Big Blue Marble: The Master's Muse reading with Varley O'Connor

Big Blue Marble Bookstore, 551 Carpenter Ln, Philadelphia, PA | Get Directions »
FREE

Wednesday, May 23, 7:00pm.

The Master's Muse reading with Varley O'Connor.

A Writers and the Process Series event hosted by Minter Krotzer. Varley O'Connor's fourth novel, The Master's Muse, is based on the life of George Balanchine's fifth wife, a star ballerina whose career was cut short when she contracted polio at age twenty-six.. In 1956, hours after performing with the New York City Ballet, Tanaquil Le Clercq fell gravely ill, awaking from a feverous sleep to find that she could no longer move her legs. Set against the backdrop of creative New York of the 1960s and 70s, The Master's Muse tells the remarkable true story of two artistic legends whose profound love and complicated relationship forever changed American cultural history.

Varley O'Connor's first novel, Like China, described by the New York Times as "a first novel that soars," was published by William Morrow in 1991. Her second novel, A Company of Three, about the world of theater and acting, came out from Algonquin Books in 2003. Her third novel, The Cure, was published by the Bellevue Literary Press in 2007. She has taught writing and literature at Irvine, Hofstra University, Brooklyn College, Marymount Manhattan College, the North Carolina Writers' Network, and thrice for the Squaw Valley Community of Writers' Summer Conference.