Alice Ramsey and her amazing travels

'Last Words' by George Carlin -- latimes.com

'Last Words' by George Carlin -- latimes.com

Posted using ShareThis

A Closer Look at Charles Dickens's 'Christmas Carol'

From the NY Times

The real Alice in Wonderland's book up for auction

Mon Nov 23, 11:34 pm ET
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – A copy of the book "Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There" that belonged to the British girl who inspired author Lewis Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland" will be sold at an auction next month, the company behind the sale said on Monday.
At its December 16 auction, Profiles in History also will sell a copy of "The Tale of Peter Rabbit" that belonged to its author, Beatrix Potter. The items come from the collection of former U.S. professional football player Pat McInally, the auctioneer said.
Read On

The Design for the New Bush Presidential Library

Architecture Review
A presidential library with modest virtues
Low profile distinguishes Robert A.M. Stern's design for Bush Center in Dallas

By Philip Kennicott
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Love him or hate him, George W. Bush presided over one of the noisiest presidencies in history. There were debates over wars of necessity and wars of choice, alarm and rancor over ballooning budgets and new social entitlements, a bold mix of political and religious rhetoric, and the projection of American power into places where it was largely unwanted. The Bush years, on a decibel meter, are up there with a NASCAR rally.

Which makes the cool, quiet and dignified design of his presidential library -- unveiled in Dallas on Wednesday -- a rather odd architectural postscript to eight dramatic years of governance. Architect Robert A.M. Stern's plans for the George W. Bush Presidential Center call for a low-slung building of brick and limestone, following traditional lines and hugging the Texas landscape with a calm reserve. It's almost as if Bush has chosen to retreat into the patrician reticence of his blue-blooded, Connecticut forebears.Read On

Faced with Too Little Bandwidth, Some Libraries Limit Streaming Media, Porn

Aim is to ensure access to ILS, databases
Norman Oder -- Library Journal, 11/24/2009

Most libraries have inadequate connection speeds
Sites like MySpace can hog network
Need for more capacity planning
Nearly 60 percent of public libraries report inadequate Internet connection speeds to meet patron demand, according to the American Library Association's (ALA) Public Library Funding & Technology Access Study, and a few, at least, are cutting back on the amount of bandwidth for streaming media to assure that the integrated library system (ILS) and other functions remain robust.

Slowing pornography
The Greensboro Public Library, NC, has been relegating streaming media identified as pornography to less than dial-up speeds—1KB a second—as part of a way to ensure that the bandwidth is not occupied by material that would violate the library's Internet policy, which states that users won't access anything "inappropriate for public viewing."

The tactic, director Sandy Neerman told LJ, is a way to avoid the problematic use of filters, while discouraging those seeking to access pornography, which has been the source of 89 complaints in a half-year—a relatively small number compared to loitering complaints, but way too many for some concerned parents, as the News-Record reported. (The newspaper editorialized in favor of the policy.)

Slowing MySpace
While Greensboro has chosen not to slow the bandwidth of sites like MySpace and YouTube, some other libraries are doing so, using the same product, made by Cymphonix. The Weber County Library, Ogden, UT, found that its four T-1 lines were becoming overburdened on school day afternoons because students were spending so much time on sites like MySpace.

"You could go through a session, hit a couple of dozen pages, and you've generated several thousand DNS (domain name system) requests, so the traffic was horrendous," Scott Jones, IT director and ....

Continue the article at the Library Journal.

A cornucopia of book covers

From the LA Times, Jacket Copy

jacket master

A Win for the Stacks

by Jennifer Epstein
The Syracuse University Library system is facing the classic book-lover’s dilemma: too many volumes, not enough shelves. The stacks in the flagship Ernest S. Bird Library are at 98 percent capacity, the on-campus archives are totally full and dozens -- if not hundreds -- of new volumes flood in each day.

Suzanne E. Thorin, dean of libraries, thought she had a solution. Her plan was to ship rarely used or redundant texts 250 miles southeast of campus, to a storage facility in Patterson, N.Y. Readers and researchers would’ve been able to request books before 2 p.m. one business day and receive them the next. Space in Bird would be freed up for new acquisitions, study halls and classrooms.



But that plan went awry Wednesday night when more than 200 faculty and students flocked to first public airing of the issue, a University Senate meeting. Some held signs protesting the proposal (one read "FREE BIRD"). Some spoke against the move on the grounds that library space had been misallocated while others questioned the need to ship the books so far away from campus. Faculty members delivered a petition against the plan signed by more than 100 humanities scholars, whose fields would be hurt more than others by the book relocation.

Now, Thorin and the library staff are reconsidering the options for the university’s 1.1 million books, as well as other library materials. “We have reached our capacity and need to figure out some way to get the space we need,” she said in an interview Thursday. “We haven't signed a contract yet and we're open to more discussion before we make a final decision.”
Read On

Not Books but close. Chess Boxing

Many libraries go quiet as local budget cuts deepen -- latimes.com

Many libraries go quiet as local budget cuts deepen -- latimes.com

Posted using ShareThis

Checkout this site... Noble Trader

http://www.nobeltrader.com/blogs/nobelblog.htm

Studs Terkel went from FBI applicant to suspect -- latimes.com

Studs Terkel went from FBI applicant to suspect -- latimes.com

Posted using ShareThis

Dodgers put a low price on decades of experience -- latimes.com

I know this is not about books, but it is about my beloved Dodgers who I am wishing could handle their affairs with a little more class.


Dodgers put a low price on decades of experience -- latimes.com

Posted using ShareThis

BBC expose on Google Books and Copyright

A jones for Lewis and Clark

By Jeff Baker, The Oregonian
November 12, 2009, 5:02AM


Wendlick
Roger Wendlick will do anything for Lewis and Clark.

"Do you want me to dress up?" Wendlick said after making an appointment to discuss his new book, "Shotgun on My Chest: Memoirs of a Lewis and Clark Book Collector."

Among his many activities related to the Corps of Discovery, Wendlick is a re-enactor. He portrays George Drouillard, considered the third-most important member of the expedition, a skilled hunter and "a man of much merit," according to Meriwether Lewis. Wendlick plays Drouillard with enthusiasm, and jokes that as a kid playing cowboys and Indians, he never imagined being 64 and dressing in buckskins.

There's much about Wendlick's life that he never imagined. He grew up in North Portland and spent most of his life working as a construction foreman, digging sewer lines, and assembled what was considered the world's finest private collection of Lewis and Clark materials. He did it through determination, luck and a willingness to take risks, going more than $140,000 in debt and re-financing his home three times to buy more rare books.

"Passion. Compulsion. Addiction. It was as close to any chemical addiction I've ever heard of," Wendlick said. "I don't know why I did it. I'm not even a book guy."

The story has a happy ending. Wendlick's books ended up at Lewis & Clark College in 1998 through a sale/donation agreement. They are the centerpiece of an outstanding collection of materials related to the expedition at the college's Watzek Library. Wendlick has spent much of the past decade studying the books he bought and becoming an in-demand speaker and authority on all things Lewis and Clark.

"Free at last," Wendlick said, laughing with relief about no longer living with the pressure of building a collection he couldn't really afford. Writing the story of his passion/addiction/compulsion was a different kind of pressure, one that took years to overcome.

"I started in 2002, and I figured it would take me about eight months," Wendlick said. "Was I wrong. I'm a workingman, not a writer. I really struggled through it."

Wendlick didn't keep a journal or any written record of his collecting spree, which began in 1980 with memorabilia related to the 1905 Lewis and Clark Exposition in Portland and kicked into high gear in 1986 when he began to seriously acquire books. He did keep 90 percent of the receipts from everything he bought, and that paper trail allowed him to retrace his steps through antique shows and antiquarian bookstores and rare book auctions across the U.S. Along the way, he made friends who were surprised to see a man who worked with his hands in the rarified air of serious collecting.

"The Internet has changed the antiquarian book trade, and not necessarily for the better," Wendlick said. "You can't go to stores and talk to people and see what might be tucked away on a shelf. Now everything's on the computer. I think I'm one of the last to do it the old-fashioned way."

"Shotgun on My Chest" is published by 12-Gauge Press ($28 paperback, 299 pages) and is available at Powell's. Wendlick reads from "Shotgun on My Chest" at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 18, at the Press Club, 2621 S.E. Clinton St., as part of the Mountain Writers Series.

Oregonian Article

-- Jeff Baker, The Oregonian

Books Returned to High School Library after 50 years with overdue fines included.

IF you can't find the book you want, you are probably at this bookstore.

European Union launches digital library

(CNN) -- The European Union has launched a digital library that offers documents dating to nearly 60 years ago, in 23 languages.


A way with words: new digital library "frees the EU tied to paper," said Leonard Orban.

All documents ever edited on behalf of European Union institutions, agencies and other bodies will be available in the library, the organization said in a news release.

"The digital library frees the memory of the European Union tied to paper since its beginning," said Leonard Orban, the union's commissioner for multilingualism.

The electronic library is free to individuals, companies and libraries worldwide, which can download documents as PDF (Portable Document Format) files, Orban said. About 12 million pages -- roughly 110,000 EU publications -- are available for download, according to officials.

"The millions of pages now accessible to everyone in the 23 official languages demonstrate the continued commitment of the European Union to preserve and encourage the history of the union in its linguistic diversity," Orban said.

Read On

Amelia%20Earhart%20movie%2C%20exhibit%20show%20that%20the%20pioneer%20pilot%20still%20soars%20in%20the%20American%20imagination

Amelia%20Earhart%20movie%2C%20exhibit%20show%20that%20the%20pioneer%20pilot%20still%20soars%20in%20the%20American%20imagination

Shared via AddThis

Superheroes on display at UO comics exhibit

From the Oregonian
EUGENE -- Ben Saunders is all too familiar with the stereotypes associated with comics and superheroes.

There's the moldy oldie: Comics are "funny books," suitable only for kids.

The next version: Comics are trivial because they're only about superheroes, i.e., men in tights. Snicker.

And the most recent, highfalutin' edition: Comics are an art form, sophisticated, complex and varied, so anybody who brings up superheroes is an unenlightened boob who clearly doesn't get it.

Saunders, however, does get it. The University of Oregon associate professor of English thinks it's high time superheroes were rescued from their low-prestige status in the comics pantheon.

"In the last three years," as Saunders says, "comic studies has grown as an emergent discipline within the academy. And a lot of attention has been placed on what you'd call 'comics lit,' the Art Spiegelman version of the form." Spiegelman is the former underground comics creator who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1992 for "Maus: A Survivor's Tale," his comic book memoir of the Holocaust.

Read On:

The Vatican Finally Shares Its Secret Stash of Astronomy Artifacts

From Gizmodo
The Vatican is holding an exhibit showing a collection of astronomy and space themed treasures, including this 18th century orrery.. I 'm just stunned that these beauties have been collecting dust somewhere, unseen and unappreciated for who-knows-how-long.

The Astrum 2009, Astronomy and Instruments' exhibition is running from October 16 to January 16, 2010 and just seeing some of the pictures in io9's makes me want to book a trip to Vatican City and stroll through space history. [io9
Send an email to Rosa Golijan, the author of this post, at rgolijan@gizmodo.com

New Smithsonian hall will focus on human evolution

From the LA Times

"Wild Things" Hit the Streets of New York City

A much anticipated movie of a classic piece of writing by Maurice Sendak. It sure would be fun to be in NYC for this.
"Wild Things" Hit the Streets of New York City

Libraries, Ebooks, and Love Stories

From Mobilitysite blog

An Urban Bookstore In Philly Finds Its Niche by JAMILA TRINDLE

An interesting story from NPR

An Award maybe a little early, but a nice sign of International Acceptance

I try to keep things here on subject as to regards to things that involve books, and the literary world. This post is a little stray from this ideal, and into the world of politics. As most of you know I am a big fan of President Obama. I have thought he was the best choice for President, long before his candidacy was announced. I first read his book Dreams of my Fathers in 2005, and was quite moved by his story. While this award may be a bit premature in receiving, and acknowledging that their are many who have spent lifetimes towards bringing peace to a war torn region, people, and world, I do think President Obama is a fine example of someone who is working towards making this nation, and this world a place where we can all co exist, and fine peace and harmony in our everyday life.
- Doug

Kay Ryan US Poet Laureate

Noble Prize Announcement 2009