While it could be said that being gay is in vogue with well loved and prominent celebrities like Ellen DeGeneres, Rosie O’Donnell, Jane Lynch, Wanda Sykes and Neil Patrick Harris, to name a few, there is still an invisibility, a voicelessness to being gay, especially if you are young and not famous. On Thursday at the Doubletree Hotel in Tarrytown, Westchester Parents of Gays and Lesbians (PFLAG) had their annual Pride Works conference. In its thirteenth year, the conference’s mission is to inform communities about the realities of growing up Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual or Transgendered. Pride …
Many among us have had the itch to write the great American novel, to put pen to paper and tell our grandparent's WWII story. Perhaps we want to chronicle everyday life for a magazine or create and design a groovy blog or children’s book. No matter the genre, the desire to write is a calling. Recently, I heard a story on NPR about the writer who dropped out of high school, then worked at a meat packing plant and a paper mill for thirty-two years. At age forty-five he quit it all to go to graduate school and later became a writer. Donald Ray Pollock is the writer; his book of short …
In popular culture, with the advent of Ellen’s talk show and popular sitcoms like Glee and Modern Family, being gay and being out can appear chic, vogue and easy. But reality negates this ideology and the proof of that can be seen in a newscasts where young gay people jump from bridges, fearful of the social stigmas and repercussions of being outed. June is National Gay Pride Month, and on Sunday, June 26 at 4:30 p.m., the Hudson Valley Writers' Center will have a salute to Gay Pride with a reading by two celebrated authors: Erin McHugh and Elaine Sexton. Erin McHugh is a former publishing …
Even in the United States, having the opportunity, the time and the means to be a writer is a privilege. Still there are places in the world where the act of writing is seen as outlaw behavior. Imagine if, in order to write, you had to get cloaked in a burqa, steal away to a safe location where your family and friends were unaware that you shared poems, wrote essays and created fiction. Such is the life of Afghan women who want to write, and who fight in secret for those rights. This Sunday, May 15, the Warner Library in Tarrytown will host a Book Group Gathering where journalist, novelist, …
Our world is filled with so much noise: sounds, conversations and extraneous utterances. And we spend countless hours engaging our computers as both a social connector as well as a platform to perform work duties. In the midst of this noise and electronic connectivity it is difficult to hear or experience the clear fresh voices that have come to share their visions of the world. As I do from time to time, I crossed the borders of Sleepy Hollow and Tarrytown and took the Metro North train to New York City. Once in the city I travelled down to the West Village and entered the doors of the New …
In a world where everything from natural disasters to the current jobs numbers are spun into everyday narratives, it’s nice to sit and hear simple, yet intriguing stories that unveil the mystery of how a leopard got her spots or how an elephant got his tusks. Last weekend at the Warner Library, featured storyteller, actor and singer April Armstrong. To a packed audience of kids and adults, she shared stories that took the audience down to the banks of the Mississippi and to the faraway lands of West Africa and Zimbabwe. Ms. Armstrong is a graduate of Manhattan School of Music and Columbia …
No one really wants to talk about race because it is scary business at best. Yet at the Warner Library, on the last night of Black History Month, Dr. Sherrill D. Wilson, an Urban Anthropologist, writer and poet, has come to discuss the emancipation of slaves in New York State, which leads to dealing with the sticky matter of race in this country. In a revealing and lively talk, Dr. Wilson dispelled misinformation and the miseducation of our understanding about northern states being free states. “First of all there was slavery in all of the thirteen original colonies. And except for John …
I’ve heard it said everybody secretly wants to write a book, and this may or may not be true. What often is true: there are individuals, those of us who want to write, yet can’t because either we can’t muster up the courage, or haven’t discovered a path to writing. What is also true: if we’re aware, unaware, or a closeted writer—everyone who is meant to write will ultimately discover this fact sooner or later. Anton Nimblett didn’t start off wanting to be a writer. Like many of us, he wrote funny, sad short stories in junior high school, stories where a class of teens might snicker under …
I first learned about the Harlem Renaissance writer Zora Neale Hurston while I was working at an art store just after undergrad. The shame in that statement is I made it through high school and college without knowing about this magnificent novelist, anthropologist, folklorist, playwright, rebel before her time, and overall groovy woman. Born 1891 Alabama, in the shadow decades just after slavery ended, it would have been easy, perhaps expected, that Zora would blend into the clapboard walls of her day, never seen or heard from. But this is a story about Zora Neale Hurston and she was …
Each week I’m charged with coming up with an idea about art. In theory it’s simple—come up with local artists, events, creative topics to write about. Yet in practice it can feel immobilizing because as much fun as working from home, setting up your own projects, and generating something from scratch sounds, it’s simply hard work. As a person who is almost always thinking about or examining stories in multiple media forms I can say first hand the art of having great ideas come from acting on, and practicing your given craft. As a kid I started my artistic life off drawing, then I moved to …
What’s exciting about art is it has its own unique language — a language that is defined by the artist’s experience, specialty, background and desire. One of the greatest things about being a creative soul is you can blend all your artistic genres into a powerful end result. Such is the creative life of painter, poet, and playwright Iyaba Ibo Mandingo. On Sunday, Feb. 13, at 4:30 p.m., the Hudson Valley Writer’s Center will host an afternoon where you can immerse yourself in Iyaba’s use of poetic dialog and storytelling skills. During the performance of this autobiographical one-man play …
I spend much of my day thinking about words, working on my novel, interviewing people, writing articles and examining films. I like to think of myself as a creative person—that is someone who seeks to build, design, and grow things or ideas from scratch, from blank pages. In these economically difficult times it seems we need more creativity woven in our everyday lives more than ever; an artistic eye that can spot and make unique connections in the companies where we work, in the jobs that we seek, in the social media where we play. So it seems appropriate, even savvy, to sprinkle and …
I've come to the conclusion over the last few holidays that I don't posses the skills to pick the perfect gift. Now this inhibition comes through like a brain freeze, writer's block, or a sort of choking up performance anxiety where I fret the choices I do make. After all, I have one shot to get it right! And often the holiday's gift giving intensifies and proceeds to push me beyond my limits as it helps press my unnatural button to shop. But shouldn't the holidays have less stress? And shouldn't an artistic type, such as myself, be better at finding creative solutions to gift giving? This …
Recently I ventured past the borders of Sleepy Hollow, out of Westchester County onto Metro North headed south to the big city. I hopped off of Metro North walked out the station and took the D train to the East Village. Once there I walked a few blocks past local bodegas, restaurants tattoo shops and landed at the Nuyorican Café. That night, the poet and performer was Ntozake Shange. The audience in the quaint café was filled with the world's people a variety of ethnicities and ages, men and women. In the 1970's For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow is Enuf was a …
From the black spirituals of the Antebellum South that both gave voice and cloaked protest of enslaved people, to the Folk Music that helped to establish unions for the everyday worker in the 1940's and 50's, to a mop-top boy band from Liverpool, England whose "pop music" would come to define a generation –songs have long accompanied and chronicled important events in history. At the Warner Library on Monday, Dec. 6th at 7 p.m., Terry Hamblin, an Associate Professor at SUNY Delhi, will give a multimedia presentation on the songs written and performed by the "Fab Four", the Beatles. Before the…
Flanked on the edge of the iconic Hudson River, embodied within the walls of Philipse Manor train station, enmeshed in the community of Sleepy Hollow resides the Hudson Valley Writers' Center (HVWC). Its goal and purpose is to foster local and regional literary talent of both emerging writers as well as the seasoned veterans, with a reading series, writing workshops with educational outreach. On Sunday November 21 at 4:30 p.m., the HVWC's reading series will host the works of Beverly Jensen and Jean Hanff Korelitz. Their new books span the bridge of an emerging talent and an established …
Even to the untrained ear most of us can discern, even detect, a well-trained reading voice – one that is skilled and that pauses in all the right spots, moving from moment to moment. It's an aspect of musicality produced without musical instruments, and even if we can't replicate the quality of the sounds, we know when it's done well. It would be fair to say Alan Sklar's voice is his calling card. Even on his website, his voice sounds crystal clear, professional and fine-tuned. On Monday, Nov. 15 at 7 p.m. at the Warner Library, residents have a chance to hear the man in person as Sklar …
Westchester County is made up of cities, towns, and villages. It spans over 450 square miles and within its boundaries there are approximately 950,000 people living, working and going to school. Inside that number there are untold amounts of creative types, and of those many are writers both aspirating and professional. On Saturday, Nov. 6 at 2 p.m. the Warner Library in Tarrytown, NY will host The Westchester Review reading of prose and poetry from their fourth annual issue. Founded in 2007, The Westchester Review spun out of a weekly workshop held at the home of writer Louise Albert. "For …
Legend has it that three sisters once owned the Hennessy House, but over the years with old age and health matters, the house fell into disrepair. Cracked windows, a leaky roof, and discarded stairs made the house look abandoned—one might say haunted, especially at night. Which is appropriate for this time of year. This long-lived house dates back to 1816, long before the Hennessy sisters or any of us were thought about. This house, like many of the houses in this Hudson Valley region held, and perhaps still holds, old spirits and secrets from its past. But a house is an inanimate object and …
This may be tough for many of us to admit but part of why this region, Westchester County, and our towns in particular, Tarrytown and Sleepy Hollow, are so great is because of their close proximity to the greatest city in the world—New York City. I may be biased but the afore mentioned city and its world importance is especially true in regards to the Art world. A few evening ago I attended an Art Roundtable entitled Lost Narratives held at Jodi Arnold, a boutique on 56 University Place at 10th Street in NYC. The talk featured Graffiti Artist and Archivist Charlene Weisler whose photography …
