tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-71967461758677143232024-03-04T23:04:49.814-05:00Brian Floca's BlogNews from children's book author and illustrator Brian Floca.Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.comBlogger266125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-39299048055222310992015-07-07T19:13:00.001-04:002015-07-07T20:02:41.076-04:00Searching for three drawings from Poppy<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YWp7J7f3HDc/VZxa3ccU4fI/AAAAAAAABJ8/4otAXBSpDZo/s1600/Poppy%2Bart%2Bquest%2Bvertical.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YWp7J7f3HDc/VZxa3ccU4fI/AAAAAAAABJ8/4otAXBSpDZo/s640/Poppy%2Bart%2Bquest%2Bvertical.jpg" width="408" /></a></div>
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I’m trying to track down a few original drawings from <i>Poppy</i>, by Avi, so that they can be rescanned for a possible foreign edition of the book. The drawings, above, were auctioned off in the late ‘90s at fundraising auctions for Horizon Institute for Homeless Children in Boston (now Horizons for Homeless Children). It's a long-shot to look for them, I know, but in the age of the internet I don’t dismiss the long shot. If you happen to own or know the owner of any of the pieces pictured here, I’d be grateful if you’d be in touch. I’d like to borrow the drawings only long enough for the scanning, and would be glad to cover costs associated with shipping and, if necessary, reframing. Thank you!<br />
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-26221880493191550212014-09-24T16:27:00.002-04:002014-09-24T16:27:55.706-04:00Flying Clouds<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-MvjH0AH4co0/VCMnyZG6Z8I/AAAAAAAABIA/jtsbjvqq9tU/s1600/Floca%2BFlying%2BCloud.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-MvjH0AH4co0/VCMnyZG6Z8I/AAAAAAAABIA/jtsbjvqq9tU/s1600/Floca%2BFlying%2BCloud.jpg" height="270" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I recently read and enjoyed <i><a href="http://www.traceyfern.com/darethewind.html">Dare The Wind</a></i>, from <a href="http://www.traceyfern.com/">Tracey Fern</a> and <a href="http://www.emilyarnoldmccully.com/index.html">Emily Arnold McCully</a>, a new book which tells how in 1851 Ellen Prentiss helped the clipper ship <i>Flying Cloud</i> make a record-setting run from New York to San Francisco — 89 days, 21 hours. I enjoyed the book because it’s a well told story, beautifully illustrated, on an interesting subject. I took a little extra pleasure from the book because a small drawing of the <i>Flying Cloud</i> appears in the front endpapers of <i>Locomotive</i> as an illustration of how one might have traveled between the East and West Coasts before the opening of the transcontinental railroad (which reduced the travel time for such a trip to about a week). (That’s the drawing from <i>Locomotive</i> above, based a model that I saw and photographed at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. A fantastic model; you can see it online <a href="http://www.mfa.org/collections/object/clipper-ship-flying-cloud-38551">here</a>.) I like to think that someone, somewhere, might end up reading both <i>Dare the Wind</i> and <i>Locomotive</i>, and make the connection. </span></div>
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-77310195647469950952014-01-28T17:34:00.000-05:002014-01-28T17:34:26.131-05:00Thank you<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Thank you to the Caldecott and Sibert Committee members for Monday morning’s overwhelming news, and congratulations to all the authors and illustrators whose books were recognized by the ALSC this year!</span></div>
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-69687982103601046162014-01-22T16:19:00.003-05:002014-01-22T16:19:41.714-05:00Marty McGuire Has Too Many Pets!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Marty McGuire Has Too Many Pets!</i>, written by the funny and thoughtful Kate Messner, illustrated by me, comes out in one week from Scholastic Books. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A synopsis: “After visiting a sanctuary for retired lab chimpanzees, Marty wants to follow in the footsteps of her idol Jane Goodall and help with their care. But “adopting a chimp” is expensive, so Marty and her third-grade pals hatch a plan to raise money by holding a talent show at school and opening a pet-sitting business in Marty’s basement. It turns out that each pet has a personality of its own, and wrangling them is much harder than Marty expected. How will Marty keep her latest great idea from going to the dogs?” </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It was great fun for me to get to spend time with Marty and friends again while illustrating this third Marty McGuire book, and I think readers will feel the same way while reading it. You can find the book at your nearest independent bookstore via Indiebound, <a href="http://www.indiebound.org/book/9780545535595">here</a>, and you can find it online at other bookstores, well, you know where. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Above: Ms. Stephanie, a school librarian, introduces Marty and Annie to Lady Macbeth, a cranky hedgehog. </i></span></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-35925260567493775322013-12-25T11:27:00.005-05:002013-12-25T11:27:53.110-05:00Merry Christmas!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-w4fG1OL6sWI/UrsHYS4uZwI/AAAAAAAABFw/5x_Ne-5249k/s1600/FlocaLocomotiveChristmas.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-w4fG1OL6sWI/UrsHYS4uZwI/AAAAAAAABFw/5x_Ne-5249k/s400/FlocaLocomotiveChristmas.jpg" width="323" /></a></div>
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<br />Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-23528668932127972432013-12-24T10:30:00.001-05:002013-12-24T10:30:56.216-05:00Apollo 8, and Christmas at the moon<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">It’s the 45th anniversary of Apollo 8, the first Apollo mission to give astronauts a view of the Earth, whole. An interview from earlier this year with historian Robert Poole and astronaut Bill Anders, <a href="http://backstoryradio.org/shows/starry-eyed-heavens/?segments=earthrise-behind-the-lens">here</a>, digs into their iconic image of the Earth rising over the face over the moon, and a new video with historian and author Andrew Chaikin, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dE-vOscpiNc">here</a>, gives a new understanding of the taking of the photo. And today is, of course, the perfect day to listen to Apollo 8’s Christmas Eve address from their orbit around the moon, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aIf0G2PtHo">here</a>. It concludes, “And from the crew of Apollo 8, we close with good night, good luck, a merry Christmas, and God bless all of you, all of you on the good Earth.” Merry Christmas!</span></div>
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<br />Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-52273820499460852202013-12-18T16:23:00.000-05:002013-12-18T16:55:01.128-05:00Locomotive on lists<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-V-dfexPaQeo/UrIMJFnsLWI/AAAAAAAABFI/XGf6kep4vqE/s1600/Floca+Crossing+Dale+Creek.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="366" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-V-dfexPaQeo/UrIMJFnsLWI/AAAAAAAABFI/XGf6kep4vqE/s400/Floca+Crossing+Dale+Creek.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">The year is closing, which makes this the season for </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">lists</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">. For anyone with a book out, watching these collections of titles trickle out can be as nerve-wracking as rolling over the Dale Creek Bridge, but </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">Locomotive</i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> has had a good crossing and found itself in a lot of good company this year, and I’m grateful to everyone who’s included the book in their year-end accounting: </span><br />
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<i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2013/10/31/books/review/31best-illustrated-8.html">New York Times</a></i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2013/10/31/books/review/31best-illustrated-8.html"> 10 Best Illustrated Books of the Year selection</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304477704579252382467727974">Wall Street Journal</a></i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304477704579252382467727974"> Top 10 Children's Books of 2013</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/b/ref=pe_636310_90346420_pe_row2_b1_t/?node=7783650011">Amazon.com Top 20 Children's Books of 2013</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.booklistonline.com/Top-of-the-List-2013-Bill-Ott/pid=6585538">Booklist</a></i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.booklistonline.com/Top-of-the-List-2013-Bill-Ott/pid=6585538">’s Top of the List pick for Youth Picture Book 2013</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://best-books.publishersweekly.com/pw/best-books/2013/childrens-nonfiction">Publishers Weekly</a></i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://best-books.publishersweekly.com/pw/best-books/2013/childrens-nonfiction"> Best Books of 2013</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.slj.com/2013/11/reviews/best-of/slj-best-books-2013-nonfiction/">School Library Journal</a></i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.slj.com/2013/11/reviews/best-of/slj-best-books-2013-nonfiction/"> Best Books 2013 Nonfiction</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="https://www.kirkusreviews.com/issue/best-of-2013/section/children/?page=5">Kirkus Reviews</a></i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="https://www.kirkusreviews.com/issue/best-of-2013/section/children/?page=5"> Best Children’s Books of 2013</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.hbook.com/2013/12/blogs/read-roger/fanfare/">Horn Book</a></i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.hbook.com/2013/12/blogs/read-roger/fanfare/"> Fanfare selection</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.nypl.org/sites/default/files/100titlesforreadingandsharing2013.pdf">NYPL 100 Books for Reading and Sharing 2013 selection</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/minhle/best-picture-books-of-201_b_4378532.html">Huffington Post</a></i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/minhle/best-picture-books-of-201_b_4378532.html"> Best Picture Books of 2103 (Best History/Biography)</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"></span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.shelf-awareness.com/readers-issue.html?issue=257#m4678">Shelf Awareness</a></i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.shelf-awareness.com/readers-issue.html?issue=257#m4678"> Best Books of 2013</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://blogs.slj.com/afuse8production/2013/12/18/100-magnificent-childrens-books-2013/#_">Fuse #8 100 Magnificent Children’s Books 2013 selection</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">It was a long, often difficult, often fantastic experience making </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">Locomotive</i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> — all of which makes this notice all the more rewarding. Thank you to all above.</span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-35182287876280919212013-11-21T12:07:00.000-05:002013-11-21T12:07:41.110-05:00A new collaboration<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kB7D2nVV8wg/Uo487ALlABI/AAAAAAAABE0/NNUJQxcF3vc/s1600/Floca_Rehearsal.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="377" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kB7D2nVV8wg/Uo487ALlABI/AAAAAAAABE0/NNUJQxcF3vc/s400/Floca_Rehearsal.jpg" width="400" /></a><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A commission and funding from Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge made possible the collaboration described in Jan Greenberg and Sandra Jordan</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">s <i>Ballet for Martha: Making Appalachian Spring</i>. Fast forward to today, and the Martha Graham Dance Company is running a Kickstarter campaign to make possible a new collaboration, this time with choreographer Nacho Duato. If the process in <i>Ballet for Martha</i> was interesting to you, then here’s a chance to see something like it from the inside, and for less than it cost Elizabeth Coolidge; for $20 (or more), donors will be able to watch a rehearsal via live streaming video. I feel lucky to have been able to watch the Company rehearse while I was working on <i>Ballet for Martha</i> and am glad to think of other people getting the chance, too. And even if you don’t watch the rehearsal, the campaign still gives those interested the chance to help some great artists create new work. You can take a look at the campaign, including a video that shows more of what this new piece will be about, <a href="http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/marthagraham/nacho-duato-creates-new-work-for-martha-graham-dan">here</a>.</span></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span>Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-15621902019290477472013-11-08T11:55:00.000-05:002013-11-08T16:24:06.155-05:00Locomotive in the New York Times<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I’m happy that </span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Locomotive</i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> will share a good review in the </span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;">New York Times Book Review</i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> this weekend with Elisha Cooper’s </span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Train</i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> and Jason Carter Eaton</span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’s</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> and (former </span>studio<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> mate) John Rocco’s <i>How to Train a Train</i>. The full review for the three books is <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/10/books/review/locomotive-by-brian-floca-and-more.html">here</a>. I’m even happier that <i>Locomotive</i> is a selection this year for the Book Review</span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’s </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">annual 10 Best Illustrated Books of the Year. (“Since 1952,” says the <i>Times</i>, “the Book Review has convened an independent panel of judges to select picture books on the basis of artistic merit. Each year, judges choose from among thousands of picture books for what is the only annual award of its kind.”) A slideshow from all ten books is online <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2013/10/31/books/review/31best-illustrated.html">here</a>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">Thank you to the <i>Times</i>, thank you to this year’s Best Illustrated jury, and congratulations to all the other illustrators on the list! It’s an honor to be in their company!</span><br />
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<i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">Above, the masthead of the </i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">Times</span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> as it appeared in the 1860s, the era of </i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">Locomotive</span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">—back when New York was New-York. (More on that, <a href="http://blog.nyhistory.org/it-can-hyphen-here-why-the-new-york-historical-society-includes-a-hyphen/">here</a>.)</i></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-8770618362182710152013-10-24T08:32:00.001-04:002013-10-24T08:32:43.356-04:00Richard Ford, boy fireman<br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A nice piece by novelist Richard Ford on a summer spent as a fireman, after the days of steam, ran in the <i>New York Times</i> on Sunday. It's online <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/20/business/a-boy-who-played-with-trains.html">here</a>.</span></span><br />
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-42463639240103724202013-10-23T14:15:00.001-04:002013-10-23T14:31:12.198-04:00Poets and trains<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfrSK-p5ujrWsXDw18PnOX3KFVx0Sfy1pdBNR8Zic2h9Ood2oBUiegXIIuVvnn1HJNRaxdlh28-T1VUe1cRxmDb9IpOnJbdqgNZUf7Pe3TcwZiVWAdXdeZpdK7zhp9WYlsvGpQrc9ABNtL/s1600/I_like_to_see_it.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="145" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfrSK-p5ujrWsXDw18PnOX3KFVx0Sfy1pdBNR8Zic2h9Ood2oBUiegXIIuVvnn1HJNRaxdlh28-T1VUe1cRxmDb9IpOnJbdqgNZUf7Pe3TcwZiVWAdXdeZpdK7zhp9WYlsvGpQrc9ABNtL/s400/I_like_to_see_it.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A new Emily Dickinson archive is online today, <a href="http://www.edickinson.org/">here</a>. (An article about the archive appears in today’s <i>New York Times</i>, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/23/books/enigmatic-dickinson-revealed-online.html">here</a>.) At the archive you can find Dickinson’s poem <a href="http://www.edickinson.org/editions/4/image_sets/80489">“I like to see it lap the miles”</a>: </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I like to see it lap the miles, <br />
And lick the valleys up, <br />
And stop to feed itself at tanks; <br />
And then, prodigious, step </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Around a pile of mountains, <br />
And, supercilious, peer <br />
In shanties by the sides of roads; <br />
And then a quarry pare </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">To fit its sides, and crawl between, <br />
Complaining all the while <br />
In horrid, hooting stanza; <br />
Then chase itself down hill </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">And neigh like Boanerges; <br />
Then, punctual as a star, <br />
Stop docile and omnipotent <br />
At its own stable door. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The poem never says what </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">“</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">it</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">” is, but you can guess, I think. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Dickinson</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> wrote the poem in or around 1862—by coincidence or not, the year Abraham Lincoln signed the Pacific Railroad Act. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">“</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I like to see it lap the miles</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">” </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">and t</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">wo other poems—Walt Whitman’s poems <a href="http://www.bartleby.com/142/260.html">“To a Locomotive in Winter”</a> and <a href="http://www.bartleby.com/142/183.html">“Passage to India”</a>—</span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> are mentioned in the author’s note in </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Locomotive</i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">as examples of the train</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">s once commanding place in the culture. </span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">(And Boanerges? A surname given by Jesus to James and John in Mark 3:17. It</span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’s</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Hebrew for Sons of Tumult, says </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable</i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">, but was commonly translated in the Bible as </span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">“</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Sons of Thunder,</span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">”</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> and surely</span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> that</span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’s</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> how Dickinson meant to use it. </span></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Finally, says </span></span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Brewer’s,</i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> Boanerges was also the nickname given to his Brough motorcycles by T. E. Lawrence—who at one point <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=jxWweoxJrxMC&pg=PA97&lpg=PA97&dq=lawrence+brough+express+train">wrote</a> the Brough company to say that he found the bikes </span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">“</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">as fast and reliable as express trains.</span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">”</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> Everything connects!)</span></span><br />
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-89788671298240257622013-10-18T21:00:00.000-04:002013-10-21T18:20:17.986-04:00Locomotive resources<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5zgsAN11rf0xMhtRLjF9BvtQukY1Mi21Shd3pSpo0YKeAzzPfkvtbdLurLEJaynhc1N6iWDMw2o44Xyy4Yt0xpikxPrmx3RPcugRnpCFsw3m_Arl1iXMQ2IhdYoc_RV9cMAUs987dZW-q/s1600/MetalRollsOnMetalAlt.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5zgsAN11rf0xMhtRLjF9BvtQukY1Mi21Shd3pSpo0YKeAzzPfkvtbdLurLEJaynhc1N6iWDMw2o44Xyy4Yt0xpikxPrmx3RPcugRnpCFsw3m_Arl1iXMQ2IhdYoc_RV9cMAUs987dZW-q/s400/MetalRollsOnMetalAlt.jpg" width="373" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">For teachers and librarians interested in using <i>Locomotive </i>in the classroom, or for readers just interested in digging a little further into the book, a page of Teacher Resources is online from Simon & Schuster, <a href="http://books.simonandschuster.net/Locomotive/Brian-Floca/9781416994152">here</a>. These include a (Common Core-friendly) curriculum guide. (The direct link for that PDF is <a href="http://d28hgpri8am2if.cloudfront.net/tagged_assets/12839_locomotive%20curriculum%20guide.pdf">here</a>.) A review and a collection of links, resources, teaching ideas, and other relevant titles is also on the blog <a href="http://classroombookshelf.blogspot.com/">The Classroom Bookshelf</a>, in a post by Erika Thulin Dawes, <a href="http://classroombookshelf.blogspot.com/2013/09/locomotive.html">here</a>. Thanks to S&S and the Classroom Bookshelf for the thoughtful attention!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Above: a painting of the train leaving the station. This page eventually became a spread, and so this painting wasn't used.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i><br /></i></span>Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-25315068266834160422013-10-03T21:32:00.000-04:002013-10-03T21:32:10.665-04:00Shelf Awareness and BCCB stars and reviews<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-1K0O6H_4mBs/Uk4ZLrNi0QI/AAAAAAAABDI/cGvMBdW9IJE/s1600/TruckeeCA.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="237" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-1K0O6H_4mBs/Uk4ZLrNi0QI/AAAAAAAABDI/cGvMBdW9IJE/s400/TruckeeCA.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Life on the road touring for <i>Locomotive</i> has me late in posting some review news for the book. First, thank you to Shelf Awareness for a starred review of the book that appeared last month, <a href="http://www.shelf-awareness.com/readers-issue.html?issue=229#m4197">here</a>. “[R]eaders will want to board this locomotive again and again,” concludes the review. And now I’m happy to see <i>Locomotive</i> on a list, <a href="http://bccb.lis.illinois.edu/2013/October2013/1013star.html">here</a>, of books receiving starred reviews in October’s issue of <i>The Bulletin of the Center for Children</i></span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><i>’</i></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>s Books</i>. The BCCB asks, “So, how much do you want to know about America’s first transcontinental railroad? Just the general picture?” In which case a reader might go through the book and simply enjoy the “poetic account” of a family’s trip. Or, “if you’re truly among the nerdiest of train nerds,” you can dig into author’s notes and endpapers and “compare the engines underway in the main text with the innards in the diagram” and so on. The idea that the book can operate on different levels for different readers is one I’m very glad to read. Thanks again, Shelf Awareness, and thank you, BCCB! </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Above: a doubleheader pulling out of Truckee, California. Two engines for two reviews.</i></span><br />
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-40102675382261681072013-09-30T17:00:00.000-04:002013-09-30T17:00:13.205-04:00Music of the spheres, music of the gears<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/--woN3acgLV0/Uknl1Nr5jTI/AAAAAAAABC4/GN-sow1Rif0/s1600/johnson+bar.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="314" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/--woN3acgLV0/Uknl1Nr5jTI/AAAAAAAABC4/GN-sow1Rif0/s320/johnson+bar.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A friend recently sent me a link to a performance of Arthur Honegger's Pacific 231, popularly regarded as an orchestral homage to the steam locomotive. Listening to Honegger reminded me of Pierre Schaeffer’s Etude aux Chemins de Fer, a piece of <i>musique concrète</i>—“real” sounds of life, in this case the sounds of locomotives, put together as music. Music evoking machines, and machines evoking music. Evoking? Achieving? You be the judge. An orchestra playing Honegger is on YouTube <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6AUioVUFu8">here</a>, and Schaeffer playing locomotives is <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OwQiMuUOFT8">here</a>. Happy listening.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Above: a sketch from </i>Locomotive<i> of a musician, maybe, on the Johnson bar.</i></span></span><br />
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-18191510439809284262013-09-25T23:23:00.000-04:002013-09-25T23:27:50.291-04:00On with the tour<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQmFkpYjYeTO849wvxFr71shJ6IqzBOAr9AlqCEijgzAfn3jUS3uOJ9Jm-uqkldvfu_tIf-PdFR_ZoKLJ8UY9QKKei4ANBXIt-KI_22qSwPsUB1vmtqvlgcTrZI5KqESzcWUzn1ce-Rrl2/s1600/FlocaDCLocomotive.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="278" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQmFkpYjYeTO849wvxFr71shJ6IqzBOAr9AlqCEijgzAfn3jUS3uOJ9Jm-uqkldvfu_tIf-PdFR_ZoKLJ8UY9QKKei4ANBXIt-KI_22qSwPsUB1vmtqvlgcTrZI5KqESzcWUzn1ce-Rrl2/s400/FlocaDCLocomotive.JPG" width="400" /></a><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">On rolls the <i>Locomotive</i> book tour. Above is the train that brought me to Washington for the National Book Festival last weekend—very similar to the train that brought me to Philadelphia tonight for some school visits and a store appearance tomorrow. (<a href="http://www.townebc.com/event/2013/09/26/day">Thursday the 26th! Towne Book Center! 6:00 P.M.!</a>) There have been a lot of flights up to this point on the book tour, so it’s nice to get some honest train travel in, even if a modern Amtrak engine makes it hard to work an 1869 theme. What else on the tour? I have signed books, I have met great readers, I have met great booksellers, I have been to great stores, and at the National Book Festival I had the privilege of giving a presentation on the National Mall with my parents and some friends in the audience. I have done a lot of school visits, and in doing so have seen a lot of kids sitting on their rears on gym floors. (When did we stop building auditoriums in schools, with stages and seats? I oppose this development.) In small bits of free time I’ve seen music in New Orleans, a Frank Lloyd Wright house in Kansas, a county fair in Ohio (horses, rabbits, pigs, roosters), and I’ve been licked on the neck by a ferret in Minneapolis. (Thank you for that, <a href="http://www.wildrumpusbooks.com/">Wild Rumpus</a>.) It has been exhausting and fantastic and the tour is not over yet. (The full schedule is <a href="http://brianfloca.com/EventsSchedule.html">here</a>.) Thank you to everyone who has come by for any part of the tour—from all the friends I was so glad to see at the book launch at <a href="http://bookcourt.com/">BookCourt</a> three weeks ago, on to the nanny and two girls who found themselves</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> rather by accident </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">at a </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">Locomotive</i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> reading at </span><a href="http://www.hooray4books.com/" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">Hooray for Books</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> in Alexandria, Virginia, this afternoon. One of the girls, dressed all in pink and sparkles, went and found herself a copy of </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">Pinkalicious</i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> as soon as I finished talking trains, and then clutched it to her chest like a life preserver. But the kind nanny bought a copy of </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">Locomotive</i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">, and so I think the kid may not be out of the woods yet.</span><br />
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-87384386144182928162013-09-05T15:06:00.001-04:002013-09-05T15:06:59.175-04:00Book launch, book tour<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-fPiAlu-HgNk/UijTeQgo8CI/AAAAAAAABCU/ikkGeeSkFyM/s1600/Corinne+Bookstore.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-fPiAlu-HgNk/UijTeQgo8CI/AAAAAAAABCU/ikkGeeSkFyM/s400/Corinne+Bookstore.jpg" width="277" /></a></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Here’s a photo (click to enlarge) of Corinne, Utah, on the route of the first transcontinental railroad. This was taken by A. J. Russell sometime between 1864 and 1869 and is online today thanks to Yale’s Beinecke Library. The resolution on the original scan, at the Beinecke web site, <a href="http://brbl-dl.library.yale.edu/vufind/Record/3529385">here</a>, is so good that you can almost fall into it. Zoom way in, and on the left, just back of CITY BAKERY, there’s a sign, not easily readable, but readable:</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">NEWSPAPER, MAGAZINE, & </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">PERIODICAL DEPOT.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">CORINNE BOOK STORE. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Now <i>that</i> is a local, independent bookstore, and local independents are on my mind; last night there was a launch party for <i>Locomotive</i> at Brooklyn</span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">s <a href="http://www.bookcourt.org/">BookCourt</a>. Thank you to Simon & Schuster for organizing, to BookCourt for hosting, and to everyone who came! It meant a lot to see a lot of familiar faces in the audience. And </span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">local independents are also on my mind because as of</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> today I’m off for the next five weeks (!) on a <i>Locomotive</i> book tour that’s going to take me to local independents across the country. This afternoon, <a href="http://www.thecountrybookshop.biz/">the Country Bookshop</a> in Southern Pines, North Carolina; tomorrow, <a href="http://www.quailridgebooks.com/event/brian-floca-picture-book-locomotive">Quail Ridge Books</a> in Raleigh, N.C.; Saturday, <a href="http://www.octaviabooks.com/event/brian-floca-locomotive">Octavia Books</a> in New Orleans, Louisiana; Tuesday, a signing at the <a href="http://www.slpl.org/slpl/library/article240163880.asp">Saint Louis Public Library</a> in Saint Louis, Missouri. The tour goes on from there but I’m taking things one step at a time here on the blog. The full tour schedule is <a href="http://brianfloca.com/EventsSchedule.html">here</a>. All wishes for smooth travel currently being accepted. I look forward to sharing <i>Locomotive</i> transcontinentally. I hope I’ll see some of you on the road! </span></span></div>
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<br />Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-13915373155403116252013-09-01T16:19:00.000-04:002013-09-02T10:32:38.668-04:00Locomotive news: Wall Street Journal, Court Street party<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-0-EynJnXl-4/UiOg1DvPRJI/AAAAAAAABCE/2K7pT8tt6f4/s1600/FlocaLocomotiveLeavingStation.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="251" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-0-EynJnXl-4/UiOg1DvPRJI/AAAAAAAABCE/2K7pT8tt6f4/s400/FlocaLocomotiveLeavingStation.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">“Mr. Floca manages not just to tell the story of one eventful journey but to summon the great rail enterprise as a whole: the sweat, ingenuity and ambition that went into building it, the smells and sounds of it, and the stunning, varied topography those first tracks traversed in the American West. Here young readers will also encounter possibly the most lucid explanation of how steam power works ever to appear in a children’s book.” So concludes Meghan Cox Gurdon</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">s review of <i>Locomotive</i> in this weekend</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">s <i>Wall Street Journal</i>. Thanks to Ms. Gurdon and the <i>Journal</i> for the review! The full review is online for <i>Journal</i> subscribers <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324463604579041044009829968.html">here</a>. Tuesday is the book’s publication date. On Wednesday a book party will be thrown at BookCourt on Court Street in Brooklyn. Details are <a href="http://brianfloca.com/LocomotiveLaunchAtBookCourt.html">here</a> and <a href="http://bookcourt.com/events/brian-floca">here</a>. I hope to see you there!</span><br />
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-67050823991439902992013-08-09T12:24:00.001-04:002013-08-09T12:24:15.296-04:00Trucks, Redux<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-QXLMcLaQbbE/UgUVeXrfmgI/AAAAAAAABB0/ctnhatvb8Hs/s1600/Floca+Five+Trucks.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="265" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-QXLMcLaQbbE/UgUVeXrfmgI/AAAAAAAABB0/ctnhatvb8Hs/s400/Floca+Five+Trucks.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">On almost every trip to the airport that I’ve made for the past eight or nine years, I</span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">ve found myself, at one point or another, gazing across the tarmac and thinking longingly of the book <i>Five Trucks</i>, out of print and largely unavailable now for, well, eight or nine years. (Such a moment is sketched out <a href="http://brianflocablog.blogspot.com/2010/09/memories-of-east-texas.html">here</a>, and more about <i>Five Trucks</i> is <a href="http://brianfloca.com/FiveTrucks.html">here</a>.) It’s happy news for me, then, that <i>Five Trucks</i> will be coming back into print at Atheneum/Simon & Schuster next year, where it will join the other vehicle books I’ve made over the past few years, <i>The Racecar Alphabet</i>, <i>Lightship</i>, <i>Moonshot</i>, and now <i>Locomotive</i>. Land, sea, air, space, together at last! Here’s a detail from a new cover painting now underway. </span></span><br />
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-27439431557945337042013-08-06T12:22:00.000-04:002013-08-06T12:22:20.106-04:00A star for Locomotive from the Horn Book Magazine<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirdU1ZLRgiRFd2R5oPHeAVAbxHd1pF7uNUMEfluAtygLJklieRjbW8qDcsDk3gUkDXyoz3a1_d-3158ygAAPQ4yVdg4UmsbgSYHilN0EzWsXEIvrC2K4tElogq-xToP4OaGdWvkwBQivwX/s1600/Locomotive_Approaching_Floca.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="274" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirdU1ZLRgiRFd2R5oPHeAVAbxHd1pF7uNUMEfluAtygLJklieRjbW8qDcsDk3gUkDXyoz3a1_d-3158ygAAPQ4yVdg4UmsbgSYHilN0EzWsXEIvrC2K4tElogq-xToP4OaGdWvkwBQivwX/s400/Locomotive_Approaching_Floca.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">It’s great to see <i>Locomotive</i> on a list of titles (<a href="http://www.hbook.com/2013/08/blogs/read-roger/septemberoctober-horn-book-magazine-starred-reviews/">here</a>) which will be receiving starred reviews in the September/October issue of the <i>Horn Book Magazine</i>. </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-align: center;">I’m happy to say that this is the book’s fifth starred review.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> Thank you to the </span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Horn Book</i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">!</span></span></div>
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<br />Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-26701326712822766432013-08-05T11:28:00.000-04:002013-08-05T11:28:11.729-04:00Poppy on a list<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfUZW1OBJswbW3caEMS4TNrjgOi3mCEwAi_8yYcyqme-zJKNjLVQbDrOiFXpPRsF_tf9ci7hTvGRoU9sQb14sJBiaR-2USjQFWmRhcquWgFZ1KLf-THE5oTJG1r6WWgqrViiGNHVffWWcU/s1600/Poppy_By_Avi_Illustration_Floca.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfUZW1OBJswbW3caEMS4TNrjgOi3mCEwAi_8yYcyqme-zJKNjLVQbDrOiFXpPRsF_tf9ci7hTvGRoU9sQb14sJBiaR-2USjQFWmRhcquWgFZ1KLf-THE5oTJG1r6WWgqrViiGNHVffWWcU/s1600/Poppy_By_Avi_Illustration_Floca.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It’s great to see <i>Poppy</i>, by Avi, in good company on a list of “100 Must-Reads For Kids 9-14,” from NPR’s Backseat Book Club. The full list is <a href="http://www.npr.org/2013/08/05/207315023/the-ultimate-backseat-bookshelf-100-must-reads-for-kids-9-14">here</a>. Thanks to the Backseat Book Club!</span></span><br />
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-40414403188700705552013-07-27T16:13:00.002-04:002013-07-27T16:13:52.226-04:00Locomotive on a list<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-xY70lIQt3OQ/UfQofW1f-WI/AAAAAAAAA-U/MTK_c7LcQv4/s1600/FlocaLocomotiveGreatBasin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="306" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-xY70lIQt3OQ/UfQofW1f-WI/AAAAAAAAA-U/MTK_c7LcQv4/s400/FlocaLocomotiveGreatBasin.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I'm very happy to see <i>Locomotive</i> on an </span>interesting<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> list of interesting books from the always </span>interesting <span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Paul Zelinsky, </span><a href="http://www.ruzzier.com/paul-zelinskys-picture-book-list/" style="letter-spacing: 0px;">here</a>. The list places the book<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> in the company of the work of Sergio Ruzzier and others whose books I’ve long enjoyed and admired, and in the company, too, of some work I don’t know but now look forward to checking out. (</span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;">King Rene’s Book of Love</i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">, by the Duke of Anjou and King of Sicily, is now on order.) </span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Thank you, Paul and Sergio!</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">More on Paul is <a href="http://www.paulozelinsky.com/">here</a>, and Sergio, <a href="http://www.ruzzier.com/">here</a>.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>Above: through the Great Basin, from </i>Locomotive<i>.</i></span></div>
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-25946674681771875732013-07-25T09:51:00.000-04:002013-07-25T09:51:15.937-04:00Lightships East and West<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2gGqtNvOJiQ/UfBOykuqcJI/AAAAAAAAA-E/8mF2p2Pqm1I/s1600/Lightship-jacket.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2gGqtNvOJiQ/UfBOykuqcJI/AAAAAAAAA-E/8mF2p2Pqm1I/s400/Lightship-jacket.jpg" width="340" /></a></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I was happy to receive an email recently from Seattle</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’s</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> Northwest Seaport, a maritime heritage organization that owns and is currently restoring Lightship no. 83, today known as the Swiftsure lightship. After restoration work at Lake Union Drydock in Seattle, the ship will be returned to its regular berth at the Historic Ships Wharf at Lake Union Park. An article about the restoration and the ship is <a href="http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2021369487_lightshipswiftsurexml.html">here</a>, and the Northwest Seaport’s site is <a href="http://nwseaport.org/">here</a>. They</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">re also on Facebook, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/Northwest-Seaport/72067008515">here</a>. Northwest Seaport will also soon begin a fundraising campaign to boost rehabilitation efforts; they</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">ve recently been awarded $30,000 as seed money by the organization 4Culture (more on them <a href="http://www.4culture.org/">here</a>) and they encourage donations, which can be made <a href="http://nwseaport.org/support/donate/">here</a>. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">And speaking of lightships and museums, here on the East Coast the South Street Seaport Museum—home to the Ambrose lightship—has been in the news for its tight financial situation, made none the easier by damage inflicted last year by Hurricane Sandy. The Museum is “alive and kicking,” though, to quote yesterday</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’s</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> status update on their Facebook page. Here’s hoping it stays that way, and if you’ve ever considered joining or donating, now would certainly be a good time. It’s a great museum; the city deserves to have it, and it deserves the city’s support. The Museum’s web site is <a href="http://www.southstreetseaportmuseum.org/">here</a>, their Facebook page is <a href="https://www.facebook.com/SouthStreetSeaportMuseum">here</a>, their donation page is <a href="http://www.southstreetseaportmuseum.org/donate.asp">here</a>.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Best wishes to these ships, museums, and the dedicated people who keep them literally and figuratively afloat!</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Above: the original, unused jacket art for </i>Lightship<i>. I was happy with this painting but I was told, as Chief Brody might have put it, and probably correctly, that I was going to need a bigger boat. </i></span></span><br />
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-26668727918476442612013-07-21T21:04:00.001-04:002013-07-21T21:12:08.264-04:00The leaf is on the tree.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-p7G4PEVcekc/UeyEpdf63vI/AAAAAAAAA84/rsSF0RcFjLc/s1600/FlocaTree.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-p7G4PEVcekc/UeyEpdf63vI/AAAAAAAAA84/rsSF0RcFjLc/s640/FlocaTree.jpeg" width="409" /></a></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Here’s a sketch from this weekend, done at just about the time on Saturday evening that it was becoming pleasant to be sitting outside. So long, heat wave.</span></div>
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-59379914294872974242013-07-18T12:51:00.001-04:002013-07-18T12:51:21.495-04:00Elizabeth, Queen of the Seas<br />
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-gLltHL-cZOw/Uegbc1GssiI/AAAAAAAAA8o/cpgqFdAgcFc/s1600/IMG_1568.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-gLltHL-cZOw/Uegbc1GssiI/AAAAAAAAA8o/cpgqFdAgcFc/s400/IMG_1568.jpg" width="400" /></a><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">If summer comes, can spring be far </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">behind? Apparently not; I’ve just received early, unbound copies of <i>Elizabeth, Queen of the Seas</i>, a picture book by the amazing <a href="http://www.lynnecox.org/">Lynne Cox</a>, </span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">coming in Spring 2014 from Schwartz & Wade Books</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">. Elizabeth is a southern elephant seal, great of girth, slow of flipper, inclined to nap in city roadways. Complications ensue!</span></span><br />
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7196746175867714323.post-49398001670773981232013-07-11T14:13:00.000-04:002013-07-11T14:13:35.113-04:00This traveling demigod, this cloud-compeller<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UxApR8D_L74/Ud7JlBWIC6I/AAAAAAAAA8Y/s8zFSRLdWLg/s1600/FlocaLocomotive.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" height="273" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UxApR8D_L74/Ud7JlBWIC6I/AAAAAAAAA8Y/s8zFSRLdWLg/s400/FlocaLocomotive.jpg" width="400" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Tomorrow, July 12, is the birthday of Henry David Thoreau. Happy 196, Henry! To mark the occasion, here is a railroad-centric excerpt from chapter 4 of <i>Walden</i>, first published in 1854. This makes for a long blog post, but it</span></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’s </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">too good a passage for chopping up. I should also say that I don’t post the excerpt meaning to imply that Thoreau was a fan of the railroad; this is the man who wrote, “We do not ride on the railroad; it rides upon us.” (And see D.B. Johnson’s </span><span style="color: #021eaa; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><a href="http://www.henryhikes.com/hikes/hikes.html"><i>Henry Hikes to Fitchburg</i></a></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> for a picture book telling of what Thoreau thought of spending money on a ticket.) Still, even within Thoreau’s critique there’s an evocation of the grandeur of the engines and some marveling at their workings, and the passage presents a vivid contemporary view of the transformative and disruptive power of the railroads. </span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="color: #666666; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">“The Fitchburg Railroad touches the pond about a hundred rods south of where I dwell. I usually go to the village along its causeway, and am, as it were, related to society by this link. The men on the freight trains, who go over the whole length of the road, bow to me as to an old acquaintance, they pass me so often, and apparently they take me for an employee; and so I am. I too would fain be a track-repairer somewhere in the orbit of the earth.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="color: #666666; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The whistle of the locomotive penetrates my woods summer and winter, sounding like the scream of a hawk sailing over some farmer’s yard, informing me that many restless city merchants are arriving within the circle of the town, or adventurous country traders from the other side. As they come under one horizon, they shout their warning to get off the track to the other, heard sometimes through the circles of two towns. Here come your groceries, country; your rations, countrymen! Nor is there any man so independent on his farm that he can say them nay. And here’s your pay for them! screams the countryman’s whistle; timber like long battering-rams going twenty miles an hour against the city’s walls, and chairs enough to seat all the weary and heavy-laden that dwell within them. With such huge and lumbering civility the country hands a chair to the city. All the Indian huckleberry hills are stripped, all the cranberry meadows are raked into the city. Up comes the cotton, down goes the woven cloth; up comes the silk, down goes the woolen; up come the books, but down goes the wit that writes them.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="color: #666666; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">When I meet the engine with its train of cars moving off with planetary motion—or, rather, like a comet, for the beholder knows not if with that velocity and with that direction it will ever revisit this system, since its orbit does not look like a returning curve—with its steam cloud like a banner streaming behind in golden and silver wreaths, like many a downy cloud which I have seen, high in the heavens, unfolding its masses to the light—as if this traveling demigod, this cloud-compeller, would ere long take the sunset sky for the livery of his train; when I hear the iron horse make the hills echo with his snort like thunder, shaking the earth with his feet, and breathing fire and smoke from his nostrils (what kind of winged horse or fiery dragon they will put into the new Mythology I don't know), it seems as if the earth had got a race now worthy to inhabit it. If all were as it seems, and men made the elements their servants for noble ends! If the cloud that hangs over the engine were the perspiration of heroic deeds, or as beneficent as that which floats over the farmer’s fields, then the elements and Nature herself would cheerfully accompany men on their errands and be their escort.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="color: #666666; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I watch the passage of the morning cars with the same feeling that I do the rising of the sun, which is hardly more regular. Their train of clouds stretching far behind and rising higher and higher, going to heaven while the cars are going to Boston, conceals the sun for a minute and casts my distant field into the shade, a celestial train beside which the petty train of cars which bugs the earth is but the barb of the spear. The stabler of the iron horse was up early this winter morning by the light of the stars amid the mountains, to fodder and harness his steed. Fire, too, was awakened thus early to put the vital beat in him and get him off. If the enterprise were as innocent as it is early! If the snow lies deep, they strap on his snowshoes, and, with the giant plow, plow a furrow from the mountains to the seaboard, in which the cars, like a following drill-barrow, sprinkle all the restless men and floating merchandise in the country for seed. All day the fire-steed flies over the country, stopping only that his master may rest, and I am awakened by his tramp and defiant snort at midnight, when in some remote glen in the woods he fronts the elements incased in ice and snow; and he will reach his stall only with the morning star, to start once more on his travels without rest or slumber. Or perchance, at evening, I hear him in his stable blowing off the superfluous energy of the day, that he may calm his nerves and cool his liver and brain for a few hours of iron slumber. If the enterprise were as heroic and commanding as it is protracted and unwearied!</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="color: #666666; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Far through unfrequented woods on the confines of towns, where once only the hunter penetrated by day, in the darkest night dart these bright saloons without the knowledge of their inhabitants; this moment stopping at some brilliant station-house in town or city, where a social crowd is gathered, the next in the Dismal Swamp, scaring the owl and fox. The startings and arrivals of the cars are now the epochs in the village day. They go and come with such regularity and precision, and their whistle can be heard so far, that the farmers set their clocks by them, and thus one well-conducted institution regulates a whole country. Have not men improved somewhat in punctuality since the railroad was invented? Do they not talk and think faster in the depot than they did in the stage-office? There is something electrifying in the atmosphere of the former place. I have been astonished at the miracles it has wrought; that some of my neighbors, who, I should have prophesied, once for all, would never get to Boston by so prompt a conveyance, are on hand when the bell rings. To do things “railroad fashion” is now the byword; and it is worth the while to be warned so often and so sincerely by any power to get off its track. There is no stopping to read the riot act, no firing over the heads of the mob, in this case. We have constructed a fate, an Atropos, that never turns aside. (Let that be the name of your engine.) Men are advertised that at a certain hour and minute these bolts will be shot toward particular points of the compass; yet it interferes with no man’s business, and the children go to school on the other track. We live the steadier for it. We are all educated thus to be sons of Tell. The air is full of invisible bolts. Every path but your own is the path of fate. Keep on your own track, then.”</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Just fifteen years after </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Walden</i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> was published, the first transcontinental railroad was completed; the changes that Thoreau was observing in his corner of New England then reached from coast to coast.</span><br />
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Brian Flocahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15558129689288822233noreply@blogger.com0