Library Notes
May 2011
Betty Moore
I have been enchanted recently watching several RPL DVDs that feature the joy of music and performing, especially by amateurs.
“Young@Heart” follows a chorus by that name during their final weeks of rehearsal before a big concert. It also shows the group’s performance at a prison and the emotional visit afterwards with inmates. What is unexpected is that the average age of the chorus members is 81! Their music is also unexpected. Rather than singing nostalgic hits from their youth, their repertoire ranges from James Brown to Coldplay. They have toured Europe and sung for royalty. Viewers get to know performers personally, since the documentary looks at many of them in their homes as well as in rehearsal and performance.
“Mad Hot Ballroom” follows fifth graders from New York City’s public schools as they learn ballroom dancing and prepare for competition. Going beyond the tango, jazz and other dances, viewers visit students in their homes and learn their thoughts about dance, their hopes, and their families.
“A Musical Quartet” contains four great documentaries. One of them, “Small Wonders,” is about a woman who teaches school children to play the violin. We watch her transform them from beginning musicians to performers at Carnegie Hall.
“The Audition: A Once in a Lifetime Chance on the World’s Most Famous Stage” takes you behind the scenes at the Metropolitan Opera’s National Council Auditions. It shows the intense pressures young opera singers face as they struggle to succeed in one of the most difficult professions in the performing arts. The documentary looks at several regional winners competing for a chance to sing at the Met and to launch their professional careers.
Sunday, May 29, 2011
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Check out 'Yours Forever: People and Their Letters'
By Rebecca Hyde
Rowan Public Library
Thomas Mallon’s “Yours Ever: People and Their Letters” is not an anthology but a love letter to the art and craft of letter writing.
It is a very personal and judgmental survey. Mallon describes it as “a kind of long cover letter to the cornucopia of titles” in the bibliography, from which the reader can choose the selected or collected letters of so-and-so.
The book is loosely organized around the circumstances of life motivating the letters: absence, friendship, advice, complaint, love, spirit, confession, war and prison.
Sorting the collections was like herding cats. And letter writing itself is changing. What is a blog? “Half diary, half letter-to-the-world,” says Mallon. If a reader is inspired to dip in or consume one of the titles mentioned, Mallon will have no regrets for the years spent on the project.
The correspondence is sometimes an introduction to a family and their times: “The most important letter Jessica Mitford ever wrote was a forgery, addressed to herself (‘Darling Decca’) at the age of nineteen on February 3, 1937.” This forged invitation to a European tour from an imaginary girlfriend and her well-positioned family was intended to be Jessica’s ticket to war-torn Spain and elopement with her second cousin. The couple transmitted news of the Spanish war for a press bureau. Mitford continued to write letters during her life as a muckraker and Communist Party member. A second marriage was long and happy. Before her death in 1996, friends had already died off, and Mitford realized that “she missed the arrival of their letters more than the people themselves.”
Examining Wilfred Owen’s World War I correspondence, Mallon remarks that Owen was never a natural soldier, rather a boy drawn to botany, evangelical religion and Keats. An older poet, Siegfried Sassoon, offered some “military-sounding” literary advice: “Sweat your guts out writing poetry,” and don’t publish too early. Owen was killed a week before the Armistice. The power of the letters, Mallon concludes, makes one almost forget that Owen’s poetry made his reputation.
Will Mallon’s book motivate us to write letters? Perhaps, if we start with a “thank-you”? See “Just a Note to Say...” by Florence Isaacs.
By Rebecca Hyde
Rowan Public Library
Thomas Mallon’s “Yours Ever: People and Their Letters” is not an anthology but a love letter to the art and craft of letter writing.
It is a very personal and judgmental survey. Mallon describes it as “a kind of long cover letter to the cornucopia of titles” in the bibliography, from which the reader can choose the selected or collected letters of so-and-so.
The book is loosely organized around the circumstances of life motivating the letters: absence, friendship, advice, complaint, love, spirit, confession, war and prison.
Sorting the collections was like herding cats. And letter writing itself is changing. What is a blog? “Half diary, half letter-to-the-world,” says Mallon. If a reader is inspired to dip in or consume one of the titles mentioned, Mallon will have no regrets for the years spent on the project.
The correspondence is sometimes an introduction to a family and their times: “The most important letter Jessica Mitford ever wrote was a forgery, addressed to herself (‘Darling Decca’) at the age of nineteen on February 3, 1937.” This forged invitation to a European tour from an imaginary girlfriend and her well-positioned family was intended to be Jessica’s ticket to war-torn Spain and elopement with her second cousin. The couple transmitted news of the Spanish war for a press bureau. Mitford continued to write letters during her life as a muckraker and Communist Party member. A second marriage was long and happy. Before her death in 1996, friends had already died off, and Mitford realized that “she missed the arrival of their letters more than the people themselves.”
Examining Wilfred Owen’s World War I correspondence, Mallon remarks that Owen was never a natural soldier, rather a boy drawn to botany, evangelical religion and Keats. An older poet, Siegfried Sassoon, offered some “military-sounding” literary advice: “Sweat your guts out writing poetry,” and don’t publish too early. Owen was killed a week before the Armistice. The power of the letters, Mallon concludes, makes one almost forget that Owen’s poetry made his reputation.
Will Mallon’s book motivate us to write letters? Perhaps, if we start with a “thank-you”? See “Just a Note to Say...” by Florence Isaacs.
Sunday, May 15, 2011
Library Notes
May 15, 2011
Cathy Brown
Authors have long been fascinated with the end of the world. Even the renowned Robert Frost wrote about it almost a century ago in his poem “Fire and Ice.” In the post-apocalyptic genre, however, most lean toward the fire and less toward the ice.
One of the most recent young adult series in the genre is the Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins. With casting recently announced for the main character of Katniss Everdeen in a planned movie trilogy, interest in the book series is sure to increase. In The Hunger Games, readers are introduced to the nation of Panem, which is the successor to an unknown part of the North American continent some time after a devastating war. Panem is controlled by the Capitol, located in the area of the Rocky Mountains, which originally controlled thirteen districts. However, seventy-four years before the events of The Hunger Games, District 13 rose up against the Capitol and the other twelve districts have been told that it was completely destroyed. As punishment for the rebellion, every year each of the remaining districts must send two “tributes”--one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen--to compete in the Hunger Games. The Hunger Games is a fight to the death with the sole survivor and his or her family being provided a home in the Victor’s Village in their home district, while also being paraded through Panem on a Victory Tour as a reminder to the other districts of the power of the Capitol if they ever decide to rebel again. Throughout the three novels, The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mocking Jay, Katniss becomes the inspiration for a new rebellion against the Capitol and the end of the Games.
Another young adult trilogy in the post-apocalyptic genre is the Maze Runner trilogy by James Dashner. The two published books, The Maze Runner and The Scorch Trials tell of a world that has been decimated by a solar flare and a virus called the Flare. In order to find the cure, a mysterious group called WICKED locks a group of teenage boys in a maze in a desperate attempt to find the most intelligent of those not infected. The second book picks up after the boys have left the maze, but have not yet passed the tests that WICKED deems necessary in order to find the cure. The third book in the trilogy, The Death Cure, is expected in October of 2011.
Of course, the end of the world isn’t restricted just to young adult literature. In the past two years, several adult books in the genre have been published, among them Cormac McCarthy’s The Road and Justin Cronin’s The Passage. The Road takes place after an unknown cataclysmic event has caused a “nuclear winter”. Readers follow the travels of the main characters, known simply as the man and the boy, a father and son attempting to move south in order to find warmer weather. Along the way, they fight against starvation, cannibals, and disease.
The Passage is the first in a planned trilogy of novels covering not only the apoclyptic events that end life as humanity knows it, but also a century later as the descendants struggle to continue. In The Passage, the end is brought about by a virus, meant to cure all disease, which instead causes vampire-like mutations to those that are infected. Most of the novel deals with the Colony, located in present-day California. The Colonists are the descendants of children brought there by the US Army when the virus overtook North America. They subsist on century-old generators and batteries, waiting for the day when the lights go out and they are left defenseless against the “Virals,” the name given to the infected. Cronin has given his world a supernatural twist in that the Virals are connected to the original Viral that created them. Otherwise, it fits in well with the post-apocalyptic genre.
May 15, 2011
Cathy Brown
Authors have long been fascinated with the end of the world. Even the renowned Robert Frost wrote about it almost a century ago in his poem “Fire and Ice.” In the post-apocalyptic genre, however, most lean toward the fire and less toward the ice.
One of the most recent young adult series in the genre is the Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins. With casting recently announced for the main character of Katniss Everdeen in a planned movie trilogy, interest in the book series is sure to increase. In The Hunger Games, readers are introduced to the nation of Panem, which is the successor to an unknown part of the North American continent some time after a devastating war. Panem is controlled by the Capitol, located in the area of the Rocky Mountains, which originally controlled thirteen districts. However, seventy-four years before the events of The Hunger Games, District 13 rose up against the Capitol and the other twelve districts have been told that it was completely destroyed. As punishment for the rebellion, every year each of the remaining districts must send two “tributes”--one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen--to compete in the Hunger Games. The Hunger Games is a fight to the death with the sole survivor and his or her family being provided a home in the Victor’s Village in their home district, while also being paraded through Panem on a Victory Tour as a reminder to the other districts of the power of the Capitol if they ever decide to rebel again. Throughout the three novels, The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mocking Jay, Katniss becomes the inspiration for a new rebellion against the Capitol and the end of the Games.
Another young adult trilogy in the post-apocalyptic genre is the Maze Runner trilogy by James Dashner. The two published books, The Maze Runner and The Scorch Trials tell of a world that has been decimated by a solar flare and a virus called the Flare. In order to find the cure, a mysterious group called WICKED locks a group of teenage boys in a maze in a desperate attempt to find the most intelligent of those not infected. The second book picks up after the boys have left the maze, but have not yet passed the tests that WICKED deems necessary in order to find the cure. The third book in the trilogy, The Death Cure, is expected in October of 2011.
Of course, the end of the world isn’t restricted just to young adult literature. In the past two years, several adult books in the genre have been published, among them Cormac McCarthy’s The Road and Justin Cronin’s The Passage. The Road takes place after an unknown cataclysmic event has caused a “nuclear winter”. Readers follow the travels of the main characters, known simply as the man and the boy, a father and son attempting to move south in order to find warmer weather. Along the way, they fight against starvation, cannibals, and disease.
The Passage is the first in a planned trilogy of novels covering not only the apoclyptic events that end life as humanity knows it, but also a century later as the descendants struggle to continue. In The Passage, the end is brought about by a virus, meant to cure all disease, which instead causes vampire-like mutations to those that are infected. Most of the novel deals with the Colony, located in present-day California. The Colonists are the descendants of children brought there by the US Army when the virus overtook North America. They subsist on century-old generators and batteries, waiting for the day when the lights go out and they are left defenseless against the “Virals,” the name given to the infected. Cronin has given his world a supernatural twist in that the Virals are connected to the original Viral that created them. Otherwise, it fits in well with the post-apocalyptic genre.
Sunday, May 08, 2011
Sara Grajek
May 8, 2011
Throughout history, there have been many great women to look to as role models. Harriet Tubman, Clara Barton, and Rosa Parks made history by standing up for what they believed in and for those who needed their help. We have made heroes out of these amazing women, and yet there are many other lesser known stories, just as much a part of our history, available at Rowan Public Library.
The Mercury 13: The Untold Story of Thirteen American Women and the Dream of Space Flight which takes place in 1960 and 1961. Author Martha Ackmann writes of 13 women selected to undergo the same rigorous testing as the Mercury 7 astronauts (which included Alan Shepard and John Glenn). Hoping to become astronauts, the women endured a battery of tests that at times seemed to border on torture. One such test, designed to see how a person would react to orbiting in a gravity-free state required the insertion of a large syringe into the ear. Cold water was trickled into the test subject’s eardrum, to throw off their balance. Nurses evaluated how quickly – or slowly - the test subject reacted. Test subjects reported loss of movement in their hands, rapid movement of the eyeballs, and staggering disorientation. The worst part was repeating it in the other ear. While preparing for the third phase of testing, the 13 were informed by NASA that they would not be moving forward. Sending a woman into space was not a priority and although the women of Mercury 13 had come further than any other in training, it would take until 1983 before a woman astronaut made it into space.
The Woman Behind the New Deal by Kirstin Downey tells the life and achievements of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Labor Secretary. Frances Perkins became the first female Secretary of Labor, agreeing to take the post in 1933 just after a plunge in the American economy that sent real estate values plummeting, un-employment rising, and the stock market into a free fall. Firm in her belief that many thought themselves wealthy, but had little savings; that companies had spent money on expensive machinery to boost productivity and employed fewer workers; Perkins created a list for the new president hoping to make a difference. After FDR was sworn in, he consulted with Perkins. She outlined her dream plan for revamping the Labor Department. In short, the department would need to provide work for the unemployed with short term public works projects, prohibit child labor, limit work days to eight hours, create a minimum wage, implement workers compensation, create unemployment compensation, provide social security for the elderly and move responsibility for immigration to another department. In their final form, these would emerge as a series of programs and departments known as the New Deal. Perkins came to the job with a strong background having witnessed the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire, served as an Industrial State Commissioner of New York (making her the highest paid woman in government at the time, and due to her talks on fire code and safety became known as a national expert on fire prevention.
Many women have played important roles in history that should be remembered. Browse Rowan Public Library’s shelves to see whose story you can discover.
May 8, 2011
Throughout history, there have been many great women to look to as role models. Harriet Tubman, Clara Barton, and Rosa Parks made history by standing up for what they believed in and for those who needed their help. We have made heroes out of these amazing women, and yet there are many other lesser known stories, just as much a part of our history, available at Rowan Public Library.
The Mercury 13: The Untold Story of Thirteen American Women and the Dream of Space Flight which takes place in 1960 and 1961. Author Martha Ackmann writes of 13 women selected to undergo the same rigorous testing as the Mercury 7 astronauts (which included Alan Shepard and John Glenn). Hoping to become astronauts, the women endured a battery of tests that at times seemed to border on torture. One such test, designed to see how a person would react to orbiting in a gravity-free state required the insertion of a large syringe into the ear. Cold water was trickled into the test subject’s eardrum, to throw off their balance. Nurses evaluated how quickly – or slowly - the test subject reacted. Test subjects reported loss of movement in their hands, rapid movement of the eyeballs, and staggering disorientation. The worst part was repeating it in the other ear. While preparing for the third phase of testing, the 13 were informed by NASA that they would not be moving forward. Sending a woman into space was not a priority and although the women of Mercury 13 had come further than any other in training, it would take until 1983 before a woman astronaut made it into space.
The Woman Behind the New Deal by Kirstin Downey tells the life and achievements of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Labor Secretary. Frances Perkins became the first female Secretary of Labor, agreeing to take the post in 1933 just after a plunge in the American economy that sent real estate values plummeting, un-employment rising, and the stock market into a free fall. Firm in her belief that many thought themselves wealthy, but had little savings; that companies had spent money on expensive machinery to boost productivity and employed fewer workers; Perkins created a list for the new president hoping to make a difference. After FDR was sworn in, he consulted with Perkins. She outlined her dream plan for revamping the Labor Department. In short, the department would need to provide work for the unemployed with short term public works projects, prohibit child labor, limit work days to eight hours, create a minimum wage, implement workers compensation, create unemployment compensation, provide social security for the elderly and move responsibility for immigration to another department. In their final form, these would emerge as a series of programs and departments known as the New Deal. Perkins came to the job with a strong background having witnessed the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire, served as an Industrial State Commissioner of New York (making her the highest paid woman in government at the time, and due to her talks on fire code and safety became known as a national expert on fire prevention.
Many women have played important roles in history that should be remembered. Browse Rowan Public Library’s shelves to see whose story you can discover.
Sunday, May 01, 2011
Library Notes / May 1, 2011
Dara L. Cain
Happy Birthday! Gary Paulsen
Born May 17, 1939, Gary Paulsen is one of America’s most admired writers of contemporary literature for young readers. To date he has written over 175 books and 200 articles and short stories for young people and adults. Many of his books often appear on the best books list of the American Library Association and three of his novels – Hatchet, Dogsong, and The Winter Room were Newbery Honor Books. Paulsen’s books are great for young teens that enjoy reading stories set in the great outdoors and characters that experience thrilling and challenging life obstacles.
Hatchet
Thirteen year-old Brian Robeson is on a small engine plane headed north to the Canadian oil fields to visit his dad. Mid-flight the pilot has a heart attack and dies. Brian is left alone to try and land the plane. When the plane crashes into an icy lake Brian narrowly escapes with his life. The plane is too damaged to radio for help. Armed with only the hatched his mother gave him as a gift and the clothes on his back Brian must learn how to survive alone in the Canadian woods. This is the first book in the Brian’s Saga series. The other titles in the series are The River, Brian’s Winter, and Brian’s Return.
Dogsong
A young teenage boy named Russel Susskit can’t bear to wake up in the morning to the sound of his father’s coughing, the piercing noises of the snow machines, and the stench of diesel oil. He is frustrated with the modern ways of his Eskimo village and longs for the traditions and the songs that celebrated his people. Inspired by the words of the wise Eskimo shaman Oogruk, Russel sets out on a journey with the last remaining dog team in his village. Traveling across tundra, ice floes, tundra, and mountains Russel is troubled by a powerful dream of a long-ago self whose adventures mirror his own. Russel’s heroic journey of self-discovery and his yearning desire to find his own song will ultimately change his life forever.
The Winter Room
Eldon and his older brother Wayne live on a farm in northern Minnesota with their parents, their Uncle David, and their great-uncle. During the course of a year follow this family through the change in seasons while they do the plowing, the harvest and the butchering. The best time of the year is winter when Eldon and his brother spend their evenings in the winter room gathered around the wood stove listening to their Uncle David tell amazing stories. One evening Uncle David tells the story of “The Woodcutter,” and Eldon immediately realizes that his uncle is not the person he believed him to always be. This story has the ability to change everything for the brothers.
Dara L. Cain
Happy Birthday! Gary Paulsen
Born May 17, 1939, Gary Paulsen is one of America’s most admired writers of contemporary literature for young readers. To date he has written over 175 books and 200 articles and short stories for young people and adults. Many of his books often appear on the best books list of the American Library Association and three of his novels – Hatchet, Dogsong, and The Winter Room were Newbery Honor Books. Paulsen’s books are great for young teens that enjoy reading stories set in the great outdoors and characters that experience thrilling and challenging life obstacles.
Hatchet
Thirteen year-old Brian Robeson is on a small engine plane headed north to the Canadian oil fields to visit his dad. Mid-flight the pilot has a heart attack and dies. Brian is left alone to try and land the plane. When the plane crashes into an icy lake Brian narrowly escapes with his life. The plane is too damaged to radio for help. Armed with only the hatched his mother gave him as a gift and the clothes on his back Brian must learn how to survive alone in the Canadian woods. This is the first book in the Brian’s Saga series. The other titles in the series are The River, Brian’s Winter, and Brian’s Return.
Dogsong
A young teenage boy named Russel Susskit can’t bear to wake up in the morning to the sound of his father’s coughing, the piercing noises of the snow machines, and the stench of diesel oil. He is frustrated with the modern ways of his Eskimo village and longs for the traditions and the songs that celebrated his people. Inspired by the words of the wise Eskimo shaman Oogruk, Russel sets out on a journey with the last remaining dog team in his village. Traveling across tundra, ice floes, tundra, and mountains Russel is troubled by a powerful dream of a long-ago self whose adventures mirror his own. Russel’s heroic journey of self-discovery and his yearning desire to find his own song will ultimately change his life forever.
The Winter Room
Eldon and his older brother Wayne live on a farm in northern Minnesota with their parents, their Uncle David, and their great-uncle. During the course of a year follow this family through the change in seasons while they do the plowing, the harvest and the butchering. The best time of the year is winter when Eldon and his brother spend their evenings in the winter room gathered around the wood stove listening to their Uncle David tell amazing stories. One evening Uncle David tells the story of “The Woodcutter,” and Eldon immediately realizes that his uncle is not the person he believed him to always be. This story has the ability to change everything for the brothers.
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