March Book of the Month: Spiritual Places In and Around New York City

Even in the most hectic, most busy, most never-sleeping city in the world, comfort for the heart, mind, and soul is only a step away. And here's your quick-and-easy guide to finding it. We are happy to announce Spiritual Places In and Around New York City by Len Belzer and Emily Squires as our Book of the Month for March.

Spiritual Places In and Around New York City is your roadmap to the myriad spaces and places around the boroughs that soothe the psyche and gladden the spirit. as well as a few extraordinarily peaceful destinations worth venturing over the city line for. From restful gardens to quiet galleries to restaurants that feed both our corporeal and incorporeal bodies, and more, Emily Squires and Len Belzer, who both unfortunately passed away in recent years, share those locations (some almost secret, others surprisingly public) that helped them relax amid the frenetic pace of their favorite city. 

In brief sketches of these spiritual respites, they reveal the insights they've come to while visiting each, and convey a palpable sense of the wise and serene essence each imparts upon us. This is a must-have for harried New Yorkers and curious visitors alike. 

About the Authors

Emily Squires was a television director and writer, with a Writer's Guild Award, a Cine Golden Eagle, and six Emmys for directing Sesame Street. She gravitated toward spiritual subjects with an interfaith series for cable television, and documentaries on Hiroshima, the Dalai Lama, and artist/ philosopher Frederick Franck. Len Belzer was a Columbia University graduate, veteran of the U.S. Air Force Intelligence Service, former journalist, and writer, producer, and host of his own nationally syndicated radioshow, The Comedy Hour.
Spiritual Places In and Around New York City is available for your Nook or Kindle, or as a paperback edition at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or at your favorite bookstores.

In Honor of Len Belzer

 

Len Belzer

Last Wednesday, July 30, Len Belzer,  Cosimo author, died from an apparent suicide. He was 73 years old.

Len Belzer was many things throughout his life: he had served in the U.S. Airforce Intelligence Service, he was a writer and journalist, a social worker, host of his radioshow The Comedy Hour, and a student of consciousness and spirituality. His interest in spirituality and his love for New York City, where he lived for many years, resulted in writing a beautiful guidebook in 2000 together with his wife Emily Squires, Spiritual Places in and Around New York City. This book was a tribute to the city they both loved and especially the places, that many people don't always appreciate or even know about, that offer rest, beauty, nature and regeneration of the spirit.

The first time I met Len was when preparing the release of the first (Paraview) edition of their book. He was a nice man with a quiet demeanor and a dry sense of humor. He was also extraordinarily committed to bringing this book directly to the readers: he regularly dropped by our office, picking up copies of their book and then visiting the spiritual places to offer the books to their stores, from the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine to the New York Buddhist Temple, from the Isamu Noguchi Garden to the Cloisters, from the Ayurveda Cafe to Hangawi Korean restaurant, and many more galeries, museums and parks in and around New York City.  Over the years, Len and Emily got many requests to update their book, and so they did in 2008.

The unexpected death of Len's wife, Emily Squires, an Emmy award winning TV director, in late 2012, affected Len deeply. His death a year and half later, is a sad end to his creative and diverse life. May he be remembered for his love of city culture, his creativity and sense of humor.

Alexander M. Dake
Publisher, Cosimo








Click here for a sample of an interview by Len Belzer with comedian Bill Hicks on Len's Comedy Hour.

Finding Peace Amidst March Madness: Spiritual Places In and Around New York City

Emily Squires and her husband Len Belzer teamed up to write this wonderful book on where to find serenity in the characteristically hectic city. We are excited to share with you that Spiritual Places is our book of the month for March. While books for NYC tourists are easy to find, Squires and Belzer decided to showcase the grand island in a different light: where to get away from the hustle and bustle and find a moment to relieve stress.

The authors discuss the various locales with reflections on what they learned while in the space. This is a great guide to places around the boroughs that soothe the psyche and gladden the spirit. We hope you get a moment to sit down with this great read.

But if you find yourself just one of the many commuters with little time to spare, we are proud to announce that the book is available on the Kindle and Nook, for your on-the-go lifestyle.

Emily Squires passed away in November 2012, and as a testament to Emily's nature and writing, following is a sample from the book Spiritual Places In and Around New York City written by Emily and her husband Len Belzer:

THE CLOISTERS

Underneath all the texts, all the sacred psalms

and canticles, these watery varieties of sounds

and silences, terrifying, mysterious, whirling and

sometimes gestating and gentle must somehow be

felt in the pulse, ebb, and flow of the music that

sings in me. My new song must float like a feather

on the breath of God. — Hildegard of Bingen

This riveting glimpse into life in the Middle Ages is an essential place on any seeker’s itinerary- especially if you were a nun or monk in a past life. The art is celestial - paintings and illuminated

manuscripts, intricately woven tapestries from churches and castles, a treasury of gold, silver, jewels, ivories, and enamels - each chosen specifically for the Cloisters from the vast collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

But it’s the feeling of the place that makes it so rare. Madrigals and Gregorian Chants echo through high stone-arched corridors. Chairs are set in small chapels for meditation. Beatific statues of saints and Mary with baby Jesus cast their gaze upon you. Recent interest in such figures as the 11th century’s Abbess Hildegard of Bingen have stirred a new appreciation of things Medieval, and the crucial role of herbs in the Middle Ages is being reexamined. The historically accurate garden at the Cloisters gives us an idea how some of them were used. Arcane plants like fever few, agrimony, mallow, and burdock were used by the nuns and their parishioners for cooking, weaving, and painting

as well as healing.

Espalliered pear trees work their way between Gothic buttresses under warm red-tiled roofs. Covered arched walkways enclose small gardens with chirping birds, bubbling fountains, and quince trees laden with fruit. The softest of green grass calls Rumi to mind: “When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about.” All this high atop a hill in Fort Tryon Park with a sweeping view of the Hudson. Hie thee there!

(from Spiritual Places In and Around New York City by Emily Squires & Len Belzer; Cosimo Books, New York, 2008) 

Tribute to Emily Squires, Evolutionary Leader, Director and Author

Last week I attended a tribute to Emily Squires, who had died last November 21, in New York City. Emily was a successful director, the first woman director of Sesame Street, who had won six Emmy Awards with her team for her work as Director of Sesame Street between 1995 and 2007. She also directed documentaries, including: Visions of Perfect Worlds, a conversation with the Dalai Lama, The Art of Being Human: a Portrait of Frederick Franck, which was shown at the tribute,  Five Masters of Meditation, and films about fracking and Occupy Wall Street.

Photo: Richard Termine/Sesame Street

In addition to her accomplished career, Emily was also actively involved with many good causes and interested in the frontiers of consciousness and human potential as expressed in her board work and membership of organizations such as the Friends of the Institute of Noetic Sciences ("FIONS"), which had organized last week’s tribute- the Source of Synergy Foundation, Evolutionary Leaders, and The Coalition of OneVoice

I met Emily as a fellow board-member of FIONS at the end of last century and was always impressed with her creativity and good nature, which experience only increased as I got to know her as her publisher. It was in those days that she and her husband Len Belzer wrote a lovely book, Spiritual Places in and around New York City, with their favorite inspiring and restful places in this city that never sleeps, from Riverside Church to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, from the New York Open Center to Hangawi Korean restaurant. 

I can only echo what I had heard from so many at this week’s tribute, Emily Squires was a warm personality who made everyone she met feel at ease and acknowledged. She will be dearly missed.

Alexander M. Dake, Publisher, Cosimo