Book Markers 07.28.11

Celebrating B.H. Friedman

    The Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center in Springs will be the site of a memorial gathering on Sunday for the writer B.H. Friedman, who was perhaps most famous for his 1972 biography, “Jackson Pollock: Energy Made Visible.” Among his works to be read is a one-act play, “Meeting the Master,” about the first time he met the artist.

    Bernard Harper Friedman died of complications from pneumonia on Jan. 4 at the age of 84. A former real estate executive who lived in East Hampton for many years, he gave up that work to write — not only biographies (the arts patron Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney was another subject) but a memoir of drug experimentation and novels, too, most recently “My Case Rests,” from 2009.

    The event, which starts at 5 p.m., will offer food, drink, and ample reminiscences. Anyone interested in being a reader can call the Pollock-Krasner House and speak to its director, Helen Harrison, or drop a line to [email protected]. 

“Everything Beautiful” in Sag

    Simon Van Booy’s first published work appeared in this newspaper back in 2000. He came to the South Fork to get an M.F.A. in writing from Southampton College and, though he now lives in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, he’s been coming back ever since. For readings, too, like the one on Saturday at 6 p.m. at Canio’s Books in Sag Harbor, where the featured book will be his spanking-new debut novel, “Everything Beautiful Began After,” which involves American expats in Greece.

    It follows two well-received story collections, “The Secret Lives of People in Love,” from 2007, and “Love Begins in Winter,” which, more than well received, won the $50,000 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award in 2009. Not a bad supplement for a single father teaching at the School of Visual Arts.