Join us today at 1:30 p.m. for a warm-up for Valentine's Day.  Karen Richardson, Curator of Haldimand County Museum, will be at The Neat Little Bookshop.  Round Table discussion on romance!    Do you have any old love letters, tokens of love or maybe a love story?

~ Postcard collection courtesy of John Walker

Familiar with Elizabeth Barrett Browning's poem, "How do I love thee?  Let me count the ways?"
Following, is an excerpt from an early letter ~ Robert Browning to Elizabeth Barrett.

"I LOVE your verses with all my heart, dear Miss Barrett,  and this is no off-hand complimentary letter that I shall write, ~ whatever else, no prompt matter-of-course recognition of your genius, and there a graceful and natural end of the thing.
Since the day last week when I first read your poems, I quite laugh to remember how I have been turning and turning again in my mind what I should be able to tell you of their effect upon me...
"...this great living poetry of yours, not a flower of which but took root and grew ~ Oh, how different that is from lying to be dried and pressed flat, and prized highly, and put in a book with a proper account at top and bottom, and shut up and put away."

~ THE WORLD'S GREAT LETTERS, Edited by M. L. Schuster, Simon & Schuster Inc., 1940.

Thursday, February 2, 1:30 p.m. Karen Richardson, Curator of the Haldimand County Museum, will be our guest at the Round Table.
Thursday afternoons ~ 1st & 3rd ~ are informal readings/discussions on topics that always entertain and hopefully inform. Being February, we think that romance is a welcome subject. Dylan Thomas, Welsh poet and writer, apparently found the winter months long. While on a lecture tour in the United States, he wrote to his wife on March 16, 1950,

"My love, Oh, cat. . .Have you forgotten me? I am the man you used to say you loved. I used to sleep in your arms ~ do you remember? But you never write. You are perhaps mindless of me. I am not of you. I love you. There isn't a moment of any hideous day when I do not say to myself, 'It will be alright. I shall go home. Caitlin loves me. I love Caitlin.'
But perhaps you have forgotten. If you have forgotten, or lost your affection for me, please, my Cat, let me know. I love you."

Please join us. Coffee pot's Always On. . . Thursday, February 2, 1:30 p.m.*From The 50 Greatest Love Letters of All Time, Edited by David H. Lowenherz, Crown Publishers, New York, 2002
Postcard collection courtesy of John Walker

The Difference Between Literature and Journalism ~

"Literature is the art of writing something that will be read twice; journalism what will be grasped at once."

~ Cyril Connolly, Enemies of Promise, English critic and writer (1903 - 1974)

Source: The Writer and the Reader, Neil Ewart, 1984, Blandford Press.

Local Author ~ Brad Smith

Sent to check out a budding story about a discovery of lost civil war memorabilia, journalist Amy Morris resents that this assignment is more about her boss' collecting hobby than advancing her career ~

"Dock Bass." "Sounds like a hillbilly action figure," she said unhappily. "How exactly am I supposed to handle this? I don't ever recall Dan Rather showing up at the space center with a pocketful of cash, trying to buy a used shuttle. There are credibility concerns here, Sam."
"Just get close to the situation. Find out what this guy's story is. If it looks as if he'll sell, I'll have somebody there in a heartbeat. I know people in the area. You can keep your distance, do a fascinating little historical piece for the six o'clock and hit the road. But don't think you're going to be the only dog in the hunt. This thing is already attracting a lot of attention, on the Lincoln pictures alone. Throw in the Edison controversy and it'll be Katie-bar-the-door."
"Oh Yeah, it's very exciting," she said and she turned away. "It's the one I've been waiting for, Sam."
~ Busted Flush, Brad Smith, Picador, Pan Books Limited, 2005

Brad Smith will be in The Neat Little Bookshop on Saturday, February 18 at 1:30 p.m. His latest book: Red Means Run released this month by Simon & Schuster.

Famous Love Letters ~

"There is only one situation I can think of in which men and women make an effort to read better than they usually do. [It is] when they are in love and reading a love letter."

~ Mortimer Adler (1902 - 2001) American author, philosopher
Famous Love Letters, Messages of Intimacy and Passion
Edited by Ronald Tamplin, Reader's Digest Assoc., Inc., 1995.
"I love you no longer; on the contrary, I detest you. You are a wretch, truly perverse, truly stupid, a real Cinderella. You never write to me at all, you do not love your husband; you know the pleasure that your letters give him yet you cannot even manage to write him half a dozen lines, dashed off in a moment!"

~ Letter Napoleon to Josephine, Spring 1707.

The couple remained married until 1809 when Napoleon had the marriage annulled. (On her death, Napoleon picked violets from Josephine's grave and wore them in a locket around his neck until his death seven years later.)
Napoleon (1769 - 1821), Josephine (1763 - 1814)
~Famous Love Letters, Ronald Tamplin, 1995.
Postcard Collection courtesy of John Walker

Karen Richardson, Curator of the Haldimand County Museum, will be at The Neat Little Bookshop

Thursday, February 2 at 1:30 p.m.

Topic: Romance. Everyone welcome ~ round table discussion. Coffee pot's always on ~ (Do you have a vintage love letter that you would like to share?)

". . . a woman who loves a man would sleep on a board." ~ English novelist, D. H. Lawrence (1885 - 1930)