Berta Zuckerkandl – Vienna literary salon, late 1800s to 1938
received & submitted by Beth Lorio
for A Teaspoon of Water: Contemplative Arts Salon
Of the purpose of Poetry, Horace says: to inform or to entertain. I can do him one better.
In my Living Room, I seek to do both.
In my Living Room, should you be so fortunate to be invited, you will meet people with talents you have never dreamed of. You will hear musicians play along the edge of what we can recognize as music. If you are of a scientific bent, perhaps I will plant you in conversation with a heretical theologian writing a new book on the the Femininity of Logic. And speaking of Femininity, it is entirely possible that without the graces of myself, your Hostess, the delights of my Living Room, the sensitivity of my curation, this ferment, this flight of ideas, fancy, policy, art, conviction might all come to naught; like an awkward cotillion one only barely managed to survive at the age of 11.
Welcome to my Living Room. Prepare to spark and be sparked. The inspiration we ignite tonight will shoot us back out into the world like so many seeds burst from the pod.
This is my Mission. This is my Delight.
Image: Portrait of Amalie Zuckerkandl (Unfinished) by Gustav Klimt, 1917
