19 posts tagged “books”
I've been doing a lot of weeding at work recently (librarian lingo for "going through books and tossing the stuff I don't like"). I'm working in the 000-099 Dewey range, which is quite odd, especially before you hit all the computer books in the 004s and 005s. If you're clueless & curious, you can get an overview of the Dewey Decimal Classification system here
. My favorite part of this antiquated way of classifying has always been the 200s, where Christianity gets 220-290, and all other religions get 290-299. Take that, heathen scum!
In any case, in a moment of inspiration, I've decided to document some of the more amusing/bizarre/perplexing books I came across. I'm sure no one's ever done that before! Unfortunately, I don't have a catchy title for what likely will be a continuing series of blog posts. I guess I'll tag them "weed party," the title of a boring Band of Horses song. Kind of stupid, I know. But, you know what? It's my blog, so piss off!
001.42: When in Doubt, Check Him Out. The cover of this book jumps out at you like the axe that Jason threw in Friday the 13th Part 3. Wait a minute...I was 8 years old when that movie came out. There's no way I actually saw it in 3D, right? Whatever. In any case, the cover of this book is so chock full of crap, that I feel like you're getting cheated by the small image above this text. let me see if I can remedy that..
Could Joseph Culligan possibly fit more crap on the cover of his book? I'm pretty sure he stole those creepy eyes from one of John Sandford's Prey books. Plus, he's got a picture of himself on the cover (also on the spine), which 1) seems extremely egomaniacal, and 2) makes him look like someone who would actually beat up a woman.
So, the gist of this book is pretty simple: women should not trust men they've recently started dating. So, before things to too serious, it's time to start doing some background checks. Here is a sampling of chapter headings: Driving & Automobile Records; Divorce, Marriage, Birth & Death Records; Child Support Enforcement; Bankruptcy Records. This excerpt from the preface sums it up nicely:
Imagine how many of the readers of this book will be able to save themselves grief and heartache simply by using telephone numbers and Web addresses on pages 7-26 through 7-28 and finding out that your boyfriend and future son-in-law had been an inmate...or by checking his driving record to discover drunken driving charges...or by reviewing his divorce record to discover that he had abused his wife...
Wait a minute! He refers to "your boyfriend and future son-in-law." What the hell does that mean? I'm assuming there was supposed to be an "or" there.
In any case, Mr. Culligan basically encourages women to write letters to many different agencies all over the country, asking for information about their prospective boyfriend/husband. About 75% of the book is simply addresses. The best part of the book, though, is chapter 13: The Internet. It starts out with: "During the late 1960's, during the 'cold war,' nuclear war was foremost in our minds because of the military power of Russia." Ah, I see. You've intrigued me, Mr. Culligan- do go on! Joseph remembers air raid drills at school, and bomb shelters being built, you see. He lived it! Somehow this leads into a 4-page history of the Internet. Most of the chapter consists of a big list of websites. But first, completely out of the blue, are two pages devoted to:
The library just received The Greenwood Encyclopedia of American Poets and Poetry, a 5-volume set. The cover of each volume is the same:
If you are a fan of The Replacements, or of the Minneapolis music scene in general, this is highly recommended. It's not quite as engrossing as Please Kill Me, but a lot of fun to read. It must be so much freaking work to put one of these oral history books together- reading through interview transcripts and album reviews, then trying to make it flow, almost like prose. Here's a great quote:
Paul Stark: Bob Stinson came to the [Hootenanny recording sessions] with three beers in him, and we realized his lead guitar playing was best between his fifth and seventh beer, and after the seventh he was worthless. If he hadn't had the four, he was worthless as well. That was a six-month period during his life that that was true; it probably wasn't true before then, and it probably wasn't true after that.
I can't remember the last book I enjoyed this much. Pollan's a fantastic writer, and this book is really fun to read (as opposed to The Omnivore's Dilemma). I actually put off reading this book for a while, because I thought it would be as dense as Omnivore's (which I did enjoy, but in more of an academic sort of way). It's not. Four chapters, 245 pages, and a narrative style that is simply a joy to read.
While gardening one day, Pollan suddenly is struck by a thought- in our coevolutionary relationship with plants, are we really as much in charge as we think? Or are we just another version of bumblebees, disseminating plant genes to and fro?
From the book's introduction:
So the question arose in my mind that day: Did I choose to plant these potatoes, or did the potato make me do it?
All these plants, which I'd always regarded as objects of my desire, were also, I realized, subjects, acting on me, getting me to do things for them they couldn't do for themselves. And that's when I had the idea: What would happen if we looked at the world beyond the garden this way, regarded our place in nature from the same upside-down perspective?
Pollan looks at four plants- the apple, the tulip, cannabis, and the potato, and examines "the desires that link their destinies to our own." I found the first section the most entertaining, since most of it deals with crazy Johnny Appleseed. But the entire book is informative and fun.
I'm finally getting around to Naomi Klein's No Logo. All sorts of interesting stuff in here, but I'm reading the chapter "The Branding of Learning," which is particularly disturbing. Here are a couple passages:
Channel One is pushing the market-research model even further, frequently enlisting "partner" teachers to develop class lessons in which students are asked to create a new ad campaign for Snapple or to redesign Pepsi's vending machines. In New York and Los Angeles high-school students have created thirty-second animated spots for Starburst fruit candies, and students in Colorado Springs designed Burger King ads to hang in their school buses. Finished assignments are passed on to the companies -- all subsidized by the taxpayer-funded school system.
Perhaps the most infamous of these experiments occurred in 1998, when Coca-Cola ran a competition asking several schools to come up with a strategy for distributing Coke coupons to students. The school that devised the best promotional strategy would win $500. Greenbriar High School in Evans, Georgia, took the contest extremely seriously, calling an official Coke day in late March during which all students came to school in Coca-Cola T-shirts, posed for a photograph in a formation spelling Coke, attended lectures given by Coca-Cola executives and learned about all things black and bubbly in their classes. It was a little piece of branding heaven until it came to the principal's attention that in an act of hideous defiance, one Mike Cameron, a nineteen-year-old senior, had come to school wearing a T-shirt with a Pepsi logo. He was promptly suspended for the offense. "I know it sounds bad - 'Child suspended for wearing Pepsi shirt on Coke Day,'" said principal Gloria Hamilton. "It really would have been acceptable...if it had just been in-house, but we had the regional president here and people flew in from Atlanta to do us the honor of being resource speakers. These students knew we had guests."
After what seems like years, I finally finished this book. (Started and stopped about 50 times.) Definitely required reading, although people should feel free to skim it, and skip parts, if they're so inclined. I thought the most interesting parts were near the beginning- the omnipresence of corn (thanks partly to insane corn subsidies), the industrial "organic" industry, and life on Joel Salton's pastoral farm, featuring a perfectly balanced, "natural" ecosystem.
Pollan is an excellent writer who literally digs in to his subject matter, participating in every aspect imaginable. I haven't yet read The Botany of Desire, his previous book, but plan on reading it soon.
Show us a book that scared you as a child.
OK- I didn't actually read the Spanish version as a child, but Steve used to like to pull it out at the Dayton house and torment me by reading it aloud. This book still freaks me out. I'm not exactly sure what did it- something about Maurice Sendak's illustrations.
Too much about Joy Division.
The title of the book comes from a Built to Spill album title, but the band is never discussed.
Partying with Robert Pollard sounds like fun, and I can definitely relate to discovering Guided By Voices way too late.
Sellers tried to be cute by inserting extensive footnotes (which he offers as a tribute to his favorite book, Nicholson Baker's The Mezanine), but they are really more of a distraction than anything.
I hadn't planned on writing about this, since Stephanie already did a bang-up job, but then I figured, I am a public librarian, so I suppose I ought to write a few words.
The ALA Banned Book Week page has all sorts of interesting information, if you feel like exploring- the top 100 challenged books of the 90s (Where's Waldo?), the top 10 most challenged of 2006, and, of course lots of pirate-themed graphics. When Steph questioned tying Banned Books Week to pirates, I defended it, theorizing that pirates wouldn't want someone telling them what to do. But then I saw this poster:
"Set sail on the ship o' the banned?" Well, I have worked with a few goofy dude librarians who love awful puns. So I guess there are a few of them at ALA, too. The book that was challenged the most in 2006?
Yep- a book about two male penguins raising a chick. GOD SAVE US FROM THE GAY PENGUINS! THEY WILL TURN OUR STRAIGHT CHILDREN GAY!!!!!!
One of the things I hate the most is when parents are looking for books for their children, but then throw in a "Oh, but none of that Harry Potter satanic stuff." My mother could be a bit overbearing/smothering when I was young, but she never questioned what books I was reading. I've talked to parents who don't want their 16-year-old kid reading Stephen King books- I was reading that stuff in 5th grade, for chrissake! If kids want to read, let them read. It sure beats staring at the television all day.
Books that attempt to refute global warming:
Somewhere, Kilgore Trout is crying.
Kurt Vonnegut died last night. Dinita Smith has a nice tribute over at the New York Times. Vonnegut has always been a favorite of mine, and, if pressed to name the BEST BOOK OF ALL TIME, I would go with Slaughterhouse Five.
Listen: I started writing this post 17 hours ago, and still have absolutely no clue how to eulogize this incredible man.
Back in 2001, Kurt jammed with his grandson's band, and invited Jon Fishman along for the ride.
He also designed a hypothetical Phish album cover:
(The Phish connections are neat, but also competely coincidental. For some reason, I thought it apt to mention them now- kind of cool when your favorite writer and your favorite band collaborate.)
"Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and finds himself no wiser than before. He is full of murderous resentment of people who are ignorant without having come by their ignorance the hard way." K. Vonnegut
"Be careful what you pretend to be because you are who you pretend to be." - K. Vonnegut
"Just because some of us can read and write and do a little math, that doesn't mean we deserve to conquer the universe." - K. Vonnegut
"I think we never become really and genuinely our entire and honest selves until we are dead--and not then until we have been dead years and years. People ought to start dead, and they would be honest so much earlier." - M. Twain
"So it goes" - K. Vonnegut
"Goodnight, sweet prince" - W. Shakespeare
