Willow maiden thoughts and SI restaurant review
Yesterday I was a guest lecturer in Stephan's freshman seminar. The course is a writing-intensive with different topics taught by professors in various disciplines. His topic is "Magic in Speculative Fiction and the Arts." Last semester focused on Sleeping Beauty, including the ballet and three contemporary novels using the story, and A Midsummer Night's Dream, with two ballets using the story and one opera. This semester is Wagner's Ring and Tolkien's Ring. He's also showing the students The Willow Maiden, the ballet performed at Butler in 2003 for which I wrote the story.
I told them about the history of the project and my writing process. The composer of the ballet's orchestral score will talk to them about his process on Monday. They were attentive listeners and asked great questions afterwards. I talked some about the transformation of the story into a novel and read the short prologue. One student asked about the races I'd created and how they would fight. I replied that the dryads are essentially pacifists, and there is only one actual fight involving dryads aside from the title character's adventures.
Really, most of the conflict in my novel is internal, and is a result of what happens when a human comes into contact with dryads who have purposefully isolated themselves from human contact. When cultures collide, even with the best of intentions, they are forever changed, for good or ill. A central question the novel raises is: can dryads and humans really coexist? Should they?
As a "thank you" for my lecture, Stephan took me out to dinner at SI, the remodeled Scholar's Inn downtown that's gotten a lot of hype because of an upscale new interior and new chef. Believe the hype. We had a nice, intimate booth upstairs partially screened with sheer curtains. A screen nearby at the head of a long, communal table in center of the room showed slowly moving images reminiscent of Renaissance paintings. If you follow the web link above, you can see this room.
I had a delicious drink consisting of Bombay Sapphire Gin, a pomegranate liqueur, and Cointreau. The bread was served with butter infused with lots of fresh tarragon. Stephan had a pork tenderloin with collard greens and a sort of parsnip/bacon cake. I had the filet mignon, in a red wine demi-glace with, oddly enough, macaroni in a light, cream cheese and a small salad on the side of fresh herbs like fennel greens.
You know a meal was good when you think about it the next day and your mouth waters. Both entrees were excellent. I'm not much of a beef eater, but I will indulge every now and then. This is definitely a place to do so. The red wine demi-glace was delicious. I could eat it on anything, except maybe ice cream. I loved the strong flavors of the herbs in the salad, and the delicate creamy macaroni with the tang of the red wine sauce.
For desert, we split a warm chocolate ganache cake with rosewater cream and fresh berries. My stomach felt like it had died and gone to heaven. I'm picky about restaurants and a lot are not what they are cracked up to be. This is definitely a great place to visit for a special occasion. Next time, I want to try the martini with cucumber-mint puree.
I told them about the history of the project and my writing process. The composer of the ballet's orchestral score will talk to them about his process on Monday. They were attentive listeners and asked great questions afterwards. I talked some about the transformation of the story into a novel and read the short prologue. One student asked about the races I'd created and how they would fight. I replied that the dryads are essentially pacifists, and there is only one actual fight involving dryads aside from the title character's adventures.
Really, most of the conflict in my novel is internal, and is a result of what happens when a human comes into contact with dryads who have purposefully isolated themselves from human contact. When cultures collide, even with the best of intentions, they are forever changed, for good or ill. A central question the novel raises is: can dryads and humans really coexist? Should they?
As a "thank you" for my lecture, Stephan took me out to dinner at SI, the remodeled Scholar's Inn downtown that's gotten a lot of hype because of an upscale new interior and new chef. Believe the hype. We had a nice, intimate booth upstairs partially screened with sheer curtains. A screen nearby at the head of a long, communal table in center of the room showed slowly moving images reminiscent of Renaissance paintings. If you follow the web link above, you can see this room.
I had a delicious drink consisting of Bombay Sapphire Gin, a pomegranate liqueur, and Cointreau. The bread was served with butter infused with lots of fresh tarragon. Stephan had a pork tenderloin with collard greens and a sort of parsnip/bacon cake. I had the filet mignon, in a red wine demi-glace with, oddly enough, macaroni in a light, cream cheese and a small salad on the side of fresh herbs like fennel greens.
You know a meal was good when you think about it the next day and your mouth waters. Both entrees were excellent. I'm not much of a beef eater, but I will indulge every now and then. This is definitely a place to do so. The red wine demi-glace was delicious. I could eat it on anything, except maybe ice cream. I loved the strong flavors of the herbs in the salad, and the delicate creamy macaroni with the tang of the red wine sauce.
For desert, we split a warm chocolate ganache cake with rosewater cream and fresh berries. My stomach felt like it had died and gone to heaven. I'm picky about restaurants and a lot are not what they are cracked up to be. This is definitely a great place to visit for a special occasion. Next time, I want to try the martini with cucumber-mint puree.