Libraries may be struggling with cuts in hours, staff, and budgets but that doesn't mean those institutions have forgotten that some folks are worse off than they are. Below is a very short, and NOT at all inclusive list of libraries that are sponsoring charitable efforts to make the holidays happier for everyone:The Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library in Abilene, Kansas is asking quilters to make wounded soldiers more comfortable. The “Quilts of Valor” challenge seeks display worthy quilts for an exhibit on Veteran's Day in 2010. After the exhibition, the quilts will be donated to wounded troops.The Red Hook...
The Oldest Living Rare Bookseller in the World
Muriel Craddock, 97, with daughter Kay in their family book storein Melbourne, Australia. Photo: Joseph Feil.Muriel Craddock, at age 97 1/2 surely the oldest living rare bookseller in the world, has announced the re-opening of Kay Craddock Antiquarian Bookseller, her family business in Melbourne, Australia.Muriel, known as the Queen of antiquarian booksellers, and her late husband, Les, established the business forty-four years ago as The Treasure Chest. As the business grew it morphed into the Bourke Street Bookshop. When daughter Kay - who started working in the shop when she was sixteen - assumed management of the bookshop in 1990,...
Rains Reigns At Alabama Library
The University of North Alabama Library's Collier Library has announced the acquisition of film scripts, photographs, DVD's. interview recordings, and other personal papers from famed motion picture actor Claude Rains.The collection is a donation from his only child, daughter Jessica Rains, herself an actor in such films as The Sting (1973) and Woody Allen’s Sleeper (1973).Claude Rains, born in London in 1889, became a US citizen in 1939, a year following daughter Jessica's birth. Originally a stage actor, he came to motion pictures late in his career, becoming a sensation as the titular character in James Whale's The Invisible Man...
Albert Camus in Grave Condition, France Holds Its Breath
The author at rest.Albert Camus is in the midst of a post-existential crisis.President Nicolas Sarkozy of France wants to transfer the remains of the writer and Nobel-laureate to the Panthéon, the Paris monument to some of the great men and women of France and one of the nation's most hallowed burial places. Camus is currently residing in the cemetery of Lourmarin, in the Luberon area of Provence, his birthplace.The gall, says Camus’s son, Jean, who asserts that interring his father’s remains at the Panthéon would be contrary to his father’s wishes and does not want to have his legacy put...
2009 Bad Sex in Fiction Award Nominees Announced
Courtney Love presents the 2006 Bad Sex in Fiction Awardto Iain Hollingshead for his novel, Twentysomething.The nominees for Literary Review's 2009 Bad Sex in Fiction Awards were announced last Friday evening.The awards were established by the editors to “gently dissuade authors and publishers from including unconvincing, perfunctory, embarrassing or redundant passages of a sexual nature in otherwise sound literary novels.” They are annually awarded to the author who produces the worst, most laughable and/or jarring description of a sexual encounter in a modern novel.In other words, when sex scenes go horribly wrong secondary to punctuation, syntax, or falling off a...