When I moved to India in 2007, I knew almost nothing about Indian food. Growing up in the Philadelphia suburbs in a typical middle-class family of Irish descent, Indian cuisine just was not on my radar. Going to college in New York City had been an unmatched opportunity to eat […]
I was on a mission to meet Louise Penny. But first, some background. I just returned from a thoroughly live-in-the-moment week at the annual Writers at Woody Point festival. The setting is spectacular — a tiny town of Crayola-coloured houses set at the end of a road on the shores […]
The portraits, landscapes, interiors and still lifes of the Dutch masters show us a world full of activity: people sailing, trading, studying, working, reading, singing, drinking, and much more. It’s fun to marvel at the rich colours and textures, the dynamic skies, the dramatic Biblical scenes, and the visual jokes […]
Existential angst, jazz cats, cheap hotels, smoke-filled basements … while Paris’s Saint-Germain-des-Prés neighbourhood is now filled with luxury boutiques, in the 1950s it was a different story. As the city emerged from Nazi occupation, Saint-Germain reclaimed its place as a centre of new ideas and daring new works of art, […]
I had a lot of fun reading the recent New York Times article on the joy of small, everyday souvenirs: “Want a Vacation Souvenir? Buy Toothpaste.” Like author Joshua Hunt, I love visiting drugstores when travelling abroad. Along with supermarkets, bodegas and corner stores, stationers, and secondhand shops. This is […]
Tanka are a form of Japanese poetry that date back more than 1,000 years. Meaning “short song” in Japanese, tanka are 31 on long, written on a single line—an on is similar to a syllable. Tanka remain very popular in Japan, and these poems have captured every facet of the […]
Gertrude Stein’s famous quote, “There is no there there” is often understood as a slight, a pronouncement that a place has no substance. Nothing to see here. Stein was writing about returning to her childhood home in Oakland, California, in her 1937 book Everybody’s Autobiography. One reason her observation has […]
[Editor’s note: Learn more about Wendy’s work in our free April 20 webinar.] I live in wonder. Okay, I know that sounds like a strange thing for someone who considers themselves to be a “serious academic” to say. But when asked what it is that I do, it’s true. See, […]
I just came back from my first trip to Japan but still have yet to come back down to earth. Wow! My husband Ben and I spent two weeks visiting my sister Carolyn in lush, laid-back Okinawa. She’s in the Navy and has been living in Okinawa for almost two […]
[Editor’s note: Join Ann at our informal online open house February 24 at 2 p.m. Eastern. RSVP here.] On many Classical Pursuits trips, we are reliant on the written word, and messages we can glean from mute buildings, streets, and monuments, to help us understand pivotal happenings in human history. […]