Posts by Julia Flynn Siler
Singing with the choir
So it was with delight and some trepidation that I accepted an invitation to sing along with the choir at a Sunday service, directed by “Auntie Nola.” I joined the soprano choristers, who wore formal mu’mu’u dresses in a pattern of green, black and white brightened with sprays of delicate orchid blossoms. It was an opportunity to sing the last queen of Hawai’i’s songs in her own church with people who’d grown up with her music. And the experience profoundly moving — joining together with these beautiful voices to perform the queen’s own songs. It touched me in a way that no amount of reading or writing ever could.
Read MorePaying Respect
“it was a little bit chicken skin for me as I went down into the vault,” said Honolulu’s acting mayor, Kirk W. Caldwell, after the ceremony at the Royal Mausoleum on the birthday of the last monarch of Hawai‘i, Queen Lili‘uokalani.
Read MoreMy Dinner with Amy
I knew I’d found a soul sister who also loved research when I clicked onto Amy Stillman’s blog and found her posting, “Adventures in Archives.” For the past three years, I’ve been making trips to the treasure trove of Hawaiian historical archives located in Honolulu. Amy Ku‘uleialoha Stillman, a Harvard-educated associate professor of music and…
Read MoreSearching for Kau Kau
I first came across the word “kaukau” in a note that the Hawaiian Princess Ka‘iulani wrote to Robert Louis Stevenson more than a century ago. The Scottish novelist and his family had arrived in Honolulu in the afternoon of January 24, 1889, and the beautiful princess dropped them a short note, inviting them to her family’s estate and adding that “Papa promises good Scotch kaukau….” Arnold Hiura’s new book, titled Kau Kau: Cuisine & Culture in the Hawaiian Islands, explains the origins of this word and a lot more.
Read MoreThe Queen’s Prayer
The last queen of Hawaii’s best known composition is Aloha Oe, which is heard in the soundtrack of everything from Elvis Presley’s “Blue Hawaii” to the Disney movie “Lilo and Stitch.” But the one that brought tears to my eyes this morning was “The Queen’s Prayer,” a hymn she wrote when she was imprisoned for eight months following a failed insurrection against the 1893 overthrow of the independent kingdom of Hawaii.
Read MoreBook Group Expo: Shakespeare … or Sex?
Crowds of book group aficionados flocked to San Jose for the third annual Book Group Expo, above; below, author Frances Dinkelspiel debuted her book, Towers of Gold, at the convention. There are conventions for everyone: dog lovers, tattoo artists, people who trade sports memorabilia, barristas, and hairdressers. They all have their annual gatherings to swap…
Read MoreMo’ Bob Mon …
The elegant Mondavi arts center, above, is a dramatic addition to the rural landscape of Davis — and it will soon be joined by the Robert Mondavi Institute, depicted in an artists’ rendering below. Anyone driving east from San Francisco on Highway 80, the 10-lane transcontinental highway to Nevada and points east, can’t miss the…
Read MoreCopia chairman asks: “Can it survive?”
Sparse crowds at Copia have contributed to its financial challenges. (Photo from Sacbee.com – Owen Brewer / Sacramento Bee file, 2002) Despite my intention to take a summer sabbatical, an investigative story that appeared on the front page of last Sunday’s Sacramento Bee brought me back to my keyboard. The story raises some new questions…
Read MoreHex, the Corpse Flower, and Berkeley’s Tree-Sitters: A Summer Sabbatical
A summer day in Berkeley includes seeing buildings rise and fall at the Lawrence Hall of Science (above) and smelling the “Corpse Flower” (below), whose name and odor both recall Audrey II, the killer plant from another planet (bottom). This spring, I mailed off applications for our boys to attend an academically challenging summer school…
Read MoreBook Reviews … and a Literary Reality Show?
Mrs. Magoo readies for her closeup; next stop, stardom as a cyber-TV celebrity book critic? (Photo courtesy Mrs. Magoo) In the fall of 2007, the Columbia Journalism Review (CJR) ran a lengthy essay by Steve Wasserman, a former editor of The Los Angeles Times Book Review, titled “Goodbye to All That.” It offers a fascinating…
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