Literary Events (Page 146)

Literary Sala presents Dallas Star Linda Gray and New Yorker Cartoonist Victoria Roberts

By Carole Schor

Linda Gray, star of the hit series, Dallas, will appear in person here in San Miguel de Allende at the Literary Sala on July 14 at 5:00 p.m. Also appearing on the same program will be the legendary New Yorker cartoonist, Victoria Roberts. It’s an historic evening, not to be missed.

Linda Gray

Linda Gray believes that getting older only gets better. Her new memoir, The Road to Happiness Is Always Under Construction, gives us an inside look into the tragedies and triumphs of her life so far. She was temporarily paralyzed by polio at age 5; she lost her younger sister Betty to cancer; and for more than two decades she was trapped in a deeply unhappy, emotionally abusive marriage.

The book is full of fascinating insights into the TV show that turned Linda into an international star. Sue Ellen was “a mogul’s wife with a shiny outside and a pickled liver.” In an eerie way, her career-defining character, who was forever engaged in roller-coaster battles with her Machiavellian, philandering husband, mirrored Linda’s own life. Fans of the soap were unaware that off-screen Linda was herself in an emotionally abusive relationship with her husband, art director and photographer Ed Thrasher (designer of album covers for musicians such as Frank Sinatra, Jimi Hendrix, and Joni Mitchell).

Gray is well known for her fabulous legs, a fact that helped to launch her first career as a model. At age 27, she was paid $25 to be Anne Bancroft’s body double in the publicity poster for The Graduate (1967) with Dustin Hoffman!

In her book Linda offers inspiration to all for overcoming obstacles to happiness! She will share anecdotes and get real with us at her Literary Sala appearance.

Victoria Roberts

Victoria Roberts is an internationally renowned cartoonist whose work appears regularly in the New Yorker and the New York Times, as well as dozens of other magazines and media. Victoria was a contract cartoonist for the New Yorker for twenty-five years. She is also the illustrator of the New York Times weekly science question. Her first cartoon strip, “My Sunday,” ran in Nation Review (Australia) when she was nineteen. She has written or illustrated over twenty books, including Cattitudes, a feline feast for the eyes featuring more than seventy watercolor illustrations. Delight in this eclectic collection of images, all cats of singular talent and endless appeal! They are literary, artistic, ecclesiastic, acrobatic, and masochistic. There are beautiful cats, international cats, bad cats, and mad cats in need of a little therapy.

Victoria was born in New York City and grew up in Mexico City and Sydney, Australia. In her latest book, After the Fall, she brings Mexico to the page when a Fifth Avenue penthouse family has fallen on hard times and is forced to live in Central Park, where the Mexican maids bring the family chilaquiles and tamales and continue to watch telenovelas on the TV that Pops has set up for them. In the book she combines her charming drawings and penchant for whimsy with storytelling panache to create a stylish, funny, and sweet illustrated novel. According to one reviewer, “The whimsical and zany cartoon drawings of the family include Mother, the eccentric diva; Pops, the scatterbrained inventor prone to bouts of melancholia; Alan, the brother and narrator; and the bespectacled Sis, whom we recognize as the young Victoria. Their fairy tale residency in the park is both a moving and humorous story of a family’s adventures and inventions in their new urban lifestyle among greenery and wildlife.”

Join Dallas’s Linda Gray and the New Yorker’s Victoria Roberts at the San Miguel Literary Sala on July 14 at 5pm at the Hotel La Aldea. Admission is 50 pesos for members and 100 pesos for nonmembers and includes a wine and snack reception. Membership in the Literary Sala supports not only the literary life of San Miguel, including scholarships for teens and reading projects for children in the campo. It also offers attractive benefits such as reading groups, discounts at the monthly author readings, as well as discounts and priority seating at the Annual Writers’ Conference. A membership table will be available at the Sala event. It is also possible to obtain information and join online here.

Gray will also be the guest of honor at a more intimate event, an elegant brunch at the Rosewood Hotel on Sunday, July 17 at 12:30 p.m. The event is a benefit for the Literary Sala’s “My First Book” reading appreciation project for children in campo communities. To purchase your ticket, go to Eventbrite.