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Karen Shklanka: Spiritual Abandon

by Sandra Vander Shaaf 2013-09-23

shklankaAs promised, here is another back cover blurb to tempt your appetite for Passionate Embrace:  Faith, Flesh, Tango.  Karen Shklanka is a local tanguera, poet, and physician.  We met in 2009, at the book launch party for her collection of poetry, Sumac’s Red Arms (Coteau Books) and have since become good friends.  I was honoured when she agreed to read my manuscript.  Here’s her endorsement:
Karen Shklanka, poet, author of Sumac’s Red Arms

“Passionate Embrace is not only a nuanced description of falling in love with Argentine tango, it is a powerful story of healing.  Vander Schaaf leads the reader into the dance to share her experience as a beginning tanguera—the spark of curiosity, the awkward beginnings, the surprise of being held tenderly and respectfully in the arms of strangers, and the exquisite moment of spiritual abandon when she inhabits her body anew, awake once again to the unselfconscious joy of movement and beauty of her childhood self.  As a professional photographer, Vander Schaaf adds another dimension to the story.  Her subtle images transcend tango clichés and capture moments of connection and interiority, inviting the reader to discover this rich and complex social dance and its profoundly textured culture and community.”

2013-09-23 0 comment
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Celeste Snowber: Embodied Prayer

by Sandra Vander Shaaf 2013-08-28

If books were dancers, I would take special delight in sending Passionate Embrace:  Faith, Flesh, Tango onto the dance floor with Celeste Snowber’s Embodied Prayer:  Towards Wholeness of Body, Mind, Soul.  When I read this inspired book almost twenty years ago, I underlined passages like this:

However we phrase it, men and women are crying out to discover the wildness within them, the passionate, the intuitive, the child, the creative, the part that acknowledges both spirit and body, the part of them that enlivens and fuels them through life.  We are tired of being separated from our bodies, we yearn for connectedness, wholeness, and healing.

When I entered the sensually and spiritually rich world of Argentine Tango, Embodied Prayer came off my bookshelves once again, practically begging to be read anew.  Fresh meaning infused the words; this time I read it not just with my mind but with my whole body.  So it is that I dared to ask Celeste Snowber to provide an advance review of my book.  With delight and gratitude, I share her response here:

snowber With Passionate Embrace, Vander Schaaf brings us into a beautiful, vibrant space, filled with visceral details of a life lived authentically.  With poetic sensibility, she tells the story of how the beauty of tango lead her on an intimate and profound journey.  Vander Schaaf brings spirit and body to all her words, words that celebrate vulnerability, resilience, and yearning.  We are led as by a beautiful dance partner, with words that dance on the page.

–Celeste Snowber, PhD, dancer, educator, writer, author of Embodied Prayer: Towards Wholeness of Body, Mind, Soul.

 

Originally posted on www.passionateembrace.ca, August 2013.

2013-08-28 0 comment
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  • Karen Shklanka: Spiritual Abandon
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  • Celeste Snowber: Embodied Prayer

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Sandra Vander Schaaf
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