A fledgling inventor concentrates so hard on developing her genius, she almost forgets the teachings of the Goddess in the Dancing Mountains.

Clever-Lazy, the girl who invented herself (An Argo book)

Bodger, Joan

Atheneum

Over forty years ago, Joan Bodger, her husband, and two children went to Britain on a very special family quest. They were seeking the world that they knew and loved through children’s books. In Winnie-the-Pooh Country, Mrs. Milne showed them the way to “that enchanted place on the top of the Forest [where] a little boy and his Bear will always be playing.” In Edinburgh they stood outside Robert Louis Stevenson’s childhood home, tilting their heads to talk to a lamplighter who was doing his job. In the Lake District they visited Jemima Puddle-Duck’s farm, and Joan sought out crusty Arthur Ransome to talk to him about Swallows and Amazons. They spent several days “messing about in boats” on the River Thames, looking for Toad Hall and other places described by Kenneth Grahame in The Wind in the Willows. Mud and flood kept them from attaining the slopes of Pook’s Hill (on Rudyard Kipling’s farm), but they scaled the heights of Tintagel. As in all good fairy tales, there were unanswered questions. Did they really find Camelot? Robin Hood, as always, remains elusive. One thing is certain. Joan Bodger brings alive again the magic of the stories we love to remember. She persuades us that, like Emily Dickinson, even if we “have never seen a moor,” we can imagine “how the heather looks.” First published in 1965 by Viking in New York, How the Heather Looks has become a prized favorite among knowledgeable lovers of children’s literature. Precious, well-thumbed copies have been lent out with caution and reluctance, while new admirers have gone searching in vain for copies to buy second-hand. This handsome reprint, with a new Afterword by Joan Bodger, makes a unique and delightful classic available once more.

How the Heather Looks: A Joyous Journey to the British Sources of Children's Books

Teen & Young Adult

MCCLELLAND STEWART

Joan Bodger, born in 1923, is a self-proclaimed old woman, whose life is so intertwined with story that she cannot write about one without telling about the other. A well-known storyteller and Gestalt therapist, she finds strength in stories – her own, other people’s, and the myths and legends of the world. She has lived a life that fell apart not once but several times. Each time, she pieced her life together again; she has learned to appreciate both the mosaic and the cracks. Joan’s father was an officer in the United States Coast Guard; her British mother came from a distinguished – and eccentric – shipping family. Because of her father’s job, she moved frequently from one tough American port town to another. But she also lived for a time in an English country house. Trying to fit herself into each new situation, she not only relied on the family stories she knew so well, but she also became an acute observer of the nuances of class shibboleth, racial prejudice, and regional and national differences. Her observations are always sharp, often funny. Graduating from high school shortly after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, she attended university for two years and then joined the army. After the war she returned to university, married, and attended Columbia University where she took – and was struck by – a course in storytelling. Although she refers to herself as a suburban wife and mother at this time, her suburb was Shanks Village, a community of veterans studying on the G.I. Bill, which was a hotbed of political activism and social experimentation. Joan read, wrote, and studied continually. She steeped herself in folklore and anthropology. When tragedy struck, in the form of mental illness, marriage breakdown, and the loss of her seven-year-old daughter, Joan drew on what she had learned during these years. She helped start a nursery school in a black neighborhood and became director of the first Headstart Program in New York State. She later directed a therapeutic nursery school in a New York City orphanage, taught at Bank Street Graduate School of Education, wrote How the Heather Looks, a book about British children’s literature, and became a book reviewer for the New York Times. In 1968-69 she was invited to become Director of Children’s Services, State Library of Missouri, only to be fired before a year was up – as a Communist pornographer. (Her name was subsequently cleared by the American library Association’s Intellectual Freedom Committee.) Stories saved her once again. Hired by the legendary Bennett Cerf, she became a liaison editor of children’s books – a sort of roving ambassador – for Random House-Pantheon-Knopf. It was in this role that she made a trip to Toronto, and fell in love with the Canadian who became her second husband. Moving to Canada, she again rebuilt her life on the foundation of story, training as a Gestalt therapist and helping to start the Storytelling School of Toronto. When tragedy struck once more, she continued to live her life with courage and resilience, sustained by these interests. Since childhood, Joan has had a fine eye for detail, and the ability to put her observations into words. She has lived in awareness of the history of her time, and has frequently been swept up in its events. She writes frankly of the discoveries of childhood, the mysteries of family life, the power of sexuality, the devastating effect of loss, and, through it all, the transforming influence of literature, of story. A remarkable old woman, she tells her story with honesty, candor, and wit. This courageous autobiography will be an inspiration to all readers – but particularly to women dealing with the poorly charted territory of their later years.

The Crack In The Teacup

Biographies & Memoirs

Arts & Literature

Emblem Editions

Far away, and on the other side of time, there lived Clever-Lazy, an explorer who loved to invent marvellous and useful things. She longed for a chance to do nothing but invent. When that chance came, it was not quite what she expected. Not everyone understood her inventions. Sometimes they puzzled people, or frightened them. And the inventions that frightened even her, proved that invention for invention’s sake was not enough. Clever-Lazy and her friend-husband Tinker move across a landscape that may or may not be ancient China. Certainly her inventions, including gunpowder, are all from that time and place. But whatever the setting, the truths of her story, and the magic and mystery of her fate exist everywhere and in all times.

Clever-Lazy

Historical Fiction

Tundra Books

Deep in the forest, Sylvania lives in peaceful serenity with her husband, Bernardo the woodcutter, and daughters, Rosy and Daisy, when the lure of adventure leads Bernardo into a foreign war. Years later, when he finally returns, he is an unrecognizable stranger. Using the lore of generations of women, Sylvania and her daughters set out to heal him and recover the man they love.Incorporating stories as disparate – and as connected – as the story of Ruth and Naomi, the Great Pan, and Sir Gawain and the Loathly Maid, Joan Bodger weaves a masterful and unique work, the culmination of her lifetime as a storyteller.

The Forest Family

Children's Books

Fairy Tales, Folk Tales & Myths

Selected by the Children’s Book Committee at Bank Street College of Education as one of the 2004 Best Children’s Books for the YearThe late Joan Bodger was known internationally as one of our foremost storytellers. At the heart of her repertoire were the great medieval tales of lords and ladies, treachery, and chivalry. Among these beautiful courtly tales from Europe are the stories of Tristan – young and old – Childe Rowland, Burd Janet, and Iron John.These are stories that were heard at the long tables of the great halls, stories repeated around modest peat fires in cozy cottages, stories that traveled with the tellers across the seas. Tales of Court and Castle is an irresistible invitation to young readers to discover stories of enduring power.

Tales of Court and Castle

Literature & Fiction

Interweaving ancient Celtic material with personal stories, Tales of the Winter Hag evokes a lifetime of tragedy and joy. Recorded live, in concert, Joan Bolger sets the scene with the story of Sir Gawain and the loathly lady, linking it to her own explorations of the rituals of prehistoric times.

Tales of the Winter Hag

Arts & Photography

Performing Arts

StorySave

In The Crack in the Teacup, Joan Bodger has done more than write a fascinating autobiography that reveals the power of stories. With courage, unblinking honesty, the eye of a storyteller, and the pen of a poet, she has shown how a life-and a century-can be shaped and given meaning by personal mythology.

The Crack in the Teacup

Starburst Digital Rights International inc.

The Crack in the Teacup: The Life of an Old Woman Steeped in Stories

The Estate of Joan Bodger

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Bodger, Joan. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Bodger, Joan

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Bodger, Joan. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Clever-Lazy, the girl who invented herself (An Argo book)

How the Heather Looks: A Joyous Journey to the British Sources of Children's Books

The Crack In The Teacup

How the Heather Looks: A Joyous Journey to the British Sources of Children's Books

Clever-Lazy

The Forest Family

Tales of Court and Castle

Tales of the Winter Hag

The Crack in the Teacup

The Crack in the Teacup: The Life of an Old Woman Steeped in Stories