One evidence of the striking singularity of this particular moment is the fact that there are currently 206 holds at the small library in Kearns, Utah on the book "White Fragility: Why it's So Hard for White People to Talk about Racism."
When University of Virginia (UVA) professor Andrew Stauffer sent his class to the library in the fall of 2009, he expected them to focus on the printed text of the books they brought back. But Stauffer and his students soon realized that was just one story being told in these volumes. While looking at nineteenth-century copies of work by Felicia Hemens, a poet widely beloved at the time for her sentimental verse, the students were immediately drawn to everything else happening in these books; not just the expected underlining and dog-ears, but bookplates, diary entries, letters, quotes, pressed flowers, and readers own poetic flights of fancy.
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In this way, Book Traces celebrates what Stauffer calls bibliodiversity; appreciating each book as its own object with its own life and history. "We're fighting against the idea that once you've digitized a single copy, then you don't need others,: says Stauffer.COMMENT
Dear Ann Cannon,COMMENT
I find that during this time of social distancing, one of the activities I miss most is visiting the library. Any suggestions for borrowing books? Not e-books, not audio book, real books.
Because of the coronavirus, two of the most enduring institutions in my life are also closed; the library and the church. I am a writer. Since the library is closed, I can't check out books, consult with library staff or use the internet. Without the church, I can't enjoy fellowship with other congregants, listen to heavenly spiritual music, or hear the preacher preach.
Science fiction appealed to her at a young age. Little about her real life was cohesive, but imagined worlds could be complete, self-contained, and bound by logic. I saw 'Star Wars' when it came out, because I was a creepy, obsessed space child," she told me. Later she mined her local library for science-fiction novels; she covered the books in paper so that she could read them in class.
Having read Mary Slosson's review of Deep River ("Wading into murky waters," 11/11/19), I picked up the novel from my local library against my better judgment. Imagine my surprise when I found, in lieu of the reactionary, stereotype-laden, and politically tone-deaf work described by Slosson, a novel focused on the struggles of working people in the Northwest at the turn of the century.
About 20 years ago my husband, Brian, and I were in Antigua, Guatemala, when I became desperately ill with a stomach parasite. For days, I could do nothing but lie in bed in the cheap hotel where we had a room. Brian found an English-language lending library nearby that would allow you to check out two books at a time for a small fee. He brought back the first two installments of Stephen King's serialized novel, "The Green Mile," and read them out loud to me. When we were done, he returned them and checked out the next tow and so on until we'd gotten through all six. Brian and I have a long history of reading books out loud to watch other, but that one was especially bonding. His steady voice guided me back to life.
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In elementary school, they used to hand out catalogs form the Scholastic publishing company that allowed you to order books that would then be delivered to you at school. I'd study those catalogs for hours and meticulously fill out the order form on the back, as if I could buy them. But I couldn't. I never turned in the forms because my family was too poor to pay for the books. It's such a visceral memory, aching for those books! The public libraries and school libraries saved me, as did my mother's bookshelf. I read everything that looked even a little bit interesting.
Frustrated with the line between life and literature, Svetlana Alexievich sought a form that fused the two. From interviews, letters, bits of history that History did not want, she complied The Unwomanly Face of War: An Oral History of Women in World War II, which I once picked off a library cart while my daughters searched for graphic novels. That's where I learned about the radio operator drowning her own infant. And the "sniper girls" who, as they became more expert at death, found themselves more susceptible to love. And the woman who, among all the atrocities, thought nothing so awful as the neighing of wounded horses ("They're not guilty of anything, they don't answer for human deeds.").
The white saviorism is tough for me to swallow, and not just because I’m a Chicano writer critical of “American Dirt.” My hometown library was chosen in late 2019 to be part of a pilot partnership between Oprah’s Book Club, the American Library Association and local library book groups. The libraries would receive several boxes of books to use with patrons in their book club, as well as other discussion and promotional materials.
Last week I was in touch with Kate Horan, the director of the McAllen Public Library here, via phone and email. She told me she felt “excited and honored” by the news, “proud that our library on the border with Mexico was recognized and selected to be part of a new initiative.”
No one at the library knew which book had been selected: Ms. Winfrey keeps titles a tightly guarded secret. But Ms. Horan was told that it would be “the most talked about book of the year.” Instructions were given: Upon arrival of the shipment, the library should film an “unboxing” video and submit it to Ms. Winfrey.
The boxes arrived on Jan. 17. Upon opening them, Ms. Horan said, her “heart sank,” and she immediately recoiled at this “deliberate assumption that libraries on the border, who were selected to receive the books, would be automatic endorsers, given the subject matter.”
She sent the unboxing video off, and after two agonizing days consulting with her predominantly Latinx staff and others, she decided to send the books back, and politely declined to participate in the pilot program.
What kind of reader were you as a child? Which childhood books and authors stick with you most?
As a kid I as a voracious visitor to Washington's main public library. I loved reading plays that Arena Stage performed across the street. Plays were more fun to read then. I also loved the Hardy boys and Nancy Drew series. Nancy was more fun.
About midway through my reporting process, I spent an afternoon at the New York Public Library. There I reviewed American history textbooks from the 1950s and 1960s. Their racism in depicting African-Americans, Chinese immigrants and Mexican-Americans was overt, a reminder of the vastly different history educations received by today's adults-- all of whom, from Generation Z to the Greatest Generation, will be eligible to vote in November 2020.COMMENT
It was a reminder that the historical stories we tell have a profound impact on the world.
Along with giving books to migrant children and their families, the book drive helps a small library that serves children in Mexico living in Anapra.
Chavez, Lenander and volunteers with the Border Servant Corps make monthly visits to the Biblioteca para la Vida to participate in Saturday morning storytelling sessions.
"The kids will come in their pajamas and just put blankets and pillows all over the floor," Lenander said.
In December, the children each got their own book bag with a book and toy and celebrated the season with a piñata shaped like a big book. Chavez read from "Dragones y Tacos" during he Christmas party as the kids munched on tacos.
The source material "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats," is a collection of poems that T.S. Eliot wrote for his godchildren. "The poems were written in the nonsense tradition," Carolyn Vega, the curator for the Berg Collection, at the New York Public Library, explained recently. Sara Beth Joren, publicist for the library chimed in: "And that's why when people hate on 'Cats' -- like "Oh there's no plot.' It's just like, 'Yeah, there wasn't supposed to be'. And anyway, there is a plot. There's a cat trying to get to the Heaviside Layer. That's a plot.
The two women were waiting for Francesca Hayward, one of the stars of the "Cats" movie. Hayward, a principal dancer in the Royal Ballet, plays Victoria, a graceful white cat -- her first film role. Vega was ready to give Hayward a quick Eliot lesson; she had brought out a first edition of "Old Possum" and some photographs of the poet.
During Kristils' freshman year of high school, she announced that she wanted to attend a high-level college and began searching what was needed to be accepted. One summer day we drove to the library to pick up books she had on order. Awaiting us were three bins and some 60 books, many of them "how-to" manuals on getting straight A's, mastering standardized tests and winning admission to Ivy League schools.
At home, Kristil lined them up in stacks along her bedroom wall, then mapped out her reading and study plan for the summer.
"My mother didn't let me read comics growing up. She thought comics were morally low rent, for morons. Superheroes, cartoons, animation-- didn't matter. I had to go to a friend's house to look at comic books." She points to two sources as essential to turning her love of drawing into there vocation as a cartoonist. One was Addams' work (from this magazine), which she first encountered as a child in the nineteen-sixties. "'Black Maria,' 'The Goaning Board,' 'Monster Rally,' 'Drawn & Quartered,'" she says rapturously reciting titles of Addams collections. "These are books that I discovered at the browsing library at Cornell. My parents used to go to Ithaca in the summer-- they lived in student quarters and it was cheap. There were other Brooklyn school-teachers, mostly Jewish, mostly without children. When my parents took me, they let me hang out."
Story goes as a high school student in New Jersey, Tommy elided he wanted to be a circus performer, but a six foot two and possessing little grace or flexibility, his options felt limited. He didn't come from a circus family and didn't have the physique of a typical aerialist or tumbler. What he wanted most of all was to wrestle an alligator. When he learned about sword swallowing, he thought it could take him to the circus, the gators.
He checked out a bunch of books on swallowing swords from the library and spread them across his bed, desk and floor. Their illustrated pages provided step-by-step instructions and accounts of some of history's most famous sword swallowers. He got to work.
My parents owned a book called "You Can Heal Your Life" by Louise Hay along with a matching set of affirmation cards, which my mother kept in her nightstand. Hay claims all illnesses result from fear and anger.
I went to the library and checked it out, wondering what am I afraid of?
Confident I could solve the problem with mind power, I visualized myself as healthy.
Whose opinion on books to you most trust?
Part-time bookstore employee and research librarians. They have no agenda and plenty of free time. The research librarians are especially good, because they don’t even care if their suggestions make them seem cool.
Throughout our history, Americans have turned to public options as a way to promote equal opportunity and reconcile markets with democracy. For example, public libraries allow anyone to read, check out books or surf the internet. This expands educational opportunities and guarantees access to information to everyone, but it doesn't prevent people from buying books at the bookstore if they choose.
When Abrams Books recently moved to new offices in Lower Manhattan from its longtime home in Chelsea, it hired the consultants that companies typically calling for their expertise in audiovisual, m lighting temperature and ventilation needs, It also hired a library consultant, who identified the first and latest editions of almost every title the 70-year-old publisher had ever printed, which were then line up on towering oak shelves. The 10,000-volume library is the first thing visitors see when they enter the new workplace. That may sound musty, but Abrams was striving for a modern workplace. Designed by the architecture firm Spacesmith, the 41,0000-square-foot office has an open plan, m a spacious cafe and state-of-the-art technology.
