Versatile Blogger Award

And now for something completely different — just for today.

Some happy news. This blog has received a Versatile Blogger Award. “Versatile” here is defined as “turning with ease from one thing to another.” The award praises the blog’s pairing of “poetry with art in the most unexpected but perfect ways.”

Thank you, Tabatha Yeatts of The Opposite of Indifference, for this. You can visit her blog here.

Now, I shall go on to the second and third duties outlined in The Versatile Blogger Awards manual:

a. Thank and link to the blogger who bestowed the award.
b. Share seven random facts about yourself.
c. Spread the love by passing the award to five other bloggers — and be sure to let them know.

The seven random facts below about myself are actually a few of my favorite things.

• Favorite poet: Emily Dickinson.

• Favorite novelist: Jane Austen.

• Favorite book of non-fiction: The Complete Oxford English Dictionary, for its entries showing the etymology or roots of words and the evolution of their meanings over the years.

• Favorite singer: Edith Piaf.

• Favorite movie: The Third Man (British, 1949), a striking film noir about post-war Vienna, where everything has changed and nothing is different. Written by Graham Greene, it stars Orson Welles, Joseph Cotten, and the luminous Alida Valli. I’ve watched it dozens of times.

• Favorite sound track from a movie: the haunting music of The Third Man, composed and performed on the zither by Anton Karas.

• Favorite quotation from a movie: Harry Lime (Orson Welles) in The Third Man, explaining the facts of life:

“You know what the fellow said. In Italy for thirty years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, bloodshed — they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vince and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love, five hundred years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock. So long, Holly.”

My choices for Versatile Blogger Awards (click on the names to link to each):

• Content in a Cottage is a place of serenity, filled with images of peaceful interiors and outdoor views, and of animals, wild and domestic. With her new iPhone camera, Rosemary Beck also looks at nature up close, paying attention to the fine details of her garden and her neighborhood.

• Jane Austen’s World is that and much more. Its main brief is to explore the life and times of the novelist’s England, but it also takes detours into other areas of Britain. Currently, it is visiting Downton Abbey, the great estate featured in PBS’s Masterpiece Theatre this month.

• Pentimeno is a most interesting blog. A Ph. D. in music, the host writes thoughtful meditations on love, community, forgiveness, and beauty, and links the reader to videos of enchanting music.

• The children’s writer Jama Rattigan hosts a blog featuring a delightful blend of poems, delicious recipes, memories of childhood, and reviews of cookery and children’s books.

• And finally, The Blue Lantern is beautiful to look at, with colorful images placed against a backdrop that reminds you of soft black velvet. The host, Jane Librizzi, writes brief illustrated essays about the arts — paintings, prints, photographs, and posters — and their place in history. I have learned much there.

~ Maria