Mira Bartók is a Chicago-born artist
and writer and the author of 28 books for children. Her writing has appeared in
several literary journals and anthologies and has been noted in The Best American Essays series. She lives in western Massachusetts
where she runs Mira's List, a
blog that helps artists find funding and residencies all over the world, and North
of Radio, a multimedia collaborative. The
Memory Palace (Free Press, January 11,
2011) is Mira's first book for adults. You can find her at the book's website.
On your nightstand now:
Well, there are quite a few piled up right now: The Haunted House, a debut book by a young poet named Marisa Crawford; Voyages in English by poet Dara Wier; a collection of W.B. Yeats; A History of the Gypsies of Eastern Europe and Russia by David M. Crowe; A Secret Gift by Ted Gup; Making Comics by Scott McCloud; I Thought You Were Dead by Pete Nelson; In the Wake by Per Petterson; and a giant book on Scandinavian mythology.
Favorite book when you were a child:
A collection of Russian fairytales my father sent me and The Secret Garden by Francis Hodgson Burnett
Your top five authors:
I chose living authors, not dead ones: Nick Flynn, Per Petterson, graphic novelist Chris Ware (why someone hasn't nominated him for a MacArthur Fellowship is beyond me), Annie Dillard, Kathryn Davis.
Book you've faked reading:
I can't remember ever having faked reading anything. But I'm sure I have!
Book you're an evangelist for:
The Arrival by Shaun Tan--an exquisitely drawn fantasy graphic novel about immigration that has absolutely no words.
Book you've bought for the cover:
Author/illustrator Peter Sis's The Tree of Life.
Book that changed your life:
Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet that my sister handed to me when I was hiding in an apple tree in my grandparents' backyard.
Favorite line from a book:
From Dante's Inferno: Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita/ mi ritrovai per una selva oscura, ché la diritta via era smarrita (in English: When I had journeyed half of our life's way, I found myself within a shadowed forest, for I had lost the path that does not stray.
Book you most want to read again for the first time:
The Secret Garden of course!