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Programs

October 2007 Programs

Sunday, Nov 22 — 2:00 PM
"American Splendor," DVD, Color, produced by Ted Hope; written and directed by Robert Pulcini & Shari Springer Berman, with Paul Giamatti, Hope Davis, Judah Friedlander, James Urbaniak, Earl Billings, James McCaffrey, Maggie Moore and Vivienne Benesch, 101 minutes, 2003.

Pekar is a frustrated file clerk working at the local V.A. Hospital. He is also a comic book fan who befriends the young illustrator Robert Crumb and is soon inspired to create comic books based on his own life. Along his bumpy journey he meets, marries and falls in love with Joyce, an admiring comic book seller.

Monday, Nov 23 — 6:30 PM
Author @ the Library presents: "Knut Hamsun: His Brilliance, his Tragedy and his Legacy," with Robert Ferguson, the author of the Hamsun biography "Enigma: The Life of Knut Hamsun.

Join us for an introduction to Hamsun's life and literary work, and a discussion of the controversies surrounding his legacy.

Tuesday, Nov 24 — 6:30 PM
"Getting Organized for an Uncluttered, Meaningful and Happy Holiday Season and New Year!" with A. J. Miller, a residential and workplace organization and productivity expert.

The holiday season juggernaut is speeding forward and you need to be prepared if you hope to thrive, not just survive.Learn how you can avoid some common pitfalls, steer clear of the stress, make the events of the season more enjoyable and jump start your 2010 "get organized" resolution.

Sunday, Nov 29 — 2:00 PM
"Vanya on 42nd Street," DVD, Color, directed by Louis Malle; produced by Fred Berner, with Julianne Moore, Brooke Smith, George Gaynes ... [et al.], 119 minutes, 1994.

A group of actors meet to rehearse Chekhov's Uncle Vanya and find the same conflicts in their own lives as are dealt with in the play. From Andre Gergory's "Vanya", based on Anton Chekhov's play "Uncle Vanya", adapted by David Mamet.

Monday, Nov 30 — 6:30 PM
Author @ the Library presents: "Knut Hamsun and the Birth of the Modern Novel," with Frode Saugestad.

Come to a discussion of how Knut Hamsun's early novels have inspired and influenced a series of modernist authors such as Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner, James Joyce and Isaac Bashevis Singer.

Tuesday, Dec 1 — 6:30 PM
"A Night in the Day of a Copy Editor" with Merrill Perlman, who managed the copy desks at The New York Times as part of her 25-year career.

Learn what a copy editor is supposed to do, what a copy editor can do realistically, and how the Internet is changing the face of copy editing as much as is changing the face of journalism. This session will include the opportunity for audience members to play the role of copy editor.

Wednesday, Dec 2 — 6:30 PM
Author @ the Library presents: "Triumph of Order: Democracy of Public Space in New York and London," with Lisa Keller.

Learn the detailed story of how two of the world's greatest cities dealt with the challenge of balancing the competing demands of public protest and public order in the 19th century.

Thursday, Dec 3 — 6:30 PM
MoMA @ the Library Presents: "Bauhaus 1919-1933: Workshops for Modernity," with Deborah A. Goldberg, Ph.D.

Explore this temporary retrospective exhibition on view at MoMA from November 8, 2009 to January 25, 2010, presented in collaboration with a consortium of the three Bauhaus collections in Germany (Bauhaus-Archiv Berlin; Stiftung Bauhaus Dessau; and Klassik Stiftung Weimar), is the first comprehensive treatment of the Bauhaus at MoMA since 1938 and the first major show in the United States on the subject in decades.

Sunday, Dec 6 — 2:00 PM
"Wordplay, DVD, Color, written by Patrick Creadon, produced by Christine O'Malley, 94 minutes, 2005.

A journey into the world of Will Shortz, the crossword puzzle editor at The New York Times. Shortz has spent his entire lifetime studying, creating and editing puzzles, and has built a huge following along the way including Bill Clinton and Bob Dole.

Monday, Dec 7 — 6:30 PM
Authors @ the Library present: "Dissection: Photographs of a Rite of Passage in American Medicine," with John Harley Warner James M. Edmonson.

Explore a hidden treasure of images of late 19th and early 20th century medical students posing around anatomical dissection tables.

Tuesday, Dec 8 — 6:30 PM
"ROOMS, Behind the Closed Doors of New York City," with Alan Feuer.

The writer of the Rooms column in the NY Times Metro section, discusses the series and the dugouts, morgues, sex clubs and other spaces that have appeared in it.

Wednesday, Dec 9 — 6:30 PM
Author @ the Library presents: "Green Oasis in Brooklyn The Evergreens Cemetery 1849-2008," with John Rousmaniere.

A noted historian traces the history of the Evergreens Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York. Beginning with the land itself before the cemetery was founded in 1850, he will show how the forces that shaped the history of New York-population growth, immigration and growing wealth-also shaped the Evergreens. He will also describe the beautiful monuments and fascinating characters that are buried there. View Ken Druse's stunning color photographs that demonstrate the beauty of the site and the monuments.

Thursday, Dec 10 — 6:30 PM
lgbt@nypl presents "Masculine Identity in Post-War Art and Beyond," with Jennifer Katanic, a lecturer at The Museum of Modern Art.

This presentation will consider a wide range of male artists working in the post-war years to today.

Sunday, Dec 13 — 2:00 PM
"Love and Death on Long Island," DVD, Color, written and directed Richard Kwietniowski, 94 minutes, 1996.

A chance encounter with a struggling B-movie star opens up a whole new world to a buttoned-up British author. Based on the novel by Gilbert Adair.

Monday, Dec 14 — 6:30 PM
Authors @ the Library presents: "In The Footsteps Of Marco Polo: A Companion to the Public Television Film" with Denis Belliveau and Francis O’Donnell.

Travel in the footsteps of Marco Polo, with two young men from NYC (Queens), Denis Belliveau, an award winning photographer and Francis O’Donnell, a sculptor/lecturer and an ex-marine, who embark on a two year adventure retracing the route of Marco Polo’s™ entire 25,000-mile, land-and-sea route from Venice to China and back.

Tuesday, Dec 15 — 6:30 PM
Author @ the Library presents: "Gilbert Rohde: Modern Design for Modern Living," with Phyllis Ross.

Discover the career of the designer who transformed the look of American furniture and brought modernism to the middle class.

Wednesday, Dec 16 — 6:30 PM
"Legal, Medical, and Psychological Thrillers: How Professionals Use Their Inside Knowledge When They Write," with moderator, Lawrence Light and panelists, Charles Atkins, MD, Roberta Isleib, Sarah Langan, Justin Peacock and Elizabeth Zelvin of Mystery Writers of America / New York Chapter.

Write what you know. Harnessing that age-old dictum, many working professionals directed their "day-job" know-how into crime fiction. Learn how our panelists, seasoned pros from various disciplines, used this knowledge to enrich their plots and hook readers. What are the promises - and perils - of knowing your subject cold and trying to translate it into edge-of-your-seat mysteries?

Thursday, Dec 17 — 6:30 PM
lgbt@nypl presents "A History of New York Gays and Lesbians during the Great Persecution of Peter Stuyvesant. with Dr. Ronald J. Brown.

The first settlers of the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam were primarily men, and sexual activity among male colonists was fairly commonplace and permissible. The arrival of Governor Peter Stuyvesant brought this tolerant era in New York's early history to an end. Settlers who engaged in homosexual activity were hung, flogged, and exiled on Stuyvesant's orders, and a host of puritanical sex laws was passed during his tenure.

Saturday, Dec 19 — 2:30 PM
"Shades of Light," an artist dialogue with artist, Michael Kukla and Florence Neal,

Emerging artist Michael Kukla will converse with Florence Neal, co-founder and director of Kentler International Drawing Space. They will discuss Shades of Light his site-specific Art in the Windows installation at Mid-Manhattan Library. They will also talk about his work, and development of his sculptures from the drawing process, as well as Kukla’s™ graphic design contributions to Kentler and the mission of this thriving space dedicated to drawing and serving the public.

Sunday, Dec 20 — 2:00 PM
"Love and Death on Long Island," DVD, Color, directed by Kevin MacDonald, 97 minutes, 1999.

An extreme Palestinian group called Black September held 11 Israeli athletes hostage in the Olympic village while the world looked on. Through archive footage, music and interviews with those who took part (including the only surviving member of the Black September group), tells the story of what happened in Munich during those 21 hours in September 1972. Narrated by Michael Douglas.

Monday, Dec 21 — 6:30 PM
Author @ the Library presents: "Knickerbocker: The Myth Behind New York," with Elizabeth Lee Bradley, the Deputy Director of the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at The New York Public Library.

Follow the career of the fictional Dutch historian, dreamed up by Washington Irving in 1809, who became New York's first mascot and was a prominent feature of the city's literature, history, politics, and advertising for the next two hundred years.

Tuesday, Dec 22 — 6:30 PM
Author @ the Library presents: "Rogues' Gallery: The Secret History of the Moguls and the Money that Made the Metropolitan," with Michael Gross.

"Behind almost every painting is a fortune and behind that a sin or a crime." With these words as a starting point, a leading chronicler of the American rich, begins the first independent, unauthorized look at the saga of the nation’s™ greatest museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In this endlessly entertaining follow-up to his bestselling social history "740 Park," he pulls back the shades of secrecy that have long shrouded the upper class’s™ cultural and philanthropic ambitions and maneuvers. He paints a revealing portrait of a previously hidden face of American wealth and power.

Sunday, Dec 27 — 2:00 PM
"Spellbound," DVD, b&w, directed by Alfred Hitchcock; screenplay by Ben Hecht, starring Ingrid Bergman, Gregory Peck, and Michael Chekhov, 111 minutes, 1945.

A psychologist falls for a suspect in a murder, which she tries to solve by unlocking the clues hidden in his mind.

Monday, Dec 28 — 6:30 PM
"The Neighbors," a new play by Dimitri Michalakis.

A staged reading about a group of neighbors who bicker and trade gossip over their backyard fire escape in Brooklyn.

Tuesday, Dec 29 — 6:30 PM
Filmmaker @ the Library presents: "Clearwater Nation; Pete Seeger introduces Clearwater’s 'Next Generation Legacy Project,"' with Pamela Timmins.

View this 2009 documentary DVD featuring Pete Seeger's performances, his forty years involvement with Clearwater, an environmental educational not for profit, and their Next Generation Legacy Project with a Master Action Plan (MAP) for our emerging green economy. A NYC accomplished landscape painter, photographer, and video artist/filmmaker will explain the new initiative, "Act locally and think globally with DVD Circles" which uses state of the art digital video to host local events and then links on to the world wide web.

Wednesday, Dec 30 — 6:30 PM
"The Social and Secret Life of Chickens: A Lecture with Visuals & a Book-Signing," with Karen Davis.

Her experience with chickens for more than twenty years has shown her that chickens are conscious and emotional beings with adaptable sociability and a range of intentions and personalities. She will relate her personal stories about the chickens at her sanctuary to how chickens are treated in factory farming and live poultry markets.

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