Newton Free Library Events

Unless noted otherwise, all events take place at the Library's Main Branch.
All events are free and open to the public.

Do you want to view a past month at the Library? If so, please click here for the Archives.
(Available for April, 2001 and on.)

February, 2004 - ARCHIVES
Sunday	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday
1 Gilbert & Sullivan Films, 1:30pm	2 Children's Book Writers Group, 7pm	3 Short Fiction Writing Group, 7pm	4 Contemporary Books Discussion Group, 7:30pm _______ Gallery reception, 7pm	5	6	7 Chinese New Year Celebration, 1pm _______ Free Tax Help, 2-4pm
8 Black History Month Concert, 2pm	9 Short Story Dicussion Group, 7:30pm _______ Artist Reception, Main Hall, 6pm _______ Newton Camera Club, 7:30pm NONANTUM	10 Board of Trustees Meeting, 8:30am _______ Poetry Reading, 7pm _______ Great Books Group, 7:15pm	11 Sequences Group, 10am _______ Friends' Meeting, 7:30pm	12 NDCC Talk, 7pm	13	14 Singing Group, Noon _______ Free Tax Help, 2-4pm
15 Shakespeare Program, 2pm	16 Library closed for Presidents' Day	17	18	19 Author Eva Hoffman, 7:30pm	20	21 Writing Workshop 10:30am _______ Free Tax Help, 2-4pm
22 Piano Concert, 2 pm	23 Green Decade, 7pm _______ Newton Camera Club, 7:30pm NONANTUM	24	25 Waban book group, 10:30am _______ African Lit Group, 7:30pm ________ Children's Book Writers Group, 7pm	26 Movie Music Program, 10:30am _______ Author Helen Kwok, 7:30pm	27 Newton Corner book group, 10:30am	28 Free Tax Help, 2-4pm
29 Piano Quartet Concert, 2pm		24			27 Newton Corner book group, 10:30am	28 Free Tax Help, 2-4pm

For more information on any of the Library events,
please call the Library at (617) 796-1360

Gallery & Main Hall Hours

Monday to Thursday 9:00 am to 9:00 pm
Friday 9:00 am to 6:00 pm
Saturday 9:00 am to 5:00pm
Sunday Noon to 5:00 pm

Closed Sundays in July & August

A R T E X H I B I T I N F O R M A T I O N

Are you interested in exhibiting your artwork at the Library? The Newton Free Library presents monthly exhibits by regional artists in the Gallery and Main Hall of the main library, a state-of-the-art facility which 11,000 people visit weekly. Please click here for more information.

G A L L E R Y

Alexander Gassel: Old European Legends
February 3 - 26
Reception: Wednesday, February 4, 7:00PM

Gassel’s relief paintings are filled with swirling motion and passion: Tristan and Isolde sailing through a stormy sea, St. George on his horse rearing up before the dragon, the tumult of “A Mother’s Thoughts” about her child’s destiny represented as a collage of intercut images. Most are medieval legends and fairy tales although some are contemporary in subject, reflecting his new life in America the past 20 years.
A native of Russia, the artist worked at a preservation center in Moscow restoring and copying ancient tempera paintings, mostly Russian icons from the 14 – 17th century. There he learned the traditional technique of painting with egg tempera, a method he continues to use for most of his work. First he grinds natural stones and minerals into powder, then mixes them with egg yolk and paints on a wood panel. Often gold and silver leaf are applied as well. This method was “used at the time of the creation of the legends,” he says, and preserves the intensity of the colors.
Of interest is his use of relief, with carved wood and gold or silver plate projecting from a hard surface – and the irregular shape of his compositions. Combining painting and sculpture feels freeing, he says, just as the unusual borders of his works suggest, “a liberation of a painting from a squared frame, which very often jails the free movement of colors.” The effect is of a scene floating in air, one which takes us from the room we are standing in to the drama of the legend or fairytale before us.
Gassel has exhibited in Germany, Russia, Washington, DC and locally at many galleries including the Art Com-plex Museum in Duxbury and the Cam-bridge Multicultural Arts Center. His works are held in the collections of the Vatican, Simon Wiesenthal Center in L.A., at museums in Russia and in pri-vate collections worldwide. He is the recipient of a curator’s award in a na-tional competition run by the Museum of National Arts Foundation in NYC.

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M A I N H A L L

Sheila Singer: Collage Monoprints
February 3 - 26
Reception: Monday, February 9, 6 - 8:00PM

Singer uses intricate patterns and textures in her mixed-media works to abstract an image or simply to create a complex design. “Shards” is a striking work of long, light, angular shapes, crisscrossed against a blurred crimson background – the contrast in shape and color highlighting the tension and beauty of the piece. “Kaleidoscope” is more menacing as fluid, snake-like forms of varying colors writhe toward a central vortex.
Many of her works use natural and found objects which she layers on the print. Dried leaves and flowers are favorite additions, but it can be bubble wrap or rough linen potato sacks that catch her fancy as well. These extra textures are added before the work goes through the press and/or afterwards; designs may also be drawn on top.
Singer began her career as a student of textile design. This early interest in fabric design, texture and layering carried through her careers as a ceramicist, batik artist, paper-maker and now mono-printer.
“What I like best about my monoprint collage method is that I can keep adding in different ideas and materials and colors and layers.” She’s delighted, she says, “by how the pressing process distorts the shapes” in her works. Occasionally, she feels she’s overlayered a monoprint – in that case she chops up the print, files the pieces by shape and color and uses them as collage elements in her next work.
A former teacher and play/art therapist, Singer has exhibited recently at Legacy Gallery in Boston, Newton Wellness Center, Newton City Hall and the JCC in Newton.

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Library groups meet at the Newton Free Library, 330 Homer Street, Newton Centre, unless otherwise noted. All meetings are free and open to the public.

	African Literatures Discussion Group
	Led by Anne Serafin, this group explores the rich variety of writings from Africa. The group usually meets on the third Wednesday of the month at 7:30PM this month in Meeting Room B. Meeting Date: February 25: I Saw the Sky Catch Fire, a novel by T. Obinkaram Echewa of Nigeria. For further information, call 527-1072.
	Children's Book Writers Group
	Meetings are held on the first Monday or on the fourth Wednesday of the month at 7:00PM in Meeting Room A. This group is for writers who have work in progress. Pre-registration required. Please call Jacqueline Davies at 781-455-8334 or Karen Day at 244-4830 for more information. Meeting Dates: Monday, February 2 or Wednesday, February 25.
	Contemporary Books Discussion Group
	Meetings are held the first Wednesday of the month, 7:30PM in Meeting Room A. Participants should read works in advance. Group coordinator: Marilyn Miller. Meeting Dates: February 4: The Story of Lucy Gault by William Trevor; March 3: Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi. To view the booklist for Sept, 2003 - June 2004, please click here
	Great Books Discussion Group Meetings are held on the second Tuesday of the month at 7:15PM in Meeting Room A. Members read books from the Great Books Foundation (available at the Library). Meeting Date: February 10: The Social Contract by Rousseau.
	To download a printable booklist in pdf format for Sept, 2003 - June, 2004, please click here.
		To download a pdf, you must have Adobe Acrobat. To get Adobe Acrobat, please click on the icon or here to get it.
	Newton Camera Club
	Meetings are held at 7:30PM on the second and fourth Mondays of the month at the Nonantum branch. Group coordinator: John Pruente: (603) 315-9735, www.newtoncameraclub.org. Meeting Dates: February 9: Competition in Nature and Open categories; February 23: Member program.
	Sequences: Women Tell Our Stories Group
	In this women’s workshop, participants read, discuss and write about literature by women. The group meets the second Wednesday of each month from 10 - 11:30AM in Meeting Room A. Leader: Robin Mayer Stein. Meeting Date: February 11.
	Short Fiction Writing Group
	This workshop provides an atmosphere of expert support to polish short fiction. It is geared for published writers as well as those who are actively pursuing publication. Pre-registration is required: 617-964-0448. The group meets the first Tuesday of each month, in Meeting Room A, 7:00PM. Meeting Date: February 3. Please bring 5 copies of work to the meeting. Coordinator is Pete Reider.
	Short Story Discussion Group
	Meetings are held on the second Monday of the month at 7:30PM in Meeting Room A. Group co-leaders are Mary Lanigan and Barbara McGinley. For further information, call 527-1505. Meeting Date: February 9: Frank O’Connor, “My Oedipus Complex” and Sherwood Anderson, “The Egg.”
	Singing Group
	This group will meet again in March.
	The Writer's Voice Group
	This writing group combines support and time for practice, reading samples and receiving feedback. Led by Tom Yee, the group meets on the third Saturday of the month, 10:30 – Noon in Meeting Room A. Pre-registration required: Call 630-0742. Meeting Date: February 21.

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All concerts are free and open to the public. For directions to the Library, please click here.

African Drumming Concert

In celebration of African-American History Month, Brother Rumas Barrett will bring a concert of Drums & Folktales to the Library on Sunday, February 8, 2:00PM. Beginning with “Harambee!,” a welcoming drum call, the program will feature his original music, thoughts and information on black history, followed by “Tales of Freedom.” The program will conclude with a participatory jam session on drums. The audience is invited to bring their own drums.
Producer, musician and storyteller, Barrett has performed throughout New England for 20 years, sharing upbeat Afri-Caribbean rhythms and stories with diverse groups. He formed and conducted the Life Symphony Orchestra that gave its premiere concert at the Berklee Performance Center in 1982, then established Life Symphony Inc. as a non-profit cultural enrichment organization which continues to provide educational programs on a wide basis. As a musician/storyteller, he has appeared at libraries and school systems in Boston and New York City, at colleges in New England, the Museum of Fine Arts and other venues. Musical director for the Roxbury Center for Performing Arts, he has appeared as percussionist with internationally acclaimed musicians at Sculler’s and other venues and has performed in such theatrical productions as “Celebrations: An African Odyssey” in Boston, Rhode Island and New York City.

Pianist Sarah Takagi to Perform Haydn, Schumann & Others

Pianist Sarah Takagi will present a free concert of works by Haydn, Schumann, Prokofiev and Bach/Busoni at the Library on Sunday, February 22, 2:00PM.
Takagi has performed numerous concerts in the U.S., Canada and Japan and was acclaimed as a “Brilliant pianist…who exudes spirit, vehemence and power” (Melrose Free Press). Nationally, she has performed at the Kennedy Center in D.C., at Carnegie Recital Hall and has been invited to appear with Leon Fleisher as a soloist on the PBS show “Musical Encounter.” In the Boston area, she has played at the French Library, as a soloist on the Lexington Sinfonietta Series and in frequent concerts at Jordan Hall. Dedicated to new works, she has premiered compositions by Leon Kirchner, Suguru Goto and Florentine Mulsant. Takagi gives frequent concerts with Michael Bonner, a faculty cellist at Longy School of Music, as part of their duo, PiantiCella. She also collaborates with Dances by Isadora, a modern dance company with whom she has toured internationally. The winner of many competitions, Takagi teaches at Wellesley College and New England Conservatory, Extension Division.

The New Piano Quartet

The New Piano Quartet will perform a concert of works by Brahms, Turina and others at the Library on Sunday, February 29, 2:00PM. Members of the ensemble are Esther Ning Yau, piano, Jennifer Schiller, violin, Andra Voldins, viola and Judith Glixon, cello. The Quartet has performed at the New School of Music, Zeitgeist Gallery, both in Cambridge, and other venues.
Yau is an active collaborative pianist who has performed several times at the Library. She has been heard at Jordan Hall, the Chinese Cultural Institute, UCLA Song Festival, Hong Kong Government House, Taipei National Concert Hall and the Museum of Arts in Puerto Rico.
Schiller is an active freelance musician in the Boston area and has performed with orchestras and festivals throughout the U.S. and Europe, including the Spoleto Festival in Italy, the Swedish Chamber Orchestra and the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic.
Voldins is equally active as a teacher and performer. She appears with numerous groups in the area including the Boston Lyric Opera, the New England String Ensemble and the Boston Ballet.
Glixon performed with the National Orchestra of New York at Carnegie Hall and was a member of the Tucson Symphony Orchestra. She has been a frequent soloist with orchestras in western North Carolina. Her Boston area freelance affiliations include work with the Boston Ballet, Prism Opera and Music at Eden’s Edge.

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Author Eva Hoffman to Speak on Holocaust Legacy

Sixty years after the Holocaust, Eva Hoffman, author of Lost in Translation, explores the difficult process of preserving an authentic version of its tragic events in her new book, After Such Knowledge: Memory, History and the Legacy of the Holocaust. She will discuss this work at the Library, Thursday, February 19, 7:30PM. This event is co-sponsored by the Library and the New England Mobile Book Fair which will provide books for a signing after the talk.
Hoffman’s intensely personal and philosophical books explore the Jewish immigrant experience and the influence of the Holocaust on American society in the 20th and 21st centuries. Now, after years of scholarship and meditation, she is publishing her seminal work on history and the Holocaust.
As the survivors of the Holocaust begin to pass away, how are their memories of this great atrocity passed on to their children - and what responsibility does the “second generation” have to keep these memories alive? Hoffman - the child of two Polish Jews who survived the Holocaust, but whose entire families perished - probes these questions through personal reflections and through broader explorations of the historical, psychological and moral implications of the second-generation experience. The result is a decisive work on memory and the Holocaust by a preeminent philosopher and scholar.
Hoffman was born in Cracow and emigrated to Canada at the age of thirteen. She is the author of three highly acclaimed works of nonfiction including Exit into History and Shtetl and one novel, The Secret. She divides her time between London and Cambridge where she is a visiting professor at MIT.

Author Helen Kwok to speak on "The Concubine's Daughter"

Author Helen Kwok will discuss her new book, The Concubine’s Daughter, in Meeting Room A on Thursday, February 26, 7:30PM.
Born in Guangzhou, China, Kwok spent almost half a century in colonial Hong Kong before moving to the U.S. in 1993, where she now resides in Newton. Educated primarily in English, she has an intimate knowledge of Hong Kong, its customs and people. In her novel, she captures the essence of the colony in the 1950s and 60s, a place where East meets West, where the two cultures are continually blending and clashing and discriminatory attitudes are a fact of life.
The Concubine’s Daughter tells the story of a beautiful, intelligent and liberated woman, tracing her university years to her thirtieth birthday, when she leaves Hong Kong with her husband and young son for the U.S., frightened by the riots inspired by the Cultural Revolution taking place across the border in mainland China. After twenty years in the U.S., she returns in 1986, just 11 years before China is to regain sovereignty over the colony.
The Library discussion may center on the status of women in Hong Kong in the 50s and 60s, the feeling of alienation experienced by Hong Kong Chinese living under a British administration and/or discrimination based on race, gender and language.
Kwok taught English at the University of Hong Kong for 30 years. She has published academic works both in Hong Kong and internationally on linguistics, translation and English language and literature.

Chinese New Year Celebration

The Library will celebrate the Chinese New Year of the Monkey (4702) with a concert of Chinese music followed by a program of traditional word games in Chinese and English on the afternoon of Saturday, February 7.
At 1:00PM, three master level
musicians, Zhi Min Zhao, er hu, Hong Ji, yang qin, and Ro-Mao Yin, Pipa, will perform a wide range of Chinese folklore music played on bowed and plucked stringed instruments. The program will include play excerpts, harvest-time celebration music and romantic love songs from many different regions in China.
At 2:15PM, a Deng-Mi Hui activity will be presented, a program of Chinese and English word games composed by Sun-Shine Yuan, a well-known practitioner of the craft. Deng-Mi dates back 1000 years, when riddles were hung from lanterns under a full moon at the Chinese New Year. At the Library, the Deng-Mi will be strung from a height; audience members can read the questions and their answers aloud. The English puzzles are based on ideas found in the Oxford Book of Word Games.
Throughout the month of February an exhibit of carved animal figurines, antique ink sticks and stones, a set of figures for a Chinese wedding procession and other items from the collection of Judith Funkhouser will be on view in the Library display cases on the first floor. Funkhouser is curator for the Ella V. Bowering Collection and is president of the Chinese Culture Connection.
The month-long display and the Chinese New Year program were coordinated by Wendy Hsu, a Library acquisitions volunteer and private Mandarin language teacher. The Library is grateful for her assistance.

Robert Jay Lifton to Discuss "Superpower Syndrome"

National Book Award winner Robert Jay Lifton has written a devastating profile of America’s current identity and superpower mindset, warning of present dangers and arguing that the United States must renounce its claim on total power to avoid widespread destruction. He will discuss his new book Superpower Syndrome: America’s Apocalyptic Confrontation with the World at the Library on Thursday, February 12 at 7:00PM. A booksigning will follow the talk, co-sponsored by the Library and the Newton Democratic City Committee.
Superpower Syndrome continues the author’s investigation into what he refers to as “the destructive excesses of our times – Nazi genocide, the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Chinese Communist ‘thought reform’, the Vietnam War, and the apocalyptic forays of ... cults of the late twentieth century. These extreme twentieth-century dreams and expressions of totalistic control and mass killing were bound to reverberate in the twenty-first century.”
In our government’s response to the Islamist apocalyptic violence of September 11, Lifton finds a no less visionary program that seeks to restore superpower invulnerability by using overwhelming military might to remake the world. The result, he concludes, is a vicious circle of victimization and violence that we can end only by renouncing the superpower model.
Lifton is Visiting Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. His many books include Death in Life: Survivors of Hiroshima, The Nazi Doctors and Destroying the World to Save It.

Poetry Series Presents
Philip Burnham, Jr., Linda Haviland Conte and Thomas Anthony Donahue

The Library Poetry Reading Series will begin its spring season with readings by poets Philip Burnham, Jr., Linda Haviland Conte and Thomas Anthony Donahue on Tuesday, February 10, at 7:00PM. The series is directed by Doug Holder.
Burnham’s collections include My Neighbor Adam and most recently, Sailing From Boston: Poems Of Loss and Remembrance. His background includes teaching in public and private secondary schools in the Boston area and serving as American Vice Consul in Marseilles, France.
Conte began the study and practice of poetry at Connecticut College, and helped produce the Poetry at the Media Lab series at MIT. She is a recipient of a Cambridge Poetry Award for her collection Slow as a Poem and recently was a featured reader at the Somerville News Writers’ Festival at the Jimmy Tingle Theatre, Somerville. She also is an editor and website manager for the Ibbetson Street Press.
Donahue has worked as an actor, director and an arts therapist in addition to his writing experience. His poems have appeared in Red Owl and Voices and six of his plays have been presented at the Boston Public Library.
Upcoming readings in the series will take place on March 9 and the Poetry Festival on April 13.

“Freestyle Shakespeare” Coming to Library

A hilarious performance of “Freestyle Shakespeare” will be presented at the Library on Sunday, February 15, 2:00PM.
“Freestyle Shakespeare” is the brainchild of Michael Anderson, a labor lawyer who creates witty monologues on cultural and historical topics. This show reflects his opinion that the Bard wrote plays as much for the common man in the cheap seats of the Globe Theater as for intellectuals to ponder. He talks about his favorite plays and characters, sometimes taking an original view of the classics, mixing philosophy and humor.
There’s a humorous skit featuring a professor’s critique of Sonnet 65’s grammar, with students named Keats, Browning and Dickinson offering their opinions. There’s “Answering Machine Shakespeare” and a speech from “MacBeth” set to the 1986 Red Sox World Series disaster. Libby Franck, host of the Center for the Arts in Natick’s Outspoken Word Series, recounts her role in a Wellesley production of “Midsummer Night’s Dream” in 1964, where the romances of the actors get as tangled as those of the characters. David Ingle, collector of Scottish songs, sings a 12 verse version of “Hamlet” written by a Glasgow high school teacher. He also plays a stuffy Harvard professor who doubts that Shakespeare’s middle-class background could have prepared him to write such sophisticated lines.
Most of the actors are also storytellers. Glenn Morrow appears as the Bard in period dress. Kevin Brooks and Laura Packer, well-known in the storytelling community, play multiple roles. Franck, Packer and comic actress Liz Appleby provide two interpretations of the weird sisters in MacBeth.
Because these players first met at a storytelling venue in Cambridge created by Brother Blue, it is fitting that Blue’s videotaped recitations of Shakespeare's lines open and close the program.
This production was successfully produced at Jimmy Tingle’s Off-Broadway Theater in Somerville and the Center for the Arts in Natick.

Sustainable Building Design in Newton

The Green Decade Coalition will present a discussion on Sustainable Building Design in Newton on Monday, February 23 at 7:00PM at the Library.
Using the Newton North High School project as a demonstration, the program will examine how sustainable building technologies can be adopted for public buildings. Brooke Lipsitt, former President of the Newton Board of Aldermen, will moderate; Nick Parnell, City of Newton Public Building Commissioner, will provide an overview of the Newton North project; David Del Porto of Ecological Engineering and owner of the Urban Ark, a sustainable home in Newton, and Barbara Batshalom of the Green Roundtable, will discuss the importance and applicability of green building solutions.
The discussion is co-sponsored by the Library, Green Decade and the League of Women Voters.

Free Tax Help

It's tax time once again and volunteers from VITA, trained by the IRS, will be on hand in Meeting Room A every Saturday from February 7 - April 10 (2 - 4:00PM) to answer questions and help people fill out tax returns. Please come in the early weeks as there will be more time for assistance.

Gilbert & Sullivan Cartoons

The N. E. Gilbert & Sullivan Society will host an afternoon of G&S cartoons at the Library on Sunday, February 1, at 1:30PM. The program will include excerpts from several animated operettas featuring the voices of Anna Russell and former D’Oyly Carte regulars as well as a short about the legendary partnership, itself.

Computer Classes

The Library offers several one-session computer classes each month. Sign up for PC Basics, Search Engines, Genealogy or classes on other topics at a Reference Desk or call 617-796-1380.

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MORNING PROGRAMS AT THE LIBRARY
	Why are movie songs and scores from the past so memorable? Join Roger Hall at the Library on Thursday, February 26, at 10:30AM, as he answers that question and many more in his survey, "Hooray for Hollywood," celebrating the 70th anniversary of Oscars for movie music. In honor of that milestone, selected songs and scores will be played and a few movie clips will be shown to demonstrate how music is used to enhance a film. With the upcoming Oscar telecast on Feb-ruary 29, Hall will announce this year's Oscar nominations for song and score and make predictions as to winners. Music preservationist, lecturer, former radio host, composer and singer, Hall is the author of A Guide to Film Music: Songs and Scores, which will be available for purchase after his talk. He is also the editor of a web magazine: Film Music Review (http://hometown.aol.com/musbuff/page2.htm). Last year he spoke on Bing Crosby and Bob Hope at the Library.
	Newton Corner's book group will discuss Le Petit Garcon by Philippe Labro, translated by Linda Coverdale, on Friday, February 27, 10:30AM. It will meet at Evans Park, Newton Corner (formerly Heritage at Vernon Court) .
	At the Waban branch, the book group will discuss Moloka'i by Alan Brennert on Wednesday, February 25, 10:30AM. Do drop in!

TO OUR CONCERT GOERS:

Please be considerate of the performer today as well as your fellow audience members and refrain from leaving the auditorium during a piece of music. If you have small children with you, please sit in the back rows. If you leave the auditorium between pieces, please close the door quietly behind you and wait to re-enter after a musical piece. Also, if you have a cellphone, please shut if off. Thank you.

PLEASE DON'T SAVE SEATS!

When attending a Sunday after-noon concert, please do not save more than one seat as this deprives others of attending the concert. The rule is first come, first served.

Newton Collection Postcards Now Online

More than 100 postcards depicting village scenes from as early as the late 19th century along with old and historic locations throughout the City are now available to view online. Patrons may view each card, sorted by village or location, with the option of emailing one with a message to a friend.
This project is part of ongoing work to preserve the Library's historic collections. By having materials available for viewing online, patrons have access to the collection without preservation concerns that arise from physically handling the items.

To view the online postcard collection, please click here.

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