On Friday Sept 2 2005 we are going to have Louise Reynolds as our guest at "The Somerville News " editorial meeting at the Diesel Cafe in Davis Square. Louise is the publisher of this 30 year old+ literary journal ( the new renaissance) of the arts and ideas. Our reporters will be interviewing her about her interesting, and varied career.

Kudos from the literary, library,and alternative presses... "the new renaissance is one of the best literary magazines around. It publishes known and unknown writers from India to Indiana and has only one criterion: excellence. tnr has a unique and vital approach to literature and the arts."-Bill Katz Library Journal
"tnr is for a thought-provoking blend of opinions and ideas, consistently fine fiction and poetry and a staunch commitment to the visual arts."The Christian Science Monitor"

Combine the journals of Foreign Affairs, Artforum, TriQuarterly," and Poetry and what do you have? -a multifaceted publication of arts, literature and thought called the new renaissance."- Small Magazine Review"

tnr is always a wonderful surprise. No library interested in the range of international literature should be without it"-David LyonNew England Foundation for the Arts"


the new renaissance may be based in the Boston area but it has a mailing list with addresses from around the world. With the October 1986 issue tnr continues an 18-year old tradition - - the acceptance and nurturing of writers and artists of disparate styles in order to attain both quality and breadth of vision. The next issue of the new renaissance (#21) will contain not only the usual photographs with the non-fiction lead article (...a piece on toxic wastes in the U.S....witten by Greenpeace program director) and the featured artwork, but alos photos accompanying an essay on the history of the first racially integrated [Broadway] musical, Beggars Holiday."-Matthew F. Witten The Tab

"the new renaissance is a handsomely produced literary magazine of exceptional quality [tnr #21] contains a 25 page essay by Daniel C. Caine entitled "A Crooked Thing" [which] deals exhaustively with "Beggar's Holiday," the 1946 musical comedy that featured Duke Ellington's music and John Latouche's lyrics... There are six full photographs from the show, and altogether the essay documents an episode of Ellington's career with very valuable detail." -Stanley Dance, Book Report Jazztimes

8/26/ 2005 Meeting.


Irene Koronas reports from "Breaking Bagels With The Bards," a group of poets that meets every Saturday at 9AM in basement of Finagle-A-Bagel in Harvard Square. It is open to all interested poets or writers.

The anticipation of autumn seems to have lent to ourenergy this morning. The bagel bards and the bagelbabes were toasted and ready for a variety of cheesespreads beginning with a plain cream cheese to ajalapeno. i was ready for any and all cool colorfulchanges after the heat of this summer.First i apologize to Elizabeth Doran for misspellingher name last week. I take full credit (oh no, that'sfull criticism) for the miss spelling. miss spellingwas my first grade teacher and she had a heck of atime with me always raising my hand to answerquestions i never even heard. when she caught on to mystraight up arm, she ignored me, hoping I'd just putthat arm down and learn to listen. i needed all theattention i could get, after all, keeping a raised armthere for 20 minutes is quite a feat. (qi gongposition). we briefly discussed yoga, health, metaphysics, andthe benefits of gossip. (huh. not really. we don'tgossip. you know that.) honestly, there was so manysubjects, so many conversations that it was hard forme to focus on any one in particular. so i salsadanced, instead. I need to start recording oursessions, meetings, gathering more information so Ican be more responsible to the greater audience. Ithought I got rid of the idea of writing for othersbut here it is again.After our initial greetings and finding out how ourweek went, (a catchup) we settled into conversations,(some very brief) like cell spits (mitosis)(niosis).ya know I'm going to have to check this out on thecomputer if i want to spell the words right and toknow what it all means. Did i say cell spits or wasthat suppose to be cell splits? yikes. pass the bananasplit with everything on it. Another briefieconversation; Juno taking the eyes of somebody,(another god, i suppose), and putting them into apeacock. Harris thinks it is from the Greek myth,garden of Hesperus. Any help here would beappreciated...it was all over my head today. Myths,science, and ancient movements. as a matter of fact idid have to visit the water closet often, just to getmy bearings. We ended the morning with talk aboutpoetry and some of us exchanged chap books and recentpoems. There was no sea glass this week and no potatochips. We ate our bagels and drank our preferreddrinks in our own noisy friendly arena.caught words (and look-ups)Junochanera (nasa)Marya zaturenska 1902-1982 Pulitzer prize 1938 forpoetry. Lived in Shelburne Falls, Ma.my mythology is shakya real poet is one who connects with a higherconsciousness; writing without a filter. (debatable)you have to believe in your self (or, at least,someone will have to believe in you)sorter dropped outspelling problems (you know who has that problem)gorged the woodvaingloriousnothing worse than a mediocre loveri was old fifteen years ago