During the first half of the twentieth century, no French writer was more universally revered than Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette -- Notre Grande Colette, as her compatriots always addressed her: But grande is too easily translated into English as "grand"; the word also suggests "noble," "magnificent," "peerless."
 
She was a best-selling novelist at the age of twenty-two, a music hall performer and later a actress of considerable repute, a Le Matin journalist, a novelist, essayist, playwright, autobiographer, literary and cultural critic, and constant chronicler of the world around her. 
 
Best known for her novels, Cheri and Gigi, she wrote endlessly about gardens, cats, fashion, food, earning a living, making love, holidays, the weather, even the sound of a snowflake falling or the sight of a poppy opening.  Her sixth sense was memory, and simultaneously she embraced the world around her, with both her head and her heart.
 
Born in 1873, she died  in 1954, encrusted with honors and the respect of the world of letters on both sides of the Atlantic -- a French earth-mother and national treasure.

Open House & Special Program 10.26.08 4:00pm
Lancaster Literary Guild invites its members to a special open house for a program of about forty-five minutes, narrated by Bruce Kellner, with readings from Colette's work by Priscilla Oppenheimer, interspersed with some songs from Colette's milieu sung by Shirley Garrett, accompanied by Matthew Hurley.
Lancaster Literary Guild
113 N. Lime Street , Lancaster
Members Only  RSVP 717.431.4433

Photography Exhibit
First Friday opening 11.07.08  5-9pm
Open daily to the public through 12.06.08
Tuesdays through Saturdays 10 a.m. to 2 p.m,   
Lancaster Literary Guild
113 N. Lime Street , Lancaster
Free to the public