Thursday, March 01, 2007

Hubert at Yaddo

Hubert reports that life at Yaddo, the famous artists' colony in Saratoga Springs, is not bad. There's lots of nice white snow (unlike here, where there is nothing like snow!) and he is finishing a harpsichord piece as well as preparing a new piece for large orchestra.
Not surprisingly, Hubert appears to like everything about Yaddo, except for the arrival of a mouse to share his studio. It is more the droppings than the mouse itself that he minds, although I would point out that mice, like rabbits, are inordinately drawn to chocolate so any chocolate had better be consumed immediately if his plans to scare the mouse off with sound waves from the computer are unsuccessful. (Would Nori, his Prague roommate's enterprising cat, have been of assistance? I'm sure Nori would do anything to keep Hubert entertained, not that Hubert would find gifts of mice entertaining.)
Yaddo is best known for hosting such writers as John Cheever and Carson McCullers. (I used to imagine that I might be allowed to go when I was fifty or sixty and had written at least ten books. Perhaps one or two would suffice!) Until Hubert went there, I had no idea other types of creators were allowed, but he says that composers Virgil Thomson, Aaron Copland, and Ned Rorem also spent time at Yaddo.
I wonder whether rabbits are allowed at Yaddo or if Ms. Spots and Orion would be considered the kind of home distractions one goes to an artists' colony to get away from...

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