An Unexpected Panel

Back to London this Saturday, DEC. 9th, live at and/or streaming from the British Library

Paris is its usual beautiful self. I do my best not to let it down.

OK, not gonna lie: We had our train tickets for London already, and here’s why:

• We’re living in Paris until January 15th, then back to NYC.¹ The European Union only allows foreigners 90 days’ residence/visit within a 180 day period. But you can break it up any way you want. So in order to be in compliance we need a few more days outside the E.U. The is the only - and I mean THE ONLY - good thing about Brexit: time spent in U.K. doesn’t count.

• Theater: Shows that weren’t up in Sept. or early Nov. are up now. Particularly The Motive and the Cue, with Johnny Flynn as Richard Burton, and Mark Gatiss as John Gielgud directing Burton in his legendary HAMLET in 1964. Also Sondheim’s Pacific Overtures, a show I love that is seldom done, at the Menier Chocolate Factory “in a co-production with Umeda Arts Theater in Japan, where it has already been a huge success in Tokyo and Osaka.”²

• Does PANTO count as theater? In which case this is a sub-thread to the above. I’ve been longing for decades to see an actual Christmas Pantomime! And this is the year we’ll make it! The exquisite Richmond Theater is doing DICK WHITTINGTON³ Featuring many British stars I’ve never heard of; but I trust there will be a cat.

Burying the Lede

• On Saturday, 9 December, in connection with its fabulous current exhibition Fantasy: Realms of Imagination, the British Library is doing an entire day of programming:

  Fantasy Worlds: a Day of Talks : A packed day of talks and conversations featuring some of the most compelling and fascinating voices in Fantasy writing and art, including Charles Vess, Brian & Wendy Froud & Alan Lee in conversation with Terri Windling, Rebecca F. Kuang, and finally,

  5:00 - 6:15 p.m. UK time

  Fantasy Worlds: World Building In Fantasy

  ME!

  in conversation with Adrian Tchaikovsky & Matt Sangster.

  (Click on the link for more information)

  
  THE FINE PRINT

  In-person tickets for this event are now sold out. Tickets can still be booked to watch the sessions online by booking an online day pass. They may be watched on the British Library platform either live or within 48 hours on catch up.
  (Single session tickets may also be available for in-person attendance - i.e., if you’re in London & you want to come at 5:00 p.m., you can probably just show up and get in.)

  WANT A FREE LINK TO WATCH THE EVENT ONLINE?

  I’ve got 10 to give away. Please Comment on this page, and I’ll try to make sure the first 10 requests are satisfied.

  How did this happen?

So the fabulous Nikki & Dean Francis Alfar, leaders of the emergence of contemporary Filipino Science Fiction & Fantasy (as well as its Kennedyesque Glamor Couple, IMO) are in Paris celebrating their wedding anniversary. Aliette de Bodard (a Parisian woman who manages also to be a celebrated SFF writer in English) & I each discovered this on FaceBook (where Dean has posted many amusing & informative videos of them enjoying the Sights of Paris, which I recommend!), and each asked if we could get together. In the end, the four of met in a cafe on Aliette’s lunch break from work.

Nikki & I photobomb an otherwise perfect selfie of Dean Francis Alfar & Aliette de Bodard in Paris

There I learned that Aliette was not, in fact, going to London on Saturday to do the panel. As I was already writing the British Library Events Coordinator to make sure they’d let us in to pick up friends after the Art panel, I casually offered to take her place if he didn’t already have someone.

To my surprise, he said Yes, please.

Alfars chez nous

I had them to dinner the next night, so they could meet Delia, as I knew we’d all be best friends immediately. I promised D she would not have to cook - and so I did what I have always wanted to do, which is to serve an entire meal made up entirely of dishes from the French Frozen Food Store PICARD.⁴ I am not kidding this food is better than anything you’ve ever eaten in a French restaurant in the U.S.!

Dean decided to video me presenting each dish. You can watch it all here on FB.

I may forgive him someday.

Delia, me, Nikki & Dean in the mirror of our livingroom in Paris

Our life has been a delicious chaos full of houseguests & running around Paris and planning trips and even getting some actual work done: I finally finished my Introduction to the forthcoming Italian translation of all 3 of the Riverside books. The volume (with gorgeous cover by Kathleen Jennings) will be published in February 2024 by the Oscar Draghi imprint of Oscar Mondadori. Tell your Italian friends!

Delia snuck this photo of me hard at work on the Italian Intro

As a result, I am grateful to Social Media for reminding us that tonight is the first night of Chanukah - because of all the above, we nearly missed the first candle! But we lit it, happily in the company of 2 houseguests & a last-minute dinner guest; then we all went to the Museum of Cluny, which is open late sometimes.

And I’m happy to say that my illustrated chapter book The Golden Dreidel is available as a gift for any holiday that likes fantasy adventure and dumb jokes.

So much more to say! But I have to stop now -

Your pal,

Ellen

1. We then have to wait 180 days to return. Which means we can’t come back to France until July 15th, more or less.

2. Yes, I would just go back and see OPERATION MINCEMEAT twelve more times if I could. I’m glad to find the recording is online. We saw the amazing GUYS & DOLLS in November. I am considering HAMNET if we have time, and Delia & I are both sad that there’s no way we can run up to Stratford to see an obscure Elizabethan play she once studied called THE FAIR MAID OF THE WEST.

We are also really sorry we can’t stick around to see our friend Liza Graham’s troupe’s lively, produced readings of 16th & 17th century plays via Beyond Shakespeare, with 5 plays for Winter Revels, each and every one a jewel…..

My dirty secret? I don’t even like London all that much.

But I do love theater.

3. The theater warns: “Disclaimer: Panto is a lot of fun, but sometimes it can be a little bit loud, and a little bit cheeky, with some jokes that only grown-ups will understand. Please bear this in mind if you are bringing anyone under the age of 5, or anyone with a nervous or more sensitive disposition.”

4. PAUSE FOR YOU TO MAKE CLEVER JOKES ABOUT THE CAPTAIN.

OK. You done, now? Then let us continue.