Newly issued:
JMB, painter, is also a poet, since childhood.
Poems of Love, Friendship and Human Nature
Joan Mitchell Blumenthal (2013)
What flowing and grace and us.
Do yourself a favor, get this book.
The preceding painting by JMB is titled ‘The Kingdom of Earth’ (1972).
Below is her drawing ‘The Possessor’.
Within the last couple of years, Joan Mitchell Blumenthal died. A while later, Allan Blumenthal also died. I find no record of these deaths from online searches. I infer these deaths from posts at the Facebook page of Allan, who was a FB friend of mine. Here is a self-portrait of Joan.
Nathaniel Branden, in Judgement Day, dropped heavy hints that Allan Blumenthal was gay. Does anybody know if that was true?
@Reidy – I did not take the remark of N. Branden as any hint that Allan was gay. (Allan might have been or bi, but I don’t know of it by any route.) I took Branden’s remark as a bit more sophisticated, specifically, that Allan did not seem to mind being around effeminate gays. Such, for example, I have gathered from videos online, was the man Gordon who was the high-fashion model who sat for Joan’s drawing The Possessor in the 1960’s. (My understanding from Ellen Stuttle is that Gordon was a patient of Dr. Blumenthal, and although she did not know, she would not have been surprised but what the negative view of homosexuality standard with Rand’s circle in those days got absorbed by Gordon, and he found he could not switch, and that perhaps was the reason he committed suicide.) If my take on Branden’s remark in his book is correct, then I don’t see it necessarily as a criticism against being at ease with homosexuals per se. But perhaps I am stilted in how I took the remark of Branden, stilted because I myself am repulsed by effeminate gay men (such as what is usually called swish) and by men who are cross-dressers, including in drag shows. (I do not know why I am that way, and I do not care why any more than why I like cerulean blue.) I mean that somewhat broadly, since I DO find the original film La Cage aux Follies hilarious and a joy.
What will happen to this website of his (with his music theory and history lectures)? musiclectures.drblumenthal.net . Somebody (obviously an heir) is offering it for sale (or to “preserve”).