Book Covers Hall of Fame, Part II
It seems like the right time to induct some more works into the prestigious Bookmarking Book Covers Hall of Fame. (Clearly, ironic air quotes should by all rights be added to the word “Fame” in this context.)
The first class of honorees included such heavy hitters as Catcher in the Rye and The Great Gatsby, the Babe Ruth and Chuck Berry of their particular field of accomplishment. For this early summer induction ceremony we’ll look a little farther afield for a few deserving but less obvious choices.
John Gall is an influential art designer for Vintage and Anchor books, companies whose book covers are almost always so compelling that I immediately consider buying any reasonably priced used copies of them I find even if I already own other editions. There’s just something about that Vintage imprint on the spine that screams, “Classy, and you know it!”
Gall’s design for the rather scholarly A General Theory of Love might be the coolest book cover I’ve ever seen:
Designer Evan Gaffney is a book cover creator whose visual style is almost always recognizeable once you’ve seen a collection of his work. Like the great Chip Kidd, his designs can be wildly different but still retain a totally distinctive element not easily copied by second-rate knockoffs.
Gaffney’s design for One Perfect Day: The Selling of the American Wedding, is about as perfect as it gets:
The cover for James Hawes’s Why You Should Read Kafka Before You Waste Your Life just kills me. I find myself staring at it for minutes at a time and laughing even the 100th time I glance at it. As is so often the case with my favorite book covers, it’s the small details that really bring it on home to all-time classic status. In this case, it’s the cockroach’s crossed legs:
I also feel like I just know exactly what his face looks like . . . but I never will.
Finally, attention must be paid to a cover unearthed by the great FontFeed.com’s “Typodisasters” collection. It’s not even a typo, really. It may even be for real, although comments seem to suggest “it’s only a careless library rebind.” Whether intentional or simply the greatest moment of irony in the history of the English language, this one richly deserves its spot in the Hall of Fame:
The World Digital Library
Last month the World Digital Library was launched by UNESCO to “make available on the Internet, free of charge and in multilingual format, significant primary materials from countries and cultures from around the world.”
The venture seeks to promote intercultural understanding while narrowing the digital divide between nations, and its collection of rare books, maps, musical scores and recordings, photographs, and other cultural materials makes it a pretty amazing resource.
The World Digital Library works closely with UNESCO’s “Memory of the World” project, which preserves archival and library collections around the world in an effort to prevent what the organization calls “collective amnesia.” The idea for the World Digital Library came from U.S. Librarian of Congress James H. Billington in 2005, and dozens of libraries, archives, foundations, and private companies worldwide have contributed content and resources to the project.
The website is available in seven languages, and content is searchable by continent of origin, time period, and broad topic- and type-of-item catalogs. A quick glance at the first few items from North American sources finds an 1805 portrait of Thomas Jefferson, a map of Cuba from the 1650s, and a 1493 letter from Christopher Columbus describing his first voyage across the Atlantic.
Other “exhibits” include the 11th century Tale of Genji, a Japanese work considered the first novel ever written; a Description of Egyptian Antiquities from Napoleon’s 1798 expedition to the Pyramids; and a German woodcut edition of Aesop’s Fables from the 15th century.
The World Digital Library is already an awesome research tool and an invaluable repository of worldwide cultural treasures. It’s also one of the most addictively browse-able websites this side of Videogum and awfulplasticsurgery.com.
Christopher Buckley’s “Mum and Pup”
In a recent C-Span/Book TV “In Depth” segment, novelist, essayist, and former Vice Presidential speechwriter Christopher Buckley talked about his diverse writing career and his newest book, a memoir of his legendary parents called Losing Mum and Pup.
These three-hour “In Depth” programs can easily test the patience of book enthusiasts with even the most iron of butts. I sat down late on a Sunday night to catch a few minutes of Christopher Buckley’s interview mainly to compare his accent and mannerisms with those of his father, the late William F. Buckley, but several fascinating hours later I came to greatly admire the slightly-more-humble, infinitely-more-likeable son.
Buckley’s new memoir describes some of the difficulties of growing up with larger-than-life and often distant parents, but it is hardly a mean-spirited hatchet job. Affection for his unorthodox and immensely frustrating ”Mum and Pup” shows through Buckley’s anecdotes, many of which focus on the final year of their lives.
In one memorable tale he describes his father struggling with prostate problems late in life, which occasionally led him to urinate out of the open doors and windows of various moving vehicles. Buckley’s mother, Patricia, was an equally headstrong figure whose difficult relationship with her son finally moved him to utter, “I forgive you,” to her after she had lapsed into a coma on her deathbed.
Buckley’s satirical novels, like Thank You for Smoking, Boomsday, and Supreme Courtship, are especially fun reads for those who appreciate the sport and absurdity of American politics. I enjoy the hell out of his essays and parodies for magazines like The New Yorker and Esquire, some of which are gathered in the hilarious 1997 collection Wry Martinis.
This excerpt from the book describes a bit of what it was like “Growing Up Buckley.” This review from the Houston Chronicle relates some details of Buckley’s mother’s legendary rudeness and the author’s rather hilarious struggles to deal with his parents’ dying wishes. In this piece for The Daily Beast, Buckley describes the furor that erupted after he endorsed Barack Obama in 2008, and he speculates on the reactions he might have received from his late parents.
“No one has yet suggested my dear old Mum should have aborted me, but it’s pretty darned angry out there in Right Wing Land . . . . One thoughtful correspondent, who feels that I have ‘betrayed’—the b-word has been much used in all this—my father and the conservative movement generally, said he plans to devote the rest of his life to getting people to cancel their subscriptions to National Review. But there was one bright spot: To those who wrote me to demand, ‘Cancel my subscription,’ I was able to quote the title of my father’s last book, a delicious compendium of his NR ‘Notes and Asides’: Cancel Your Own Goddam Subscription.”
“Reading Minds” Interview: Summer at the Library
In this NewsOK.com “Reading Minds” video interview, I talked to two of the Metropolitan Library System’s awesome Outreach Coordinators, Emily Williams and Lisa Wood, about the library’s biggest annual event: the Summer at the Library reading program for children and teenagers.
This summer almost 20,000 kids are expected to participate in a variety of reading contests, arts programs, music concerts and other cool activities available for free at all 17 Metropolitan Library locations around Oklahoma County.
The theme of this year’s children’s program is “Be Creative,” and a fantastic variety of music, art, dance, and theater events will be featured at libraries around the county. For teens, the ”Express Yourself” events include hip hop dance, henna art, and graffitti programs. Local performers like the Lucky Penny Players and Rhythmically Speaking will also perform at special library programs all through the summer.
This year’s ”Summer at the Library” features more cool music events than ever before, including the first ever Metro Music Fest with acclaimed children’s rock bands from around the country. On June 9 at the Midwest City Library, the third annual all-ages Wizard Rock Concert presents a lineup of four Harry Potter-inspired bands, including the Remus Lupins and the Whomping Willows, scheduled to rock people’s faces off starting at 6:00 p.m.
The summer library programs are a great way to keep kids reading after the school year is over, and lots of cool prizes are on offer as an extra incentive. When kids read eight books, 800 pages, or spend eight hours reading, additional prizes are given along with entry into grand prize drawings at the end of the summer and tickets to the Oklahoma City Red Hawks’ “Library Night at the Ballpark” on August 3.
Kids can register at any Metropolitan Library location through June and July, and they’ll receive a cool packet of stuff as soon as they sign up.
The Book Beast
Former Vanity Fair and New Yorker editor Tina Brown’s new online venture, The Daily Beast, is an amazing sensory overload of hard news, pop culture fluff, and opinion pieces from across the political spectrum. The site takes its name from the fictional newspaper in Evelyn Waugh’s novel Scoop, and it shows off its literary bent in its impressive Book Beast section.
On first glance the crazy conglomeration of dozens of reviews, interviews, celebrity recommendations, and links seems exactly the kind of venture that is killing off print newspaper book sections. While we read by the glow of their funeral pyres, it is hard to deny the addictive qualities of the Book Beast’s approach.
Its reviews range from best-selling novels to serious political and historical tomes, and a handy “Literary Round-Up” sidebar collects hot news items from the publishing world. The “Book Buzz” section throws out recommendations from a passel of celebs as diverse as My Name Is Earl’s Jaime Pressly and iconic playwright Edward Albee.
The site’s ever-expanding video library features interviews with authors like Michael Connelly and Jodi Picoult, while its “Book Bag” features a four-pack of blurbed “must-read” tips from prominent writers. The Daily Beast has also lined up an impressive collection of writers to provide content throughout the site, including Christopher Buckley, Michael Kinsley, and Scott Turow.
The Daily Beast appears locked in a steel-cage deathmatch with the more established Huffington Post to combine news analysis and tabloid cheap thrills in a multi-layered web platform. When it comes to book coverage, its Book Beast is leaving them in the shade.
Travel As a Political Act
I observe a predictable set of rituals when preparing for any big vacation, most of which involve overdosing on library books, DVDs, and websites to make sure I don’t miss any potentially life-changing experiences along the way. As Mrs. Bookmarking and I are about to embark on an intercontinental voyage, my collection of prep materials has maxed out my library card, filled up my DVR’s memory, and stacked up all around the coffee table like the turrets of a medieval castle.
The collected works of Rick Steves are almost unavoidable in any bookstore or library travel section, and I’ve usually considered him a reliable-if-slightly-nerdy resource for basic travel preparations. When I picked up his newest book after a glance at its arresting title, the mild-mannered, gigantic 80’s-glasses-frame-wearing PBS icon became my new personal hero by the middle of the first chapter.
Travel As a Political Act is only one of five travel books Steves has already published in 2009, but it is a particularly thoughtful collection of essays illustrating the interconnectedness of world cultures and the fundamental value of travel. Steves makes a powerful argument about how travel can change the way we think about the world, and his book suggests interesting ways travelers can broaden their personal, cultural, and political perspectives.
Steves turns out to be way more of a radical hippie than I ever would have imagined, and throughout the book he tells fascinating tales of his own travel experiences to non-traditional vacation spots like the Balkans, El Salvador, and Iran. He is a passionate advocate for the value of travel as a humanizing force, and the book illustrates the mind-expanding virtues of experiencing Muslim cultures, third world villages, and other locales that challenge Americans’ cultural norms.
An especially valuable section addresses the importance of overcoming fear in order to gain an understanding of alien societies. Steves advocates a ”refusal to be terrorized by terrorists” in a passage that aptly summarizes his book’s theme:
“Every time I’m stuck in a long security line at the airport, I reflect on one of the most disconcerting results of terrorism: The very people who would benefit most from international travel–those who needlessly fear people and places they don’t understand–decide to stay home. I believe the most powerful things an individual American can do to fight terrorism are to travel a lot, learn about the world, come home with a new perspective, and then work to help our country fit more comfortably and less fearfully into this planet.”
Steves also reflects on lessons that can be learned from visting countries like Denmark, routinely listed as the happiest nation on earth while operating with a rather different “formula for societal success” than our own. He also visits the still smoldering nations of the former Yugoslavia to observe the after-effects of a ruinous war, and he considers alternative approaches to social problems like drug abuse offered by Switzerland and the Netherlands.
Steves’s travelogues and observations are like the lectures of an engaging professor, enlightening without being preachy, and his book is a thoughtful challenge to Americans to engage with the outside world for our own good as well as the benefit of the planet. After reading Travel As a Political Act, my personal pantheon of literary heroes was re-shuffled to make room for the dude with the squeaky voice, goofy grin, and greatly inspiring message.
Rejuveniles
A pair of recent columns from the Wall Street Journal’s Daniel Akst and veteran bow-tie wearing buzz-killer George Will bemoan the destructive cultural ubiquity of . . . wait for it . . . denim fabric.
Akst kicked off the sartorial smackdown with his column “Down with Denim,” damning our Levis and Wranglers as,
“(A)n essential co-conspirator in the modern trend toward undifferentiated dressing, in which we all strive to look equally shabby no matter what the occasion. Despite its air of innocence, no fabric has ever been so insidiously effective at undermining national discipline.”
Akst goes on to condemn denim’s essential “hypocrisy,” as it requires fussy tailoring, pre-washing, and acid treatments to achieve an un-earned sense of fashion authenticity that the writer considers a “sad disguise.”
Not to be outdone, the eternally disgruntled Will piggybacked Akst’s piece with an even more hysterical column of his own, headlined “Demon Denim.” For Will, denim represents a “plague . . . which is symptomatic of deep disorders in the national psyche.”
Both columnists point to denim as a symptom of American adults unwillingness to let go of the trappings of childhood, with Will diagnosing it as,
“(T)he infantile uniform of a nation in which entertainment frequently features childlike adults (”Seinfeld,” “Two and a Half Men”) and cartoons for adults (”King of the Hill”) . . . . In their undifferentiated dress, children and their childish parents become undifferentiated audiences for juvenilized movies (the six — so far — “Batman” adventures and “Indiana Jones and the Credit-Default Swaps,” coming soon to a cineplex near you).”
Not surprisingly, these columns proved to be low-hanging comedic fruit for the likes of Stephen Colbert. The underlying theme of not-leaving-behind-childish-things is also discussed in Christopher Noxon’s examination of adults indulging their inner children: Rejuvenile: Kickball, Cartoons, Cupcakes, and the Reinvention of the American Grown-up.
Rejuvenile describes otherwise responsible adults, like the author himself, who enjoy Spongebob, Harry Potter, video games, and defiantly wearing denim in almost any occasion. Noxon also studies the value of play, not just as pure escapism but as a vital component of a healthy, balanced life.
The book describes a redefinition of adulthood that is sure to put a knot in George Will’s triple-pleat herringbone trousers. Noxon does worry that rejuveniles may “morph from fun and free-spirited to just plain pathetic,” but his book puts this trend in such interesting psychological and historical context that adult readers may indeed feel empowered to bust into the lineup and take a few swings at the neighborhood kickball field.
Banned Penguins
Last month the American Library Association announced that the award-winning children’s book And Tango Makes Three topped its list of “frequently challenged books” for the third straight year.
Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell’s 2005 book is the story of Ray and Silo, two male “chinstrap penguins” living in New York’s Central Park Zoo whose longtime companionship was noted by zookeepers. When the two penguins were observed attempting to hatch a rock that resembled an egg, zookeepers successfully introduced an actual egg from another penguin couple who were unable to hatch theirs. When the chick, Tango, was born after their several weeks of care, Ray and Silo raised her for two-and-a-half months until she could survive on her own.
The book’s interesting story and pictures are enjoyable enough on their own terms, but the especially great part (for previously uninformed readers like myself) comes in an afterword where the authors confirm that this is indeed a true story. As the New York Times reported, this “love that dare not squeak its name” between the two inseparable penguins is a fairly common phenomenon according to zookeepers and biologists.
According to concerned folks in Illinois, Virginia, and North Carolina, among other places, the book’s controversial celebration of diverse families means access to it in libraries should be restricted. Some libraries have moved it to the non-fiction section in an attempt to avoid controversy, and other school districs have removed it from the shelves altogether.
Co-author Parnell reports that at a book signing at BookExpo America a few years ago, many librarians waiting in line told him, “I love your book, but I could never buy it for our library.”
A memo from school administrators in North Carolina explained their reasons for banning it from the district:
“First, it is a picture book that focuses on homosexuality. Second, we did not feel that such information was vital to primary students. Next, we did not believe the book would stimulate growth in ethical standards, and the book is too controversial.”
The ALA’s “Most Frequently Challenged Books” list features other titles for which objections were raised due to “homosexual themes,” while separate categories of offense include “occult/satanism” (the Scary Stories series), “offensive language/sexually explicit” (The Kite Runner), and “political/religious viewpoint” (Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials series, showing up at #2 on last year’s list).
The ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom reported 513 book challenges across the country in 2008. With the threat of rampaging gay penguins on the rise thanks to global warming, 2009 could well be another challenging year for those infamously hedonistic radicals, Ray and Silo.
“Reading Minds” Interview: Michael Owens
In this video interview at NewsOK.com, Oklahoma author Michael Owens discusses his compelling new book Yes I Am Who I Am: A New Philosophy of Black Identity.
In the interview, Owens discusses some of his life experiences that led to the book’s challenging critique of ideas surrounding Black Americans’ identity. His examination of the terms “Black American” and “African American” are an especially interesting part of the book, which Owens also touches on in the interview in regard to Black Americans’ efforts to “carve out an identity from the American experience.”
Owens also notes the role of Hip Hop as a polarizing element in considerations of Black identity. The author describes the need for Hip Hop to reshape itself in order to make a more positive impact, and his book effectively puts this vital and controversial movement in proper context as part of an effort to reach a consensus on Black identity.
Some of the author’s solutions to the “broken identity” of Black Americans are also discussed, including the need to re-educate and re-tell the early aspirations of Black Americans. In Owens’s words,
“‘Black History Month’ was never the goal. Black history is American history.”
This YouTube video is an excellent introduction to the book’s themes, and the author’s website is full of interesting resources on Black history and links to some of Owens’ other writings.
Yes I Am Who I Am is available at local bookstores, including Full Circle, as well as online at Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com.
Book Vending Machines
A recent NPR story described yet another revolution in the publishing industry that could change the way we purchase and read books.
The Espresso Book Machine is “essentially an ATM for books that automatically prints, binds, and trims, on demand at point of sale, perfect-bound, library-quality paperback books.” About a hundred pages can be printed per minute (meaning it will take about a quarter of an hour to churn out that copy of War and Peace I’ve been meaning to scan on my next coffee break).
The manufacturer claims books will cost about a penny a page and,
“Ultimately, the EBM will make it possible to distribute virtually every book ever published, in any language, anywhere on earth, as easily, quickly, and cheaply as e-mail.”
Other revolutionary claims for the “EBM” see it replacing the traditionally centralized supply chain for book distribution with its “direct-to-consumer retail model.” Over two million public domain and in-copyright titles are currently available at the fifteen or so current vending machine locations in bookshops, libraries, and universities around the world. The manufacturer sees the devices eventually costing about as much as a traditional copy machine.
This statement from the company’s founder discusses his view of “the end of the Gutenberg era” and the revolutionary new publishing infrastructure offered by devices like E-Books and the EBM.
This spec sheet gives more interesting details of the machine itself, with the impressive claim that the EBM “makes it possible to distribute virtually every book ever published, in any language, anywhere on earth, as easily, quickly, and cheaply as e-mail.”
This CNN video shows the machine at work at a London bookshop, with the store manager describing how the revolutionary device all the sudden makes his shop “ten times bigger.”
