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November 11 – December 23, 2023

Elizabeth Bishop delighted in the postcard. It suited her poetic subject matter and her way of life—this poet of travel who was more often on the move than at home, “wherever that may be,” as she put it in her poem “Questions of Travel.” She told James Merrill in a postcard written in 1979 that she seldom wrote “anything of any value at the desk or in the room where I was supposed to be doing it—it’s always in someone else’s house, or in a bar, or standing up in the kitchen in the middle of the night.”

Since her death in 1979 and the publication of her selected correspondence, Bishop has become known as one of the great modern-day letter-writers. And yet inevitably something is lost when an editor transcribes a letter to prepare it for print: the quality of the correspondent’s hand (or the model of her typewriter), the paper used, cross-outs and typos, and everything else that fixes the letter in time and space. When it comes to a postcard, or a letter composed on a series of postcards (something Bishop enjoyed doing), we get none of the images, and even more is lost.

But what exactly? “What do we miss by not seeing these postcards?” Jonathan Ellis and Susan Rosenbaum ask in the catalogue for the exhibition of Bishop’s postcards they have curated at the Vassar College Library, on view through December 15, 2023. Vassar, which is home to Bishop’s papers, has published print and online catalogues of the exhibition. The print catalogue includes the curators’ richly suggestive introduction, front and back images of the exhibition’s sixty-three items, and appendices.

The answer to the curators’ question is: quite a lot. There is always some dialogue between the front and back of one of Bishop’s postcards. Take the one to Merrill commenting on her restless habits of composition. The front of the card (“the nicest left of my postcards from the Eastman Museum,” she says) is a reproduction of the nineteenth-century photographer Eadweard Muybridge’s motion study of a goat. Bishop doesn’t point out the analogy between her unsettled ways and the ambling goat. She knows Merrill will get it.

In 1965, a stone house near New Paltz was slated for auction. A cousin of the owners, a young and broke painter, begged them to let her buy it with her musician partner. She feared the house, which was limping along, would be torn down. Soon after the artists purchased the house, the painter heard a voice in her dreams: Take a chisel to the concrete stucco, and you will find golden stones beneath; use a crowbar to peel up the linoleum flooring, there are chestnut boards below; hammer at the drop ceilings, there are wide beams above. The painter did as she was told, and found what she was promised. The house began to breathe again. The painter lived in, or perhaps with, the house for more than five decades, long after the musician departed. There were other lovers, and a series of cats—some of the cats were reincarnations of the previous cats. She made films in the rooms and worked in a studio on the second floor. She became, in time, famous. Four years ago, she died in the downstairs bedroom.

This is the story, anyway, as told by the painter, who was known to take creative liberties. Carolee Schneemann named herself. “I made it up,” she said of the surname, “I wanted a big masculine German name.” She was born in 1939, if not 1934. Her birth certificate seems to have been altered with one careful pen stroke, closing off the four into a nine. Census records concur. Still, even last winter, at her first retrospective in the U.K., the Barbican’s Carolee Schneemann: Body Politics, the museum materials showed not just the factual date, but the later date, the one Schneemann used when she told her life story.

Last December, I saw the house myself. Rachel Churner, the director of the Carolee Schneemann Foundation, picked me up at the station and drove me to Rosendale, New York, where Rachel Helm, who caretakes the house, met us. There was snow on the ground, and we stomped what we could off our boots before the Rachels began my tour. Helm pointed first to the exterior stones Schneeman had uncovered, and then, inside along the walls, the horsehair insulation, coming unstuffed like a child’s favorite plush toy.

The house was built, I learned, in the 1750s. One of three on the street, it was constructed when the French Huguenots made a deal with the Lenape. The Huguenots designed these houses with sloped entries to the basements for livestock to enter—the animals’ body heat would rise, helping to warm the rooms above. In the 1820s, the town became the cement capital of North America, and the industry supported the community until the early twentieth century, when Rosendale cement fell out of favor. The town grew quiet. The house expanded upward and sideways, a patchwork of extensions and renovations, and there was a farm on the property—the farm failed. Finally, the young Schneemann, along with pianist and composer James Tenney, purchased the house.

We witnessed one of the greatest ever Premier League goals on Sunday, but there are more urgent matters to attend to on today’s show. Like… is Sean Dyche actually bald?

Marcus, Vish, Jim and Pete guide you through a chaotic Premier League weekend! We argue that Lewis Miley looks like a stretched out Furby, Steve Bull should be given an unlimited number of dogs by Wolverhampton City Council, and why Pete should definitely be allowed to launch a new German techno club in Motherwell. Come join us! On the podcast of course, not the nightclub.

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It's the season for giving – but how to do it ethically and sustainably?

Mikel Arteta, regarded as one of the best managers in England, has achieved a new milestone in the Premier League with Arsenal.

The Spanish manager has consistently performed well since taking over the helm at Arsenal and has now set a new record. The recent victory against Brentford marked his 116th win as the Gunners manager in 200 games.

This accomplishment makes him the Arsenal manager with the most wins after 200 games, surpassing the records of Arsene Wenger (111) and George Graham (106), as revealed by Coaches Voice on Twitter.

Despite facing initial scepticism from critics when appointed for his first senior managerial role, Arteta has proven himself. Arsenal’s hierarchy, who never doubted his suitability for the position, deserves credit for sticking with him.

What a remarkable achievement and testament to Arteta’s managerial prowess.

Pundit Steve Sidwell believes that Arsenal’s win against Brentford this evening sends a strong message to Liverpool and Manchester City in the race for the Premier League title.

The draw between Liverpool and Manchester City earlier in the day provided an opportunity for Arsenal to claim the top spot with a victory against Brentford.

Despite facing challenges in the game, Mikel Arteta’s side, far from their best form, managed to secure the win and is entering the new week as the league leaders.

Arsenal put in considerable effort to secure the decisive goal, and it seemed like an opportunity they couldn’t afford to miss.

Former Chelsea player Sidwell sees this victory as a clear message to the other two contenders in the race for the league title.

Retail workers are walking out during  the busiest shopping day of the year, Black Friday, leveraging a weekend of huge profits for retailers to demand better pay and working conditions. 

Amazon workers in more than 30 countries are striking this weekend as part of the worldwide “Make Amazon Pay” campaign, protesting the retailer’s labor practices, low wages, and high emissions. The strike would amount to “the largest day of industrial disruption in Amazon’s thirty-year history,” according to Amanda Gering, an organizer with the UK’s GMB union, which began strikes at Amazon earlier this month. This Black Friday marked the fourth year globally that Amazon workers have planned strikes for this shopping weekend—an effort that began during Covid, when Amazon made record profits as workers struggled and, in some cases, died.

In Washington, about four hundred Macy’s employees from three different stores went on strike, beginning their picket at 3:00 AM on Black Friday. Their union, the United Food and Commercial Workers, says that Macy’s isn’t doing enough to address safety threats like violent shoppers and shoplifting, and that pay is not keeping up with the cost of living. “Workers don’t feel safe in our store, and now they are scared of retaliation so they’ve stopped calling for help when they see a threat,” explained sales associate Liisa Luick in a release from UFCW 3000. Azia Domingo, who has worked for Macy’s for 21 years, said, “Macy’s is making billions of dollars and paying their CEO $11 million a year, but most of us workers are struggling to make ends meet…We shouldn’t have to question whether we can afford to have health insurance and go to the doctor.”

These Black Friday strikes cap off a historic year of labor action. In September, the United Auto Workers launched a historic strike at the country’s three largest automakers. (Mother Jones’ rank-and-file staff, including the author of this post, are represented by UAW Local 2103.)  In October, the largest health care strike in US history took place when 75,ooo Kaiser Permanente workers across five states and Washington, DC, walked out. Hollywood actors and writers spent almost half the year away from sets and writer’s rooms, demanding better pay and protections around the use of artificial intelligence. 

“Workers know that it doesn’t matter what country you’re in or what your job title is,” said General Secretary Cristy Hoffman of UNI, an international union federation which has workers taking part in this weekend’s Amazon strike.  “We are all united in the fight for higher wages, an end to unreasonable quotas, and a voice on the job.”

Mikel Arteta expressed immense relief following Arsenal’s 1-0 victory over Brentford in the Premier League today.

The game could have swung in either direction, with Brentford putting up a strong defence and coming close to scoring the opening goal. However, Arsenal held their ground and secured a crucial win against a well-organised Brentford side.

Arsenal will now look to capitalise on this victory, and BBC pundit Alistair Bruce-Ball observed the visible relief on the Arsenal manager’s face after the match.

He said on the BBC:

“Mikel Arteta with some vociferous celebrations. That win meant a lot to him. Brentford put a lot in the way of Arsenal tonight, but they have managed to win the game.