What with a profile of television host and mad fisherman Clarke Gayford, a photo essay by Auckland photographer Emma Bass and her almost hypnotic Imperfect flower series, an analysis of Esquire's 1954 Handbook for Hosts and a provocative piece on the struggle to combine motherhood and an artistic life, we've hopefully got something for everyone this week.
American novelist Rufi Thorpe's essay on motherhood had me transfixed reading it. In her introductory paragraphs, she writes of catching up with an old friend while in New York on a publicity tour, and in the middle of their torrent of conversation, she says, almost without thinking: "Oh, well, I love my husband, he is the perfect man for me and it was love at first sight, but I would never willingly enter into this state of servitude again."
The sucker punches keep coming, an outpouring of love, anger, confusion and rage at her inability to combine motherhood with a life of the mind.
I'm not sure I entirely agree with her but I couldn't put it down.
