↓

TABLE OF CONTENTS

RETURN TO MAIN PAGE

Gladys Knight’s 1968 pop hit had it right, “There’s magic in the air. Greet us everywhere. It’s summer.” Before Memorial Day, questions for friends build up like geysers: What are you doing for the summer? Where are you going? What are your plans? 

In the Northern Hemisphere at least, summer brings maximum daylight for activities. Let’s fill up the hours with adventure. Summer is the season for doing—not curling up by a fire, not hibernating and secluding yourself from others, but the opposite: gathering, traveling, exploring, sunning, and funning.

Summer surprises us all at once, somehow. It is like a gate we rush through, like a race down a grassy hill. It’s a timeless sensation. The English Romantic poet John Clare wrote these lines in 1841: “I love to see the summer beaming forth/ And white wool sack clouds sailing to the north….”

Whatever your summer plans are, The Season has some ideas for you. Why not bring Latter-day Saint artists along? You’re going to need books to read on those vacations and campouts, food for those picnics, classes for summer learning, and audio for those long road trips. Lucky for you, we have dozens of delightful possibilities.

Summer is about more than having fun. It’s also a call to explore and recalibrate where we’re headed in life. In his poem, “Song of the Open Road,” Walt Whitman turns the image of the open road into an invitation to expand the person’s internal and external, to leave work behind, (he didn’t call it unplugging, but we can) and to find things, places, and people to love. Here is the final section of his 1856 poem:

Allons! the road is before us! 

It is safe—I have tried it—my own feet have tried it well—be not detain’d! 

Let the paper remain on the desk unwritten, and the book on the shelf unopen’d! 

Let the tools remain in the workshop! let the money remain unearn’d! 

Let the school stand! mind not the cry of the teacher! 

Let the preacher preach in his pulpit! let the lawyer plead in the court, and the judge expound the law. 

Camerado, I give you my hand! 

I give you my love more precious than money, 

I give you myself before preaching or law; 

Will you give me yourself? will you come travel with me? 

Shall we stick by each other as long as we live?

We invite you to survey the offerings in our Summer Guide—new books: picture books for children, books for middle grade, young adults, and fiction and non-fiction for adults; interesting food by LDS purveyors for your campout and picnic basket; fascinating podcasts and audio books for road trips; and in-person and virtual summer school classes. Bring your own sunscreen; otherwise, we’ve got you covered.

Thank you so much for your continuing efforts, as you say, to focus on the intersection of creativity and belief for Latter-day Saints, and to share your experiences, knowledge and insights with others. You are doing our community a great service.

That spirit was also a core value of the Associated Latter-day Media Artists (ALMA) that I founded in the 1970s-90s, and it lives on today, not only in your Center for Latter-day Saint Arts organization, but also in other similar groups like the Latter-day Saints in Publishing and Media Arts (LDSPMA) and the fledgling "Visionaries" in Utah, and the Utah Alumni in Entertainment in Los Angeles. May it continue to grow as we all use our talents in service to our God.

Robert Starling

Riverton, Utah

The May issue just arrived in my inbox and I wanted to dig in when I had full time to relish. You have my interest piqued! The team does such important work. Being exposed to The Center for Latter-day Saint Arts felt like I found the home I had been looking for. I attended an Exponent II retreat last fall and there met Margaret Olsen Hemming who told me about it. May we all art more!

Shannon Milliman

Florence, Alabama

Glen Nelson, you are an extraordinary writer. Both pieces in the May issue are great reads. The discussion about The Chosen obviously went well beyond the event itself. Particularly compelling was the section about McNally and Shepard. I was devastated. Thanks for intellectually and emotionally impactful writing. 

Pat Debenham

Orem, Utah

James Ransom

James Ransom is an award-winning commercial photographer with over ten years of experience shooting stills and motion for brands spanning the food, still life, and interiors industries. He lives in New York City with his wife and four children.

What tickets do you have?