“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.
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.
Ann Patchett, Keith Richards, and Your Public Library
At Tuesday night’s Literary Voices fundraising dinner benefiting the Metropolitan Library System, best-selling author Ann Patchett made a case for public libraries as among the best and most important services offered by a community.
Patchett pointed out the inarguably unequal health care services available in our society, as well as the fundamental inequalities in educational opportunities and legal services. On the other hand, for Patchett the public library offers an ideal of equality, a sanctuary open to anyone and a repository of the broadest possible resources for learning, job-hunting help, or limitless entertainment.
Patchett also discussed the value of reading fiction in answer to folks who insist they have to “learn something” from picking up a book. The author argued that readers of fiction are forced to empathize with and inhabit the lives of people they would never otherwise meet — in the case of her own remarkable novels, readers confront terrorists, opera singers, magicians, politicians, unwed mothers, and wayward Nebraskans. In Patchett’s view, fiction offers a window to the human condition every bit as valid and informative as a history book or a how-to manual.
In this podcast from the Wall Street Journal, Patchett discusses the particular value of reading in tough economic times. In this PIF magazine interview, Patchett discusses her writing career and some of the sources of inspiration for her novels.
Patchett’s passionate advocacy for public libraries also reminded me of one of my favorite quotes, Rolling Stones guitarist and indestructable human debauchery machine Keith Richards’ thoughts about the proud institution where I work:
When you are growing up, there are two institutional places that affect you most powerfully — the church, which belongs to God, and the public library, which belongs to you. The public library is a great equalizer.
Rock on, public libraries.
Just what I didn’t need
Like a junkie looking for his next fix after a dramatic, once-a-year weekend bender, I recently used the awesome NoveList database to, *gulp*, search for more book recommendations.
NoveList is a diabolically useful tool available through the Metropolitan Library System website to any of the half-million or so Oklahomans with a valid MLS library card. Once you’ve logged in at the “Catalog and Databases” tab with your card number, you can proceed to the “Databases” link to the tab labelled “Readers Advisory.” From there, a quick click on “NoveList Plus” opens up this fiendishly helpful guide to great reading.
I recently finished Dennis Lehane’s gripping psychological thriller Shutter Island, which I picked up after learning Martin Scorsese is currently filming an adaptation of it for release later this year. The book didn’t disappoint, with stomach-churning twists and turns that seemed movie-ready from the first page. The director of Cape Fear and The Departed, among his other masterpieces, should knock this gothic noir tale out of the park with a seriously great cast including Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo, Ben Kingsley, and Patricia Clarkson.
I was so fired up by the novel that I turned to NoveList to see what else it would recommend along the same lines. The database allows searches by author, title, series, or plot description and can also be limited by age group. Among the wealth of book information it provides is a list of “similar authors” as well as “author read-alikes,” while an extensive list of subject headings is also provided to search for similar books. A collection of full reviews from Booklist, Library Journal, and Publisher’s Weekly is also available for most titles.
A helpful and extensive essay on “author read-alikes” for Dennis Lehane described the writer’s themes, settings, and characters before thoughtfully linking him to other authors like Pete Dexter, S.J. Rozan, and Archer Mayor, none of whom I had even heard of before, much less read. (Great, juuuust great.) The “advanced search” option allows users to refine their search by means of targeting genres, nationalities, and even number of pages, among many other categories.
NoveList is exactly what I didn’t need — another source of book recommendations to add to my already overstuffed pile. For readers who’ve exhausted the complete works of a beloved writer or genre fans who are looking for expert opinions for where to turn next, it’s a pretty great resource.
Libraries and the Economy
There was a really interesting episode of NPR’s “The Diane Rehm Show” this week focusing on the role of public libraries in economic hard times. Guests included present and former presidents of the American Library Association who discussed the often overlooked role libraries play in the economic development of communities.
The guests pointed out to an occasionally surprised host how public libraries are an extremely valuable investment for communities, especially during an economic downturn. Libraries offer great resume and job application help in addition to computer databases for job-hunters, and many libraries around the country are offering free or cut-rate computer skills classes and workshops for displaced workers.
Libraries’ traditional role as a resource for children is especially important for parents whose own resources are stretched thin. A fantastic variety of children’s services and programming are available at Oklahoma County’s 17 Metropolitan Library locations, in addition to the one eternal, unbeatable function of the library: free entertainment for budget-conscious citizens of all ages. In addition to a book collection that easily rivals Barnes & Noble or Borders, the selection of movies and music can make it fairly difficult to stay under the library card’s limit of 30 items at a time.
As the OkieReads blog pointed out, several other media outlets have recently noted increased library usage nationwide.
MSNBC reported on a major upswing in library card applications, and they note that the American Library Association has found the number of library users increasing even more during the current downturn than in previous economic hard times.
Newspapers around the country, like the Charlotte Observer and the San Francisco Chronicle, are noticing this trend as well. They have also reported how the same economic and budget pressures that increase library usage are simultaneously threatening library funding across the country. This week the municipal government of Philadelphia has been involved in a court fight over closing 11 branches due to budget pressures.
Oklahoma City is lucky to have a terrific library system to serve its growing community, but budget issues are a constant worry when communities are looking for places to cut costs. There are several ways to help support our library system, but the best way is just to use the library whenever you can. It’s hard to beat the price, after all, if only the ten-cent-per-day overdue fines can be kept to a minimum.
