Wednesday, Mar 23, 2022 • 5min
The Writer's Almanac for Wednesday, March 23, 2022
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Today is the birthday of filmmaker Akira Kurosawa, born in Tokyo, Japan (1910). Best known for his film “Rashomon.” George Lucas said he lifted the plot of Star Wars from Kurosawa’s epic, “Hidden Fortress.
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Garrison Keillor
00:08
And here is
The Writer's Almanac
for Wednesday. It's the 23 March 2022. It's the birthday of the artist, Juan Gris
, born in Madrid
1887. He was 19 years old when he moved to Paris
and rented an apartment right next to Pablo Picasso's
. He was a friend of Matisse
and George Brock,
and one of the artists who helped to create Cubism
.Share
00:38
It's the birthday of
Akira Kurosawa
. Born in Tokyo
1910, famous for his movie Rashomon
and his movies, Hakuchi, based on Dostoyevsky
, his movie The Throne Of Blood
(Kumonosu jo) adapted from Macbeth
. His movie Ron based on King Lear
and his epic Hidden fortress
, which George Lucas
said he had based Star Wars
on.Share
01:10
It's the birthday of
Fannie Farmer
born Boston 1857 who published the first cookbook in America
that used precise cooking instructions and level measurements. Publishers at first did not see the need for a cookbook. They thought that all young women learned how to cook from their mothers. But finally it was published and it was an enormous success.Share
01:36
It was on this day 1743, that
Handel's
Oratorio
Messiah
had its London
premiere. Handel
had been a very successful composer of operas in Germany
. And then in 1711, he had a big success in London,
but his style of opera was going out of fashion. He produced a whole series of operas in the 1730's that attracted smaller and smaller audiences until finally Handel's
theater closed.Share
02:09
Most people thought that his career as a composer was over. But
Handel
decided to turn his attention to the Oratorio
, telling biblical stories in musical form. Handel
wrote the Messiah
in the summer of 1741.Share
02:27
He worked for 25 days almost without brakes, skipping his meals, staying up all night and when he finished he said, I think God has visited me. I think I did see all heaven before me And the Great God himself. It finally had its
London
premiere on this day, 1743 and the audience was simply overwhelmed.Share
02:55
Here's a poem for today by
Stephen Dunn
entitled Mercy.Share
03:00
The music was fidgety arch, an orchestral version of a twang. Welcome to a tonal hell! Welcome to the execution of a theory. I kept thinking, thinking, thinking I hadn't felt a thing. Was it old-fashioned of me to want to, or were feelings, as usual, part of the problem. The conductor seemed to flail more than lead his baton, evidence of something unresolved. Perhaps recent trouble at home. And though I liked the chalice, especially the way she held her instrument. Unless you had a taste for unhappiness. You didn't want to look at the first violinist's face, my wife whispered to me, this music is better than it sounds.
Share
03:49
I reminded myself the world outside might be a worse place than where I was now. Though, that seemed little reason to take heart. Instead, I closed my eyes, thought about a certain medicine soprano who could gladden a sad day anywhere. But one January night in
Milan
went a full octave into the beyond. Sometimes escape can be an art or a selfishness, or just a gift you need to give yourself. Whichever, I disappeared for a while, left my body behind to sit there, nod applaud at the appropriate time.Share
04:34
Mercy, a poem by
Stephen Dunn
from his collection What Goes On
, published by W. W. Norton
and used by permission here on The Writer's Almanac
. Be well, do good work and keep in touch.Share
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