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Dearest Margit and Ursula,
this beautiful heart is especially for you both.
Thanks a million for your wonderful friendship.
Wishing you a wonderful Sunday!
All our love to you and your family,
Betty MacDonald fan club fans,
Wolfgang Hampel's books, stories, poems and interviews are real treasures.
Wolfgang Hampel's very funny Ma and Pa Kettle biography ' The Kettles' Million Dollar Egg ' will be updated
Betty MacDonald fan club newsletter April includes all the info.
Ma and Pa Kettle were comic characters who first appeared in the novel
The Egg and I by Betty MacDonald. She based them on farming neighbors in
Washington state, U.S.A.
In 1996 Betty MacDonald's Family had been
interviewed by journalist Wolfgang Hampel who is the author of The Kettles' Million Dollar Egg.
Betty MacDonald's youngest sister Alison Bard Burnett knew the real 'Kettles' very well and told the most interesting
stories about Betty's exciting experiences with them.
This interview has been published on CD/DVD by Betty MacDonald
Fan Club in 2009.
Ma and Pa Kettle became the featured characters in a
series of popular, light comedic movies in the 1940s and 1950s. The
movies revolved around the absurd misadventures of the Kettle clan.
Pa (Franklin Kettle) (played by Percy Kilbride) is a gentle,
slow-speaking, slow-thinking and lazy man. His only talents appear to be
avoiding work and winning contests. Ma (Phoebe Kettle) (played by
Marjorie Main) is larger, raucous, more ambitious and smarter than Pa,
but not by much, and can easily be fooled. She is content with her role
as mother to a small army of children on their ramshackle farm. At the
end of the first film in the series, Pa Kettle wins a modern home that
the family moves into. As the series continued, various reasons were
devised to have the family relocate to the "old place", sometimes for
extended periods of time.
Much of the humor comes from the preposterous situations the Kettles
find themselves in, such as Pa being mistaken for a wealthy
industrialist or being jailed after he accidentally causes race horses
to eat feed laced with concrete. The Kettles first appeared in
supporting roles in The Egg and I, starring Fred MacMurray and Claudette
Colbert. After that they starred in a series of their own movies. Main
was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1948 for her role in The Egg and I.
Main and Kilbride also appeared together
in the 1948 Universal film Feudin', Fussin' And A-Fightin'. The movie
also starred Donald O'Connor and Joe Besser. Many have mistaken this
movie to be a Kettle film. Main played Maribel Matthews and Kilbride
played Billy Caswell.
Kilbride retired after making Ma and Pa Kettle at
Waikiki. The Pa Kettle character did not appear in The Kettles in the
Ozarks. Arthur Hunnicutt played Pa's brother Sedgewick Kettle in that
movie and in The Kettles on Old MacDonald's Farm, the last Kettle movie,
Parker Fennelly played Pa Kettle.
Many Betty MacDonald - and Wolfgang Hampel fans are very interested in a Wolfgang Hampel CD and DVD with his
very funny poems and stories.
Mr. Tigerli is very busy around the World because of so many serious problems.
I totally agree that our unique Betty MacDonald fan club honor members are brillinat artists and writers.
Let's talk about great writers and poets Letizia Mancino, Hilde Domin and Betty MacDonald.
Betty
MacDonald fan Club honor member, artist and writer Letizia Mancino
shares her delightful story THE SECOND PARADISE.
Enjoy the brilliant translation by Betty MacDonald fan club honor member Mary Holmes, please.
Thanks a million dearest Mary Holmes!
I'm one of Letizia's and Mary's many devoted fans.
Letizia Mancino sent this connecting piece to " The Second Paradise".
DEFIANT AS A COCK
Copyright 2011/2018 by Letizia Mancino
translated by Mary Holmes
All rights reserved
That
was how my friend Hilde Domin was, dear Betty! You would have liked her
so much. She had also been in America. At that time you were a famous
author but she was still unknown.
-Did she love cats like you do?
-Yes Betty, she sure did!! Otherwise how do you think she could have been a friend of mine?
-Oh Letizia, don’t boast! Hilde was famous!
-It’s all the same to me, Betty, whether a person is famous or not but that person must love animals
-Why was she as defiant as a cock?
-Well Betty, she was simply so!
-Like a pregnant woman in my “Egg and I”?
-No not so! Betty, Hilde was a whole farm!
- A farm, how was that?
- No Betty, Hilde was more! Almost a zoo! Even more. She was all the animals in the world!
-You loved her very much.
-As I love all animals.
You Betty, if I had known you, I would have loved you exactly so because you loved animals.
-But as defiant as a cock from my Bob-farm!
-Yes
and no! (Hilde really loved this double form of answer). Listen Betty ,
I’ll tell you a story about how Hilde was. You would certainly have
loved her.
I’ll call my story “The Second Paradise”.
THE SECOND PARADISE
Copyright 2011/2018 by Letizia Mancino
translated by Mary Holmes
All rights reserved
The Lord God, one day, met Adam in Paradise and saw him lying under a palm.
And God spoke to him: Adam, my son, are you happy, are you content with Paradise ?
Adam answered: Oh Lord, it is wonderful!
And God said: But I will create a second Paradise and give you a wife.
Adam answered: Oh Lord, that is wonderful!
And God said: I will create the wife according to your wishes.
And Adam stood under the palm and thought hard.
And God said: Adam, are you ready?
Adam
answered: My wife should be as lively as a bird but she should not fly.
She should swim like a goldfish but not be a fish….. She should be as
playful as a cat but not catch mice….. She should be as busy as an ant
but not so small.
And God said: So shall she be: Like a bird, a goldfish, a cat, an ant…
Adam answered: Oh Lord, that is wonderful, but she should be as faithful as a dog.
And God asked: Adam, have you finished?
Oh Lord, cried Adam. She should also be as delightful and gentle as a lamb and as defiant as a cock!
….She should be as curious as a monkey and as pampered as a lapdog.
And God said: So shall she be.
And Adam said: My wife should be as courageous as a lion and as headstrong as a goat…
And
God said: So, like a bird, a goldfish, a cat, an ant, a dog, a lamb, a
cock, a monkey, a lapdog, a lion, a goat… and slowly and surely he
wished to begin creating…
But Adam stretched himself under the palm and called:
Lord, Lord, she should be as adaptable as a chameleon but not creep on four feet.
She should have sparkling eyes like, like… real diamonds. She should be as fiery as a volcano
But … she should have crystal-clear thoughts like a mountain spring.
God, the Almighty, was speechless…
And Adam spoke: Also she should be as quick as lightening…
And God said: Man, have you finished????
No, said Adam! She should be as strong as a horse, as long living as an elephant but as light as a butterfly!
God
found Adam’s thoughts were good and said: So, bird, goldfish, cat, ant,
dog, lamb, cock, monkey, lapdog, lion, goat, chameleon, genuine
diamonds, volcano, mountain spring, lightening, horse, elephant….
butterfly…
God wished at last to begin creating her…
Lord, called Adam… she should be as stable as steel, but as sweet as three graceful women in one…
And God asked: Should she also be a poet?
Yes, called Adam from under the palm…
And God said: Adam have you finished?
Lord, I wish that, in the second Paradise I shall be one and doubled:
So God according to Adams last words created:
HILDE PALM DOMIN
Very best wishes
Letizia Mancino
Letizia Mancino is an outstanding writer and artist.