modern ballet classic. The story follows the destruction of a marriage through consuming jealousy, the abandonment of a child and a seemingly hopeless love. Yet, through remorse and regret – and after a seemingly miraculous return to life – the ending is one of forgiveness and reconciliation. With powerful designs by Bob Crowley and atmospheric music by Joby Talbot, The Winter’s Tale is a masterful modern narrative ballet.
More on this ballet here:
Bolshoi presents The Winter’s Tale, running through April 11, 2021. The production features a libretto by Christopher Wheeldon, and is based on the play of the same name by William Shakespeare.
Leontes, king of Sicilia, is possessed by a mad jealousy, believing that his pregnant wife Hermione is having an affair with his childhood friend Polixenes, king of Bohemia. He orders that Hermione’s infant daughter be abandoned. Hermione and their young son Mamillius die of distress, and Leontes is overcome with remorse. The baby is found by a shepherd in Bohemia and named Perdita (“the lost one”). Sixteen years pass. Perdita falls in love with Florizel, son of Polixenes, who returns her affections and proposed marriage. Polixenes is outraged that his princely son intends to marry a commoner and is consumed by fury. Florizel and Perdita, pursued by Polixenes, seek refuge in Sicilia at the court of Leontes. Perdita is recognized, Hermione returns from the dead, and the family is reunited.
Please note that the streaming full ballet performance is the British Royal Ballet’s original production from 2018. Which will be different than the amazing and untouchable dancers of the Bolshoi…I hope you enjoy it.
This is an open thread.
peej
Carissa
ecocatwoman
grayslady
mablue2
NW Luna
peggysue22
quixote
skydancingguestblogger
Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Sky Dancing 
So, with Amazon tornado safety issues in question there is this:
Bell hooks, feminist and poet, has died. WaPo uses upper case to spell her name, despite mentioning that hooks used the lower case because she wanted the attention focused on her work, not herself. (I initial-capped ‘bell” here because it’s the first word in a sentence.) https://www.washingtonpost.com/obituaries/2021/12/15/bell-hooks-dead/
She was also Buddhist. “In the Temple of Love is a collection of poetry by bell hooks. hooks draws on Buddhist themes of compassion, and puts a particular focus on the female bodhisttva, Tara, on the 30 poems in this collection.”
https://www.lionsroar.com/the-best-of-bell-hooks-life-writings-quotes-and-books/
All the greats are leaving. 😦
The Columbine shooting was more than 22 years ago.
So many since then.