2008 Book & Author

Luncheon

Thursday, May 8, 11:45 a.m. - 2:30

Clubhouse at Harbor Links*

Cost of luncheon is $50

Please register in advance via brochures available in library or call Tinu Thakore at 767-1142

*New location

The annual Richard D. Whittemore Book & Author Luncheon will feature editor Barry Day (The Letters of Noel Coward) and author Brian Hall (Fall of Frost: A Novel).

Barry Day replaces historian Laurence Bergreen (Marco Polo), who was forced to cancel due to illness.

Books will be available for purchase and signing. Raffles for books and gift certificates will be sold at luncheon.

*Noted British actor Simon Jones and other thespians will perform dramatic readings of Noel Coward's letters as part of the presentation!

The Letters of Noel Coward is the first and definitive collection of letters (most of them previously unpublished) both from and to the incomparable Noël Coward. They present a unique and irresistible portrait of a society and age—from the Blitz to the Ritz and beyond.

The range, charm, and vitality of Coward's talents—he was a playwright, actor, composer, librettist, lyricist, director, painter, writer, cabaret singer, wit—brought him into close encounters, and often close friendship, with the great and the gifted. He knew everybody who was anybody in the theater and in the movies, in literature and in politics, on both sides of the Atlantic

Barry Day was born in England and received his M.A. from Balliol College, Oxford. In addition to his seven previous books on Noël Coward, Day has written about Dorothy Parker, Oscar Wilde, Johnny Mercer, and Rodgers and Hart. He has written and produced plays and musical revues showcasing the work of Coward, the Lunts, Oscar Wilde, Dorothy Parker, and others. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a Trustee of the Noël Coward Foundation and was awarded the Order of the British Empire. He lives in New York, London, and Palm Beach.

Fall of Frost

Robert Frost was a Job-like figure. A tough man and a tough artist who led a hard life, he decided early on that he wouldn’t wallow in the tragedies that life threw his way. Fall of Frost is Brian Hall’s evocative portrait of this brilliant and complicated man, arguably the best-known and most widely-read American poet. Staying true to Frost’s life in all external facts, and aiming to be an accurate biographer, Hall speculates only when it comes to what Frost’s thoughts might have been. The resulting novel is a multi-faceted view of Frost that captures him from many angles and allows the reader to sample the world through Frost’s eyes.

Brian Hall was a featured author at the Friends’ 2003 Book & Author Luncheon when he spoke about his acclaimed novel I Should Be Extremely Happy in Your Company. He is the author of two other novels and three books of non-fiction. Mr. Hall’s articles have appeared in The New Yorker and The New York Times Magazine. He lives with his family in Ithaca.

Edward Mendelson

Columbia University Professor and Author to give 2008 Ruth D. Bogen Memorial Lecture on Classic Literature

Sunday, April 27

2 p.m.

Edward Mendelson, professor of English and Comparative Literature, and Columbia University’s Lionel Trilling Professor in the Humanities, is the 2008 Ruth D. Bogen Memorial Lecturer.

Professor Mendelson’s talk, "From Frankenstein to Mrs. Ramsay: Seven Novels and One Life," will focus on classic authors Mary Shelley, George Eliot, Virginia Woolf and the Bronte sisters. Dr. Mendelson’s book. The Things That Matter: What Seven Classic Novels Have to Say about the Stages of Life, on which the talk is based, will be available for purchase and signing.

The book has been called an illuminating exploration of how seven of the greatest novels of the 19th and 20th centuries — Frankenstein, Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre, Middlemarch, Mrs. Dalloway, To the Lighthouse and Between the Acts — portray the essential experiences of life. “

Professor Mendelson did his undergraduate work at the University of Rochester and earned his Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins University. He is the author of Early Auden, Later Auden, and  is the Literary Executor of the Estate of W. H. Auden. He is the editor of Auden’s Complete Works, as well as of novels by Thomas Hardy, George Meredith, Arnold Bennett, Anthony Trollope and H. G. Wells.

Laton McCartney

Author of the acclaimed work of history, The Teapot Dome Scandal: How Big Oil Bought the Harding White House and Tried to Steal the Country

On Tuesday March 11 Author McCartney regaled a crowd of 75 on the amazing, complex, and at times ribald story of how Big Oil handpicked Warren G. Harding, an obscure Ohio senator, to serve as our 23rd president. Mix in hundreds of millions of dollars in petroleum reserves, rapacious oil barons and crooked politicians, under-the-table payoffs, murder, suicide, and blackmail, White House cronyism, and the excesses of the Jazz Age. The result: the granddaddy of all American political scandals, Teapot Dome.

Lucette Lagnado

Author of the award-winning memoir

The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit

On Thursday evening November 29 more than 100 patrons heard author Lagnado discuss her award-winning memoir, The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit: My Family’s Exodus from Old Cairo to the New World. Wall Street Journal reporter Lagnado recounts how her once prosperous family lost everything including their identity when they fled her father’s beloved Cairo for New York in the 60s.  From the Lagnado's elegant apartment overlooking one of Cairo's grand boulevards to a cramped one bedroom in Brooklyn, The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit is a moving riches-to-rags story of loss, identity, faith, tradition and triumph that has been hailed by The New York Times as a "crushing, brilliant book."

Friends & Family Day 2007: A New Tradition

On Saturday, November 3, nearly 500 library patrons enjoyed the second annual Friends & Family Day, which showcases the library as a friendly meeting place for patrons of all ages. Events included vaudevillian silent clown Chip Bryant performing for children, author Dan Paisner speaking on the art of ghostwriting, a family movie presentation of Willy Wonka with free popcorn, and a popular afternoon paperback book swap. Teen volunteers helped pass out library literature and sort books.

2007 Book & Author Luncheon a Roaring Success

Bestselling  novelist Alice Hoffman (Skylight Confessions) and award-winning historian David Nasaw (Andrew Carnegie) wowed a crowd of 200 at the 38th Annual Richard D. Whittemore Book & Author Luncheon on May 11 at the George Washington Manor.

Past speakers at this prestigious event have included John Berendt (The City of Falling Angels), William J. Broad (The Oracle: The Lost Secrets and Hidden Message of Ancient Delphi), Russell Shorto (Island at the Center of the World), Mimi Sheraton (Eating My Words), A. Scott Berg (Lindbergh), Arthur Golden (Memoirs of a Geisha), Dava Sobel (Galileo’s Daughter), Dennis Lehane (Mystic River), and Susan Isaacs.

2007 Bogen Lectures On Shakespeare Draw Crowds

The 2007 Ruth D. Bogen Memorial Lectures in April featured two talks by John Broza, Shakespeare scholar and legendary Schreiber High School teacher. His topics were Aspects of Love in Shakespeare and Bad to the Bone: Some of Shakespeare's Notorious Villains. Each lecture drew more than 100 attendees to the library's Lapham Room.

Noted British actor Simon Jones

will perform dramatic readings of

Coward's letters

Barry Day, Editor of The Letters of
Noel Coward

Novelist Brian Hall, author of

"Fall of Frost"

The popular paperback book swap!

Members of the FOL Board with authors Alice Hoffman and David Nasaw (first row, center)

John Broza explained Shakespeare's lovers

and villains.

40th Anniversary Celebration Weekend

November 3-5, 2006

Nearly 400 people attended our Celebration Weekend, which included a family movie night, a vaudeville show for kids, a gospel concert, and a lecture on the future of investigative journalism, among other events.

Thanks to the library staff and local businesses who supported us: Dolphin Bookshop, Eckerd on Port Blvd., Frank's Pizza, and Stop & Shop.

Here are the winners of our K-6 Art and Writing Contest on the themes of "The best book I ever borrowed from our library" and "What I love about our library."

Writing:

Cassie Scandalios

Helena Littman    

Harry Paul                                             

Annie  Rubin        

Art:

Clara Teitel                                            

Jenny Aguiar                                     

Kelly To       

Honorable mention for writing and art:       Amanda Dumpson   

Mariel O'Connell and performer

Chip Bryant

Carol Hiller, Ellen Zimmerman and Pam O'Connell of the FOL accept congratulatory proclamation from TONH Councilman Fred Pollack