BBC World News America has a short news story about Benedito da Silva, who works sorting garbage in Brazil. Silva describes how he began collecting books out of the garbage and taking them home and eventually building his own library collection. He also donates them to his local public library (Luiz Odair de Sousa). Silva tells the BBC that before he began collecting books out of the trash, he could not read. As he began saving the books, he also improved his ability to read. In this short news story, Silva talks about the volume of trash in Brazil and the world and the problems it creates and the carelessness of such waste. He emphasizes the value that he and others provide sorting through all of the trash. Silva calls for others to view their work with the respect it deserves.
Go to BBC World News America to see this story.
submitted by R. Stuhr
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Librarians and Libraries in Fiction II: Rex Libris
Turner, James. Rex Libris: I Librarian. San Jose: SLG Publishing, 2007.
Submitted by R. Stuhr
This is the first volume in a comic books series, with the tag: "The World's Favorite Butt-Kicking, Sesquepedalian Librarian!" I have volume one and two on my bookshelves. The second is Book of Monsters and was published in 2009. Each volume is made up of multiple issues, which can be purchases separately from SLG Publishing. Check out the Rex Libris Web site to read about one of the few vector based comic books in the world. Rex Libris has mythical qualities. When he isn't traveling across time and space, he is the Head Librarian at Middleton Public Library. The library, apparently has generous lending policies, because Rex Libris travels to the "farthest reaches of the galaxy" in search of overdue books, all the while fighting the forces of ignorance and darkness. He wears "super thick bottle glasses" and is "armed with an arsenal of high technology weapons." Zombies as well as recalcitrant borrowers figure into the plot line.
Within these pages you will find your blams, pows, zips, and zings (also thaks, thwopks, and schwifs).
Truthfully, I find slogging through a graphic novel, no matter how creative and how much about librarians not really my first choice of reading. But these have great black and white illustrations by Turner, and enough villains, odd creatures, black market weapons, and references to all the intellectuals of times past you could possibly want. Here is a tiny sample from book 1, I, Librarian:
"Find for the first time in print ever, the tumultuous tales of the public library system and its unending battle against the forces of evil. This struggle is not just confined to our terrestrial sphere but extends out into the farthest reaches of the cosmos ... and beyond! The librarian has faced patrons so terrible, so horrific, they they cannot be described here without the risk of driving readers mad. But enough prattle and preamble! Settle back with a cup of coffe and a donut (or other pastry if you prefer), and prepare to enter the secret world of ... Rex Libris 'I, Librarian.'"
Immediately, the reader is thrown into a confrontation between the librarian and a demanding patron:
"Puny Mortal! I am Kurui-No-Oni, Demon Spirit Samurai! I need no card! I take what I wish! Give me the book, lest I squash you like the sniveling little bookworm that you are!"
(Rex:) "Listen Bucko, the branch administrator sez nobody, but nobody, takes out a book here without getting a card and signing for it. And that includes you, Buster. .... And you're going to have to check that sword at the desk."
So that is just the very beginning--imagine where this winding tale can take you. Join Rex and his roommate Simonides (turned into a bird by Circe--a former villain and now cookie baker), on his travels and investigations (when the Montgomery Reading Room is overrun by vandals, they really are Vandals).
More on Rex Libris
Check out Volume 1 from Burling Library:
1st Floor, Smith Memorial PN 6727. T865x R48 2007
Submitted by R. Stuhr
This is the first volume in a comic books series, with the tag: "The World's Favorite Butt-Kicking, Sesquepedalian Librarian!" I have volume one and two on my bookshelves. The second is Book of Monsters and was published in 2009. Each volume is made up of multiple issues, which can be purchases separately from SLG Publishing. Check out the Rex Libris Web site to read about one of the few vector based comic books in the world. Rex Libris has mythical qualities. When he isn't traveling across time and space, he is the Head Librarian at Middleton Public Library. The library, apparently has generous lending policies, because Rex Libris travels to the "farthest reaches of the galaxy" in search of overdue books, all the while fighting the forces of ignorance and darkness. He wears "super thick bottle glasses" and is "armed with an arsenal of high technology weapons." Zombies as well as recalcitrant borrowers figure into the plot line.
Within these pages you will find your blams, pows, zips, and zings (also thaks, thwopks, and schwifs).
Truthfully, I find slogging through a graphic novel, no matter how creative and how much about librarians not really my first choice of reading. But these have great black and white illustrations by Turner, and enough villains, odd creatures, black market weapons, and references to all the intellectuals of times past you could possibly want. Here is a tiny sample from book 1, I, Librarian:
"Find for the first time in print ever, the tumultuous tales of the public library system and its unending battle against the forces of evil. This struggle is not just confined to our terrestrial sphere but extends out into the farthest reaches of the cosmos ... and beyond! The librarian has faced patrons so terrible, so horrific, they they cannot be described here without the risk of driving readers mad. But enough prattle and preamble! Settle back with a cup of coffe and a donut (or other pastry if you prefer), and prepare to enter the secret world of ... Rex Libris 'I, Librarian.'"
Immediately, the reader is thrown into a confrontation between the librarian and a demanding patron:
"Puny Mortal! I am Kurui-No-Oni, Demon Spirit Samurai! I need no card! I take what I wish! Give me the book, lest I squash you like the sniveling little bookworm that you are!"
(Rex:) "Listen Bucko, the branch administrator sez nobody, but nobody, takes out a book here without getting a card and signing for it. And that includes you, Buster. .... And you're going to have to check that sword at the desk."
So that is just the very beginning--imagine where this winding tale can take you. Join Rex and his roommate Simonides (turned into a bird by Circe--a former villain and now cookie baker), on his travels and investigations (when the Montgomery Reading Room is overrun by vandals, they really are Vandals).
More on Rex Libris
Check out Volume 1 from Burling Library:
1st Floor, Smith Memorial PN 6727. T865x R48 2007
Librarians and Libraries in Fiction I: Some Tame Gazelle
Pym, Barbara. Some Tame Gazelle. New York: Dutton, 1983 (first published in England in 1950).
Submitted by R. Stuhr
Writing about the mobile librarian reminded me of another novel I read recently, this one by Barbara Pym. I am a big fan of Barbara Pym. I suppose I read her the way others read Jane Austen. I like to read and reread her books at intervals. I think of them as miniatures or tiny jewels. Almost all of her novels feature unmarried women. Occasionally the women get married, most are involved in the church, and if not with the church, then they at least share tea with the clergy. They are generally well versed in the greater and lesser English poets. Most of Pym's novels are comedies. In Some Tame Gazelle, Pym writes about two unmarried sisters, one flamboyant, outgoing, and flirtatious, the other quieter and cherishing a long unrequited love from college.
I bring up this novel now, because of the charcter Nicholas Parnell, friend to the quieter sister (but not the cherished love) and chief librarian at the college they both attended. There are quiet a few funny lines related to libraries and librarians, although, maybe they are funny because I spend much of my time in and thinking about libraries
Nicholas Parnell responds to the reverence he receives, when introduced as the Librarian, "I do not approve of this hushed and reverent attitude towards our great Library. After all, it is a place for human beings, isn't it?" (94). He goes on to explain that the Library now has central heating and a Lady's Cloak Room.
Later tells another character, "She ... introduced me to a charming lady who showed great reverence when the Library was mentioned. It is really rather gratifying. I should be delighted to show her round," he added. "She would find every convenience. The next thing will be to have some kind of a restaurant where readers can take luncheon or tea together. Do you know,"--he tapped his walking stick on the ground--"I have had to have notices printed requesting readers not to eat in the Library? One would hardly have thought it possible" (97).
More references to libraries and this time library patrons while discussing scholarly pamphlets and popular reading tastes at dinner:
"I'm afraid you're hardly a best seller," said Mr. Mold [the Librarian's no. 2 man] jovially. "Nor even as much ordered in the Library as Rochester's poems . .. "
"I am afraid they are rather naughty," Said Dr. Parnell. "We have had to lock them away in a special place, together with other books of a similar nature. All the same, they are quite often asked for by our readers."
"Oh, well, I suppose people have to study them," said Belinda, handing round cigarettes wondering how she could change the subject (p. 117).
And just one more, Belinda, the quiet sister, describes the Librarian, "Nicholas, is a great connoisseur," said Belinda. "It seems right that a librarian should be, I think. Good wine and old books seem to go together" (115).
Pym writes about expectations, disappointments, small successes, and the routine, often welcomed, of every day life. Her characters are often content with the trajectory of their lives, even when all around them think that they must be wishing for something more.
To dip into a Barbara Pym novel yourself stop by Burling Library.
Submitted by R. Stuhr
Writing about the mobile librarian reminded me of another novel I read recently, this one by Barbara Pym. I am a big fan of Barbara Pym. I suppose I read her the way others read Jane Austen. I like to read and reread her books at intervals. I think of them as miniatures or tiny jewels. Almost all of her novels feature unmarried women. Occasionally the women get married, most are involved in the church, and if not with the church, then they at least share tea with the clergy. They are generally well versed in the greater and lesser English poets. Most of Pym's novels are comedies. In Some Tame Gazelle, Pym writes about two unmarried sisters, one flamboyant, outgoing, and flirtatious, the other quieter and cherishing a long unrequited love from college.
I bring up this novel now, because of the charcter Nicholas Parnell, friend to the quieter sister (but not the cherished love) and chief librarian at the college they both attended. There are quiet a few funny lines related to libraries and librarians, although, maybe they are funny because I spend much of my time in and thinking about libraries
Nicholas Parnell responds to the reverence he receives, when introduced as the Librarian, "I do not approve of this hushed and reverent attitude towards our great Library. After all, it is a place for human beings, isn't it?" (94). He goes on to explain that the Library now has central heating and a Lady's Cloak Room.
Later tells another character, "She ... introduced me to a charming lady who showed great reverence when the Library was mentioned. It is really rather gratifying. I should be delighted to show her round," he added. "She would find every convenience. The next thing will be to have some kind of a restaurant where readers can take luncheon or tea together. Do you know,"--he tapped his walking stick on the ground--"I have had to have notices printed requesting readers not to eat in the Library? One would hardly have thought it possible" (97).
More references to libraries and this time library patrons while discussing scholarly pamphlets and popular reading tastes at dinner:
"I'm afraid you're hardly a best seller," said Mr. Mold [the Librarian's no. 2 man] jovially. "Nor even as much ordered in the Library as Rochester's poems . .. "
"I am afraid they are rather naughty," Said Dr. Parnell. "We have had to lock them away in a special place, together with other books of a similar nature. All the same, they are quite often asked for by our readers."
"Oh, well, I suppose people have to study them," said Belinda, handing round cigarettes wondering how she could change the subject (p. 117).
And just one more, Belinda, the quiet sister, describes the Librarian, "Nicholas, is a great connoisseur," said Belinda. "It seems right that a librarian should be, I think. Good wine and old books seem to go together" (115).
Pym writes about expectations, disappointments, small successes, and the routine, often welcomed, of every day life. Her characters are often content with the trajectory of their lives, even when all around them think that they must be wishing for something more.
To dip into a Barbara Pym novel yourself stop by Burling Library.
Mr. Dixon Disappears
Sansom, Ian. Mr. Dixon Disappears. A Mobile Library Mystery. NY: Harper, 2006.
Submitted by R. Stuhr
This is the second in the Mobile Library Mystery series. I posted a review of the first novel, The Case of the Missing Books in March of this year. You can hearken back to that review for my general feelings about mysteries. And yet, I dived into volume two and Sansom still pleases because of his take on libraries and librarianship, for his cast of quirky characters falling into no particular stereotypes, and this time for his representation of churches, pastors, and congregations.
The plot in this novel surrounds the disappearance of the head of a local department store. Israel, the mobile librarian, is implicated because, while he is setting up a display he has created to tell the history of the department store, he is called in to be of service at the scene of the crime by a panic stricken caretaker. Naturally, being a librarian, he responds to the call, and as he is trying to read the clues--leaves his fingerprints all over the place. It is a ridiculous plot, gets going slowly, and then takes several twists and turns to a satisfying ending. My main objection with Sansom's writing is his dialogue--people rarely finish sentences, and Israel is unnecessarily thick with his inability to follow people's intentions.
Still! Read up and Enjoy!
Submitted by R. Stuhr
This is the second in the Mobile Library Mystery series. I posted a review of the first novel, The Case of the Missing Books in March of this year. You can hearken back to that review for my general feelings about mysteries. And yet, I dived into volume two and Sansom still pleases because of his take on libraries and librarianship, for his cast of quirky characters falling into no particular stereotypes, and this time for his representation of churches, pastors, and congregations.
The plot in this novel surrounds the disappearance of the head of a local department store. Israel, the mobile librarian, is implicated because, while he is setting up a display he has created to tell the history of the department store, he is called in to be of service at the scene of the crime by a panic stricken caretaker. Naturally, being a librarian, he responds to the call, and as he is trying to read the clues--leaves his fingerprints all over the place. It is a ridiculous plot, gets going slowly, and then takes several twists and turns to a satisfying ending. My main objection with Sansom's writing is his dialogue--people rarely finish sentences, and Israel is unnecessarily thick with his inability to follow people's intentions.
Still! Read up and Enjoy!
Saturday, August 7, 2010
Tariq Ali: The Islam Quintet
T. Hatch
In reading the review on Mueenuddin and Afzal-Khan I was put in mind of Tariq Ali. Especially his last book Night of the Golden Butterfly which is the fifth of five in his Islam Quintet series. All five books of the Quintet are a wonderful window into Muslim culture covering different historical eras in as many different locations.
As I watched the Twin Towers collapsing on September 11, 2001 I remember thinking "man, am I woefully ignorant about Middle Eastern history?" Tariq Ali in the novels of the Islam Quintet, and in his nonfiction works, has been incredibly useful in attacking that ignorance.
I highly recommend the series.
Fiction and Nonfiction by Tariq Ali at Grinnell College Libraries
Novels in the Islam Quintet:
The Book of Saladin. London, NY 1998.
Burling 3rd Floor PR6051.L44 B66 1998
On order:
Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree, 1993|
Stone Woman, 2000
Sultan in Palermo, 2006
Night of the Golden Butterfly, 2010
In reading the review on Mueenuddin and Afzal-Khan I was put in mind of Tariq Ali. Especially his last book Night of the Golden Butterfly which is the fifth of five in his Islam Quintet series. All five books of the Quintet are a wonderful window into Muslim culture covering different historical eras in as many different locations.
As I watched the Twin Towers collapsing on September 11, 2001 I remember thinking "man, am I woefully ignorant about Middle Eastern history?" Tariq Ali in the novels of the Islam Quintet, and in his nonfiction works, has been incredibly useful in attacking that ignorance.
I highly recommend the series.
Fiction and Nonfiction by Tariq Ali at Grinnell College Libraries
Novels in the Islam Quintet:
The Book of Saladin. London, NY 1998.
Burling 3rd Floor PR6051.L44 B66 1998
On order:
Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree, 1993|
Stone Woman, 2000
Sultan in Palermo, 2006
Night of the Golden Butterfly, 2010
Shades of Grey: The Road to High Saffron
Fforde, Jasper. Shades of Grey: The Road to High Saffron. New York: Viking Press, 2009.
Reviewed by T. Hatch
As the narrative begins our narrator and protagonist Eddie Russett is being digested by a carnivorous yateveo tree. Eddie is a Chromatocracy up-and-comer who, because of his 86.7 percent Red perception, is likely a future prefect. His potential up-spectrum social mobility is threatened, and the fact that he is being macerated inside a tree in the first place is because of his relationship with the subversive Jane Grey. She is an anarchist (only in the most positive sense of the word) who infatuates and leads young Russett through a harrowing experience beyond the established boundaries of the Collective. These actions set the stage for further collaboration in undermining the rigidly enforced hierarchy that is Chromatica.
Fforde who is the author of the Thursday Next and Nursery Crime series has said that reading requires a greater amount of imagination than writing. Little surprise then that Shades of Grey, even more than his previous work, has Fforde - to create a Ffordean trope of our own - becoming the master enabler of reckless invention. Like his previous seven novels, Fforde continues to create a genre of his own which looks to the influence of Swift, Carroll, and Waugh and manifests itself as a satirical mystery wrapped in a solid science fiction shell. It has been suggested that Shades of Grey is thematically darker than previous works by Fforde; there is a grain of truth in this, if for no other reason than politics and corrupt hierarchies are inherently more sinister than Jack Sprat tracking down Humpty Dumpty's killer.
The world Fforde creates is remarkable both for the copious amount of absurd details that litter the narrative and his ability to manage the life-is-long-art-is-short problem of providing the reader with the necessary information in the beginning of this complex creation. This is the first of three books thus making the task even more daunting. Another wondrous aspect of Shades is the structural integrity of Fforde's created world of Chromatica. All the details “fit.”
The first thing about twenty-sixth century Chromatica is that it is a society with an iron-clad hierarchy. The Colortocracy assiduously follows the Rulebook based entirely on The Word of Munsell and the crackpot prophet's chef d'ouvre, The Munsell Book of Wisdom written four hundred years ago (i.e. circa 2100). Munsell was widely credited with bringing peace to the Collective. The number seventy-three was forbidden, there was no counting of sheep, spoons were not to be made, and there was absolutely no using acronyms. Additionally, Gross Impertinence was a criminal charge. Munsell may have his eccentricities but no one can argue with results.
Little is known of the Epiphany which occurred circa 2083 but The Something That Happened was the societal rupture that ended the chaos associated with what came to be known simply as The Previous. The prophet opined that: “Imaginative thought is to be discouraged. No good ever comes of it – don't.” His particular genius (not unlike Glen Beck's philosophical system) was that he made the world knowable to everyone by simply reducing the number of facts. The prefects who managed society took a dim view of “irresponsible levels of creative expressions.” Libraries had more librarians than books. Librarians fondly remembered what books used to sit on the now empty shelves, acting as oral historians reminiscing about the books there used to be, they were now consigned to checking out Racy Novels and the Collected Thoughts of Munsell. A succession of National Color engineered Great Leaps Backward had seen to this. The long-term secular trend in Chromatica was defacting, which made continuous sustainability both safe and possible.
Chromatican society is organized around the hue of it various members. Chromaticans are required to display prominently the color spot that identifies their hue for all to see. Their entire existence is defined by what color they are and how much of it they can perceive. At the bottom of the Colortocracy are the Greys. About thirty-five percent of the population, Greys are unable to distinguish any color at all. Theirs is a second-class citizenship. Jane (the anarchist in a good way) resists the dominant paradigm. Her chance meeting with Eddie Russett has serious implications for the history of Chromatica.
The most difficult and mysterious character in the book is the Apocryphal man. A four hundred and fifty two year-old historian who pops in from time to time and only occasionally makes himself visible to Eddie. Even then the only way to get a straight answer out of him is to bribe him with loganberry jam. The Apocryphal man says he exists because without him no one's life would have any meaning. It's difficult to say what all of this means. We will have to wait until 2014, when the second installment of Shades of Grey is scheduled to be published, to find out.
Jasper Fforde at Grinnell College Libraries
Thursday Day Next Lost in a Good Book: A Novel
Burling 3rd Floor PR6106.F67 T48 2003
At Drake Community Library
The Eyre Affair, 2002
Thursday Next in the Well of Lost Plots, 2004
More
Reviewed by T. Hatch
As the narrative begins our narrator and protagonist Eddie Russett is being digested by a carnivorous yateveo tree. Eddie is a Chromatocracy up-and-comer who, because of his 86.7 percent Red perception, is likely a future prefect. His potential up-spectrum social mobility is threatened, and the fact that he is being macerated inside a tree in the first place is because of his relationship with the subversive Jane Grey. She is an anarchist (only in the most positive sense of the word) who infatuates and leads young Russett through a harrowing experience beyond the established boundaries of the Collective. These actions set the stage for further collaboration in undermining the rigidly enforced hierarchy that is Chromatica.
Fforde who is the author of the Thursday Next and Nursery Crime series has said that reading requires a greater amount of imagination than writing. Little surprise then that Shades of Grey, even more than his previous work, has Fforde - to create a Ffordean trope of our own - becoming the master enabler of reckless invention. Like his previous seven novels, Fforde continues to create a genre of his own which looks to the influence of Swift, Carroll, and Waugh and manifests itself as a satirical mystery wrapped in a solid science fiction shell. It has been suggested that Shades of Grey is thematically darker than previous works by Fforde; there is a grain of truth in this, if for no other reason than politics and corrupt hierarchies are inherently more sinister than Jack Sprat tracking down Humpty Dumpty's killer.
The world Fforde creates is remarkable both for the copious amount of absurd details that litter the narrative and his ability to manage the life-is-long-art-is-short problem of providing the reader with the necessary information in the beginning of this complex creation. This is the first of three books thus making the task even more daunting. Another wondrous aspect of Shades is the structural integrity of Fforde's created world of Chromatica. All the details “fit.”
The first thing about twenty-sixth century Chromatica is that it is a society with an iron-clad hierarchy. The Colortocracy assiduously follows the Rulebook based entirely on The Word of Munsell and the crackpot prophet's chef d'ouvre, The Munsell Book of Wisdom written four hundred years ago (i.e. circa 2100). Munsell was widely credited with bringing peace to the Collective. The number seventy-three was forbidden, there was no counting of sheep, spoons were not to be made, and there was absolutely no using acronyms. Additionally, Gross Impertinence was a criminal charge. Munsell may have his eccentricities but no one can argue with results.
Little is known of the Epiphany which occurred circa 2083 but The Something That Happened was the societal rupture that ended the chaos associated with what came to be known simply as The Previous. The prophet opined that: “Imaginative thought is to be discouraged. No good ever comes of it – don't.” His particular genius (not unlike Glen Beck's philosophical system) was that he made the world knowable to everyone by simply reducing the number of facts. The prefects who managed society took a dim view of “irresponsible levels of creative expressions.” Libraries had more librarians than books. Librarians fondly remembered what books used to sit on the now empty shelves, acting as oral historians reminiscing about the books there used to be, they were now consigned to checking out Racy Novels and the Collected Thoughts of Munsell. A succession of National Color engineered Great Leaps Backward had seen to this. The long-term secular trend in Chromatica was defacting, which made continuous sustainability both safe and possible.
Chromatican society is organized around the hue of it various members. Chromaticans are required to display prominently the color spot that identifies their hue for all to see. Their entire existence is defined by what color they are and how much of it they can perceive. At the bottom of the Colortocracy are the Greys. About thirty-five percent of the population, Greys are unable to distinguish any color at all. Theirs is a second-class citizenship. Jane (the anarchist in a good way) resists the dominant paradigm. Her chance meeting with Eddie Russett has serious implications for the history of Chromatica.
The most difficult and mysterious character in the book is the Apocryphal man. A four hundred and fifty two year-old historian who pops in from time to time and only occasionally makes himself visible to Eddie. Even then the only way to get a straight answer out of him is to bribe him with loganberry jam. The Apocryphal man says he exists because without him no one's life would have any meaning. It's difficult to say what all of this means. We will have to wait until 2014, when the second installment of Shades of Grey is scheduled to be published, to find out.
Jasper Fforde at Grinnell College Libraries
Thursday Day Next Lost in a Good Book: A Novel
Burling 3rd Floor PR6106.F67 T48 2003
At Drake Community Library
The Eyre Affair, 2002
Thursday Next in the Well of Lost Plots, 2004
More
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