Big Bird Day

No, I am not referring to the one above. 

I am referring to the bird that was threatened with extinction below. 

Today is world migratory day. FMI follow this link here. 

I want to use this opportunity to promote an upcoming program to be presented by the Pontine Theatre at the Conway Public Library Thursday, May 22, 2025 from 6-7 pm. 

They will use a "toy theatre" like the one above in their unique approach to storytelling. You can find more info on the program here. 

They will  present original adaptations of two stories by two New England authors. In a previous blog here, we looked at Robert Frost’s The Star Splitter. 

This blog focuses on Sarah Orne Jewett’s A White Heron. Published in 1886, it is often seen as a coming of age story about a young city girl, Sylvia, who comes to live with her grandmother in the country. She meets a young ornithologist who is hunting a rare bird he recently spotted in the area. Sylvia wants to please the young man by revealing the heron’s location, yet doesn’t want him to take its life. In the end, she embraces her passion for country life and the natural world around her.

I want to focus more on the bird than the girl for now. First, there is some question about exactly which white heron they are talking about. There are actually a number of bird species referred to as a white heron including Great Egrets and Snowy Egrets. In either case, they are "snow birds" that migrate between Florida and Maine. 

Why is the young man hunting for birds? In the context of the story, he refers to his collection of stuffed birds. 

John James Audubon was also known for shooting and stuffing birds to use as models for his artwork. 

Let's follow the Audubon connection is a different direction. The Audubon Society was founded by two Boston socialites in response to the late 19th century fashion craze for hats decorated with bird feathers.

White Herons were particularly valuable for their plumage.

One of the Boston ladies who helped found Audubon and save/ protect these birds has a local connection to the greater Mount Washington Valley in NH.  

Harriet Lawrence Hemenway, seen in this 1890 portrait by John Singer Sargent, was one of the Boston ladies who helped found the Audubon Society. Hats off to her!

 

No I did not spell it wrong. For more on that "Hemingway," see our previous blog about Chocorua's Hemingway here.  

 

There are two children's books about Harriet Hemenway and her struggle to protect the birds. While not in the collection of the Conway Public Library, we can get them for you through interlibrary loan (ILL).

 

 

 

Recently the library hosted a program by David Govatski about big trees. He pointed out that many big trees can be found in the Big Pines area of the Hemenway State Forest in Tamworth which Harriet and and her husband helped establish. FMI see this link here and here. 

The Star Splitter

Today is International Astronomy Day. I want to use this opportunity to promote an upcoming program at the Conway Public Library. 

On Thursday, May 22, 2025 from 6-7 pm the Pontine Theatre will present "Sojourner Stories" which uses their unique storytelling techniques to display original adaptations of two stories by New England authors Robert Frost and Sarah Orne Jewett. 

Today's blog focuses on Robert Frost’s poem "The Star Splitter." 

Published in 1923, the story explores the conflict between societal expectations and individual passions. A farmer’s reckless pursuit of a telescope leads to the loss of his farm and home. This loss initially evokes ridicule from the townspeople. 

However, their subsequent contemplation reveals the importance of forgiveness and understanding. Frost uses the image of a telescope, "a star-splitter," as a symbol of the farmer’s "life long curiosity about our place among the infinities.”

We will cover the second story, Sarah Orne Jewett’s A White Heron, in a future blog.

For more info on the program follow this link here.

So now to Robert Frost’s poem "The Star Splitter." To see the whole poem follow this link here. 

Robert Frost's poem starts with, 

"You know Orion always comes up sideways.
Throwing a leg up over our fence of mountains,
And rising on his hands, he looks in on me"

The narrator feels as if nature in the form of the constellation Orion is watching him and has caught him red handed. The poem continues,

"Busy outdoors by lantern-light with something
I should have done by daylight,"

While not clear at this point what he is doing wrong, we learn later in the poem that he is splitting wood by lantern light and too late in the year after the "ground is frozen," when the constellation Orion is most obvious in the early night sky. 

Even the wind criticizes him, 
"...a gust flings a handful
Of waste leaves at my smoky lantern chimney
To make fun of my way of doing things,"

In the poem, you can see contrasting meanings of the term "split."

First we have the image of the narrator splitting wood, a very practical, earthly seasonal thing to do, critical to surviving during the time period through the winter and to basic daily life as most meals then were cooked with a woodstove. 

We learn that the title of the poem refers to a telescope christened the Star-Splitter. The narrator explains the telescope was named that ...

"Because it didn't do a thing but split
A star in two or three the way you split
A globule of quicksilver in your hand
With one stroke of your finger in the middle.
It's a star-splitter if there ever was one,
And ought to do some good if splitting stars
'Sa thing to be compared with splitting wood."

Quicksilver is also known as mercury liquid at room temperature

So this use of "split" is cosmic, unearthly, with no real practical application to survival. 

The contrast between the earthly and the cosmic universe is also seen in how he acquired his telescope. 

This pr photo from the Pontine Theatre shows how they use their "toy theatre" to illustrate the part of the poem in which we discover that after failing at farming, 

"He burned his house down for the fire insurance
And spent the proceeds on a telescope
To satisfy a lifelong curiosity
About our place among the infinities."

In a later stanza it is revealed that, 

"Trying to sell his farm and then not selling,
He burned his house down for the fire insurance
And bought the telescope with what it came to."

But still he had to work to live so, 

"Out of a house and so out of a farm
At one stroke (of a match), Brad had to turn
To earn a living on the Concord railroad,"

"As under-ticket-agent at a station
Where his job, when he wasn't selling tickets,
Was setting out up track and down, not plants
As on a farm, but planets, evening stars
That varied in their hue from red to green."

Later in the poem, the narrator declares. 

"A telescope. Someone in every town seems to me owes it to the town to keep one."

Thanks in large part to this gentleman from South Tamworth NH, we do have one for you to check out from the Conway Public Library. You can find it listed in our online catalog here. We also have star charts and numerous books on astronomy to share.

The poem concludes with these thoughts, 

"We've looked and looked, but after all where are we?
Do we know any better where we are,
And how it stands between the night tonight
And a man with a smoky lantern chimney?
How different from the way it ever stood?

We hope to see you at the library soon and that you attend the Pontine Theatre program.