Musician with MS organizes poem marathon

How to go

What: Marathon reading of “Paradise Lost” by John Milton, part of the “Words and Music, Perhaps” series by The Early Music Center, a Yellow Springs group of musicians who give lessons and perform

When: 5 p.m. to midnight, Friday, Feb. 19

Where: Yellow Springs Senior Center Great Room, 227 Xenia Ave.

Information: Call Patricia Olds at (937) 767-8161 to be a reader for $2 in a 20 minute slot. Others attend for $3.

YELLOW SPRINGS — Patricia Olds started playing viola de gamba, a type of violin played on the leg instead of under the chin, because she did not have the strength in her fingers to keep playing cello.

Since about age 20, Olds has lived with multiple sclerosis.

Olds taught English and music at Wright State University until her retirement in 1985. She still plays viola de gamba with her organization, The Early Music Center.

Now Olds and her group have organized a fundraiser for the center: a marathon reading of excerpts of “Paradise Lost” on Friday, Feb. 19, at the Yellow Springs Senior Center, 227 Xenia Ave.

The reading combines Olds’ passions for literature and music. The funds will help The Early Music Center apply for grants and play future shows, she said.

The Early Music Center has four musicians who play medieval and Baroque music, Olds said. The center offers lessons in reading music, a cappella, music theory and playing viola de gamba and recorder. They might perform during the poem marathon, which is part of the music group’s series, “Words and Music, Perhaps,” said Olds.

“Paradise Lost” is John Milton’s 12-book blank-verse poem about the Christian story of the temptation of Adam and Eve by Satan and their expulsion from the Garden of Eden.

“It’s the only epic poem of modern English,” said Olds, 78, whose illness requires her to use a wheelchair and play a smaller viola de gamba treble in her lap. She and her husband, Ray, live in Yellow Springs.

The idea came from her friend, Henry Limouze, WSU history department interim chair. Limouze has held four “Paradise Lost” marathons at WSU when teaching Milton classes. He said the poem, which is 10,000 lines, makes a good marathon because it tells a story with plot and straightforward narrative.

“I’ve always been very impressed, even more so in recent years, by the fact she (Olds) doesn’t let things stop her,” said Limouze, who pointed out Milton was blind when he wrote “Paradise Lost.”

Olds has had her own setbacks and even says she did not expect to live this long. Multiple sclerosis is an autoimmune disease that damages brain and spinal cord nerves. She said the effect of MS on the brain and spinal cord causes loss of muscle control, vision, balance and sensation.

She studied early music in London, England, while on sabbatical at WSU. In 1979, she started The Early Music Center with a grant from the Village of Yellow Springs. Other members of the group are Robbie Marion, Kitty Jensen and Fred Bartenstein of Yellow Springs.

Contact this reporter at levingston.2@wright.edu.