Myth, mist, and magic combine in a fairy tale for grown-up girls. Oh, will no one stop Sara Sonnenschein? Clouds sweep restlessly past the moon above the dragon-tailed tower as she stands shivering on a windy Copenhagen corner, wobbling on red high-heeled boots, on her way to meet yet […]
Chapter 1 Walpurgis Spring had come at last. High overhead, seagulls screeched and dove and floated on the wind, for the wind…the wind is always blowing in Denmark. Sometimes the lusty wind would billow her long coat behind her so fiercely that she felt it could carry her upward like a kite, up above the […]
A Weaver in Denmark from Barbara Bluestone on Vimeo.
In 1970, Barbara Bluestone went to Denmark, where after a weaving apprenticeship she became a professional textile artist. This video shows the evolution of her work.
In 1970, I arrived in Denmark for a study-abroad semester. I fell in love and decided to stay. I apprenticed myself to a tapestry weaver, Jette Gemzoe, and after a year spread my wings and set up my own studio. This marked the start of an incredible creative breakthrough, a period of freedom and expansion. […]
I wanted to share with you these quotes from 2 of my favorite writers. These quotes also form the epigraph of my work-in-progress, “East of the Sun, West of the Moon.” …Is it not a sweet thing to think that, if only you have patience, all that has ever been will come back to you? […]
In the 1930s refugees poured into France, fleeing Hitler’s reign of terror in Germany . Mainly Jews, but also gays, communists, radicals, intellectuals — all those persecuted by the Nazis found a home in France. At least, that is, until the Germans occupied France in 1940 and set up their puppet Vichy regime. Yet France, this […]
In 1989, I moved to Paris. I didn’t yet know the city, and in my imagination, it was the magical, mysterious black-and-white place portrayed by such great masters of photography as Brassai, Kertesz, and Cartier-Bresson. I quickly needed a furnished apartment to rent for 6 months, but was discouraged to find only dreary flats crammed […]
Just saw Hitchcock’s delicious 1938 mystery, “The Lady Vanishes.” The genre is that seemingly impossible contradiction in terms, a comic thriller. It’s all about spying, of course, which was the great theme of the pre-war years. Spoiler alert! Miss Froy, the kindly old English governess turns out to be a British spy, trying to get a […]
In 1936, to get to Europe from the US, you had to sail. It took a bit less than a week, and crossing the tempestuous Atlantic was not for the faint of heart. Gladys’s diary publishers included a helpful guide to life on board ship, remedies for the dreaded seasickness, and advice on hat pools, in […]
Suspense, espionage, betrayal, and love, as darkness falls over the City of Light… Read here to see why this book had to be written. Enjoy a taste of the start of a dangerous adventure into the labyrinth…