Daring steps

This is a photo of our son Harvey and his class of freshmen at Yale. He leads a seminar on reproductive biology, an elective mainly for students expecting to enter various medical fields.
To enlarge the photo, click on it; to reduce it again, use back arrow.

Dear Family and friends,

Harvey and I enjoy talking to each other about teaching: he is a master at it, perhaps partly because he is not required by his work as a research scientist to teach regularly, day after day. Because he has only this one course, which he has taught for a few years now, he can devote himself to the seminar in ways that most professors at colleges cannot. But he does have a natural gift. I have to say that he caught a lot of my interest in teaching: active learning, student-centered teaching, social gatherings for students at his home—all these are part of the modus operandi that I employed too. As a freshman in college myself, I read the essay "How Agassiz taught Shaler," and it inspired my teaching from then on, leading ultimately to the grant proposal I wrote and won for NCC on active learning across the disciplines, a program still working (and expanded) at NCC under Hedda's direction.

Yesterday's big event was the opera Armida, by Rossini, a wonderful production, broadcast live from the Met; we attended the HD version at the Port Washington movie theater. Not the best venue, but we were closed out at our preferred locations. We hope to go to many of the 11 operas the Met will broadcast in HD next year, and we will order our tickets early!

It was an adventure for us, because we used both the walker and the cane to make the trip down and up the fairly steep aisle possible for me. I am getting stronger but still a little fearful, especially after Paul had his accident. Turns out, he didn't even do anything to break the sutures: he just turned, and one or more broke. It was a near disaster. He is better now, thank goodness.

If you are interested in this production of Armida, it will be repeated on 4, 7, 11, and 15 May at 8 p.m.—but only at the Met itself. I sometimes used to get a standing room ticket and stand at the very back wall just below the roof, but the music was still glorious from there, and all the large effects were visible. Now one can phone at noon sharp and get a $20 ticket in a better spot: but these go very quickly. 12.01 can be too late. I did this once only and sat in the orchestra, probably a seat that would have cost over $200.

Merwin and I were intrigued by this opera because we both knew (but he much better) a lovely, sweet and charming girl who lived in his neighborhood named Armida. Renée Fleming strikes me (and many) as having that same kind of sweetness and charm. She admitted in the intermission interview that the role stretched her, because every soprano has a different repertoire, and she was going out of her comfort zone—and confided that she could not do what other sopranos for whom this role is tailor-made could do. She sounded great to us, however, and if casting a "lesser" soprano in the role is the price to pay for having this very seldom produced opera performed (not since 1817!), we don't mind. We are not that good at distinguishing the gradations of excellence.

Here, if you are interested, is a URL of a review of the opening performance of the opera, earlier this season:
http://www.nj.com/entertainment/music/index.ssf/2010/04/armida_opera_review_a_flawed_p.html

The reviewer, a lot more knowledgeable than we are, liked but didn't love it. But we did.

When we returned home, we had a fairly light supper and watched the first act of a recent Hamlet film: I'll probably write some details about it when we finish watching it.

Now I have to stop procrastinating and get back to work!

Love to all,
Bernice