Winter Break Closure

 

Happy holidays! The Library will be closed from December 21st through January 2nd and will reopen on January 3rd. Have a safe and happy break. 

Friday Reads: The Woman in Me

 This week's Friday Reads is a bit predictable; Kelly tells us about her recent audiobook listen, The Woman in Me by Britney Spears. 

As a woman who was born in America in the 1980s, I am legally obligated to read Britney Spears' just-released memoir, The Woman in Me, and to give you my opinion about it. 

I grew up in the woods listening to country music, so I missed a lot of the Britney hype at its zenith, but I do have fond memories of bopping to "One More Time" in my Girl Scout leader's minivan. Even I, however, knew that Britney was a phenomenon; there was Britney Spears, and then there were all of the other female singers. Many of them would even make caustic references in their own songs and interviews about the impossibility of being held to her standard. 

Britney's memoir reveals that a lot of that image was smoke and mirrors, and that all of the pop-princess success came at an impossibly steep price. The book's juicy "reveals" that have made headlines are shocking and heartbreaking, but I was most saddened by the way she described her day-to-day life under her father's conservatorship. The monotony and degradation of that existence sounds unbearable, and I have so much respect for what she endured to maintain the "privilege" of time with her children. 

I don't have any formal psychology training, but it doesn't take any to recognize that she has been though a lot of trauma, beginning in her early childhood. While I believe that Britney is telling her truth, I'm not sure that all of it is the truth. And honestly, I'm not sure how much that matters. What is clear from public record is that, over and over again, the people closest to her viewed her as a meal ticket rather than as a person deserving of love and respect. I truly hope that she is getting the therapy, love, and support that she needs as she tries to pick up where she left off in her late teens and works on becoming her own woman.

Friday Reads: Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma

Happy Friday! Interim Library Director Adam Pellman's book this week, Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma by Claire Dederer, is about the real-life monsters who have been the creators of some of our most-loved works, and how we as fans struggle between our love of the art and our repulsion by the creators' other actions. 

Particularly since the advent of the #MeToo movement, and the rise of so-called "cancel culture," I think that many of us have found ourselves in a situation where we've learned that an artist (actor, singer, writer, director, painter, etc.) whose work we love has been accused, or even proven, to have committed some terrible act, and we've had to suddenly ask ourselves difficult questions about our relationship to that artist's work. Is it still okay for me to like this art, even if I now despise the artist? If I do still like it, does that make me a bad person? Is it truly possible to "separate the art from the artist," or is that just wishful thinking?

This book, by critic and memoirist Claire Dederer, dives deep into all of these questions, and more, embracing all of the complexity and nuance of this dilemma that many fans must face. At its core, the book addresses one question: How do you balance the greatness of the work against the badness of the deed? Dederer is clear right from the start that her goal is not to offer a definitive answer (as she notes, there's no magical calculator that lets you plug in one value for artistic greatness and another for deed heinousness, and then tells you which one trumps the other). Rather, her goal is to explore in depth what it's like, and what it means, to grapple with this dilemma. Each chapter focuses on a different facet of this issue, allowing Dederer to explore all the sticky elements that make this such a complex topic. Does our conception of what it means to be a "genius" lead us to be more forgiving of bad behavior among those artists who have earned that descriptor? How does gender play into this dilemma? Does a monstrous act later in an artist's career retroactively stain all of their earlier work? Dederer is a brilliant writer, and it's a real pleasure reading her insightful, funny, and sometimes self-critical examination of these questions.

Friday Reads: A Libertarian Walks Into a Bear

 Happy Friday! This week, Public Services Librarian Kelly Clever wants to tell us about the audiobook she's been listening to recently: A Libertarian Walks Into a Bear: The Utopian Plot to Liberate an American Town (And Some Bears) by Matthew Hongoltz-Hetling.

This book sat on my Audible wishlist for a year or so before I finally decided to give it a listen. I don't remember howI first heard of it, but I do remember that the title made me laugh. In 2004, a group of libertarian-minded people identified the small town of Grafton, New Hampshire, as the perfect location for a libertarian society. They spread word of their plan through websites and message boards, and soon liberty-lovers from around the nation began moving there with the intent to vote out the existing local government and to install no government at all in its place. 

Unfortunately for the libertarian colonizers, however, Grafton was already home to an impressive population of particularly bold black bears. The bear situation was not improved by the sudden influx of people living in the woods and disposing of their garbage in any manner they chose. 

The book is filled with memorable characters, both human and ursine. In the audio version, the narrator's deadpan delivery adds to the drama and hilarity. We meet a woman known as Doughnut Lady who began feeding doughnuts to the bears several times a day. We learn about an eccentric preacher from decades gone by who built a towering outdoor pulpit to preach above the treetops. My personal favorite anecdote so far is about an old farmer and her guard-llama, who gave one cow-hunting black bear the butt-kicking of its life. 

I expect this book would be enjoyable for people from any political orientation who appreciate oddball history and dry humor. And bears. 

Friday Reads: Dandelion Wine

Most people have heard of Fahrenheit 451, but today Interim Library Director Adam Pellman tells us about one of Ray Bradbury's other books: Dandelion Wine.

 

I first encountered Ray Bradbury's stories as required reading in high school and college, and he's been a favorite of mine ever since. I've read most of his story collections, and novels like Fahrenheit 451 and Something Wicked This Way Comes still stand out as classics. For some reason, it's taken me this long to get to one of his most beloved books, Dandelion Wine, his semi-autobiographical novel about a childhood summer in a small town. This feels like the perfect time for me to read it. With school back in session, I need something to help me hold on to these last summer days, and this book fits the bill.

The novel takes place over the course of the summer of 1928, in fictional Green Town, Illinois (a setting modeled after Bradbury's own hometown of Waukegan). While the narrative returns time and again to the activities of twelve-year-old Douglas Spaulding and his brother Tom, many other townspeople get their time in the spotlight, and Bradbury does a marvelous job of fleshing out these characters, even if it's only for a single chapter. As much as he excels at capturing the rhythms and concerns of childhood, Bradbury is equally adept at fashioning the town's adult citizens, whose joy, sadness, fear, hope, and reminiscences create such an affecting collective portrait. As grounded as much of the novel is, there are still the darker elements and sense of magic that I often associate with Bradbury's work, whether it's the brothers' fascination with a fortune-telling arcade automaton, or the series of local murders thought to be carried out by an otherworldly creature known as the Lonely One. It's been a real treat to revisit Bradbury's work after such a long time away.

Friday Reads: Major Labels

Our newly-minted Interim Library Director, Adam Pellman, has a Friday Reads for this last Friday before Fall Workshop! Today he tells us about his experience reading Major Labels: A History of Popular Music in Seven Genres by Kelefa Sanneh.

I've been a casual music listener for most of my life, and my listening habits tended to be limited to classic rock or whatever happened to be on the radio in the car. It's only been over the past five years or so that I've made a conscious effort to expand my musical horizons, seeking out genres I had ignored in the past, and discovering new and old music by artists with whom I was previously unfamiliar. On the recommendation of a colleague, I even started a listening project using the 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die album generator website, which randomly assigns an album each day for you to listen to, based on a list created by a panel of music critics. That's why this feels like the perfect time for me to read Sanneh's comprehensive and accessible book, which is essentially a history of American popular music since 1970. It's given me a lot of context to keep in mind as I listen to a new album from the list each day. Sanneh, a longtime music critic, draws heavily from contemporary criticism and journalism in music publications like Rolling Stone, Billboard, Source, and Creem, in addition to offering his own analysis and bits of autobiography, discussing, for example, how he fell in love with punk and hip-hop in his youth, or writing about his adoration of country music.

What I really love about this book is the way Sanneh dissects music culture, often drawing parallels between genres that might not seem obvious. As Sanneh writes, there's a sense of identity or culture associated with genres like punk and country, and terms like "rock 'n' roll" and "hip-hop" often evoke ideas of a certain lifestyle apart from the music itself. Musicians and fans embrace the distinctiveness of a particular genre and its cultural identity as part of its appeal, so when an artist or even a whole genre begins to have mainstream success or "crossover" appeal, that feeling of distinctiveness or specialness begins to fade. And yet, isn't greater success and broader appeal the goal of most musical artists? This tension is inherent in all of these genres, leading to constant evolution and the advent of new subgenres or strains like heavy metal, outlaw country, hardcore, trap, and house music. The book is a welcome reminder that music can be something we connect with on a deeply personal level, yet simultaneously something that can give us a real sense of community.

Fall 2023 Library Newsletter

The Library's Fall 2023 Newsletter is live! Check out the big changes happening at Reeves. https://mailchi.mp/bafa.../library-newsletter-summer-8290399

Celebrating David's Retirement

Today we celebrated David Stanley's 26 years of service to Seton Hill as the Director of Reeves Memorial Library. Dr. Stanley will be retiring at the end of next week and will be sorely missed by many on the Hill! (For those attending Fall Workshop, he does plan to attend the reception honoring retirees at the end of the second day.) Please join us in wishing him the best!

Friday Reads: To Kill a Mockingbird

This Friday, Dr. Stanley shares a book that is probably familiar to most of us and which always makes me (Kelly) think of summer: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. As with many classics, there is always something new to find with a re-read!

I like to spend some of my time during the summer re-reading books that I’ve read before. It doesn’t matter if I read it recently or many years ago. It doesn’t matter if I’ve read it just once before or more times than I can remember. It’s a great time to revisit old friends. One of my choices this summer has been To Kill a Mockingbird. This may have been one of the first novels I read growing up so it’s always held a special place for me. If you’ve seen the movie but not read the book, I think you’d be surprised how different they are. While the movie tells the general story the book is much more all-encompassing of the events that took place during that period in America. Granted there are some disturbing sections but it tells the story of the era. The past is not always pleasant as is pointed out in the plot. You get to learn more about Scout, Jem, and Dill; their personalities give you a more fleshed out perspective. Calpurnia is not just a background character; she interacts at a much deeper level and plays an active part in exploring the racial issues that arise. There are many subplots that are explored and they all work together to made this a difficult albeit excellent summer read.

Closed July 1 - 4th

The Library and the University will be CLOSED Saturday, 7/1 - Tuesday, 7/4 in observance of Independence Day. Have a safe and happy holiday!

Friday Reads: The Buried Giant

If you're looking for a misty, mysterious fantasy novel to read this summer, Adam's current book might fit the bill. Read on for his teaser of The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro!

Set in a mostly uncivilized post-Arthurian England, The Buried Giant tells the story of an elderly Briton couple, Axl and Beatrice, who live in a small hillside village. The England of the novel is a land shrouded in mist, where ogres and dragons roam the land, and where everyone is experiencing a mysterious sort of collective amnesia. Some believe it is the constant mists that cloud their memories. With vague recollections occasionally gnawing at the corners of their minds, Axl and Beatrice set out on a journey to visit their barely remembered son, and along the way they are joined by a fierce Saxon warrior, an orphaned boy with a strange bite wound, and the aging Arthurian knight, Sir Gawain. Facing peril from human and non-human threats alike, they continue on their way, slowly piecing together the truths about their shared past.

This is a different kind of fantasy novel than I've read before, borrowing genre iconography like dragons and ogres, but with a very grounded storyline and language that reads more like historical fiction, despite its mythic trappings. It's also a highly allegorical novel, and its examination of collective responses to guilt and trauma feels sadly relevant. Kazuo Ishiguro also wrote two of my favorite novels, The Remains of the Day and Never Let Me Go, both of which offer similarly slow, subtle builds to their respective story revelations. They're the kind of novels for which the phrase "quietly devastating" was coined, and The Buried Giant is another work that fits that description to a T.

Memorial Day weekend closure

The Library is closing tomorrow (Thursday, 5/25) at noon for the annual SHU Employee picnic and will remain closed for the holiday weekend. Regular summer hours will resume at 8:00 a.m. on Tuesday, May 30th.

Building closed tomorrow

Reeves Hall will be closed to the public tomorrow (Friday, May 19th) for an Admissions event. The Library staff will be available via email to assist you remotely. 

Summer Newsletter

The Summer 2023 edition of the Library Newsletter is out! Faculty and staff, check your inboxes, or click here to view online: 

https://mailchi.mp/c9e0f0f8fb2e/library-newsletter-summer-2023

Closing at noon on Wed., 5/10

The Library will be closing at noon tomorrow (Wednesday, May 10th) for an employee event. 

Summer Library Hours

We're on summer time here on the Hill!

Our summer hours run from May 8 - August 20, 2023. We will be open 8:00 a.m. - 4:50 p.m. Monday through Friday and will be closed on weekends. Exception dates are posted on the Library home page. 

National Library Week!

Celebrate National Library Week April 23-29, 2023!

National Library Week is an annual celebration sponsored by the American Library Association (ALA). It has been observed throughout the United States every April since 1958! The week highlights the many ways libraries, librarians, and library workers transform lives and strengthen school, public, academic, and special-interest communities.

The theme for that first National Library Week in 1958 was "Wake Up and Read!" This year, for the 65th celebration, the theme is “There's More to the Story."

While the "brand" of most libraries is books, "there's more to the story." Our print and digital resources form the space for the scholarly conversation and the sharing of the human experience across chronological, linguistic, cultural, and geographic barriers. Come and contribute to the great ongoing story!

Throughout the week, stop by Reeves Hall and visit the Reeves Memorial Library spaces upstairs and downstairs for research help, interactive whiteboard questions, bookmark and sticker giveaways, Mindful Moments with the Counseling Center, and easy ways to express your support for the Library, its staff, and its resources. And make sure to participate on social media by following us on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.

National Library Week Events:

Monday-Friday, all day: New whiteboard question and bookmark or sticker giveaway every day (by the Library desk on the main level of the Learning Commons)

Monday (Right to Read Day): ALA releases the State of America's Libraries report and the Top Ten (13 this year!) Frequently Challenged Books of 2022 (watch our social media)

Tuesday (National Library Workers Day): Library Aide appreciation day - thank a student Library worker

Wednesday (National Library Outreach Day): Cheer Kelly on at the Honors Club "Life Raft Event" in front of McKenna at 7:00 p.m. and vote for her to make it to the deserted island!

Thursday (Take Action for Libraries Day): Stop by the main level of the Learning Commons and write a postcard in support of Reeves Memorial Library

2023 Research Award Winners Announced!

The Reeves Library Research Award was created to recognize and encourage the development of information fluency in resource-based research. Each award recipient is recognized at honors convocation and receives a monetary prize in the amount of $250.

Rowan Mentzer received the award in the Junior & Senior division for the paper, "Drama Therapy in Prisons: The Benefits of Playing Pretend with Incarcerated Individuals." The reviewers were impressed by "the high quality of writing and the extremely effective organized way that the topic was presented" and loved the "unique approach combining theatre, [psychology], and [criminal justice] elements." The entry was sponsored by Dr. Kellee Van Aken.

Sarah Minghini was the first-year/sophomore level award winner for the project, "Duolingo Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Report." Our review panelists said that the project displayed both "qualitative and quantitative depth" as well as "excellent (and professional!) analysis." The entry was sponsored by Dr. Jen Jones.

Please join us in congratulating both Rowan and Sarah, and in applauding loudly at Honors Convocation!

ACRL in PGH!

I (Kelly) had the opportunity to attend the annual conference of the Association of College & Research Libraries last week when it came to Pittsburgh! This was my first national conference since graduate school (a looooong time ago), so I made the most of the 36 hours I attended in person. 

The conference was held at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center. This was my first time visiting the venue, and it was perfect for a large conference such as this one. 

The fun & games area included this self-serve photo booth. You could elect to get a photo or a gif of yourself, and I opted for the still image. 

The games and relaxation area also included oversized Jenga, coloring tables, a bookshelf mural where you could add your favorite book title, and much more. I didn't spend much time there, but it was fun to walk through. 

The weather was cold but beautiful, and the many outdoor decks and patios had stunning views of downtown Pittsburgh. 

Because I was only at the convention center for the first evening and first full day, I tried to attend as many in-person-only sessions as possible. I wish I'd had more time to explore the exhibits hall. It's always exciting to see what new initiatives and resources are out there! I did get to chat with some folks from OCLC (who provide our WorldCat Discovery tool, among other things) and the representatives from Sage (a major publisher in the social sciences). 

I also got to meet representatives of an up-and-coming AI research tool and of several open-access publishing collectives. We're planning to do more to connect students and faculty with open educational resources in the coming months, so stay tuned!

Friday Reads: A Gentleman in Moscow

For this week's Friday Reads, Adam shares A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles, a delightful novel about a less-than-delightful situation. 

Count Alexander Ilyich Rostov is a Russian aristocrat, a learned man of impeccable manners and wit, whose life of leisure changes drastically when he is brought before a Bolshevik tribunal in 1922. Declared a "Former Person" by the new Communist government, Rostov is sentenced to house arrest in his current Moscow residence, the grand Metropol hotel, where he is moved from his luxury suite to a cramped attic room, and threatened with execution should he ever set foot outside the hotel. He passes his days reading, making his weekly visit to the hotel barber, dining and drinking in the hotel's restaurants and bar, and getting to know the hotel's staff and other guests. He befriends a bright, enthusiastic young girl named Nina, who shows him the hotel's hidden nooks and crannies. He begins an affair with a famous actress, and takes a job as headwaiter in the hotel's fanciest restaurant. I'm only about halfway through the book, and it's only 1930, so I look forward to finding out what happens to the count and his acquaintances over the coming decades. How will the count experience, from the confines of the hotel, the lean years of the Depression, the terror of Stalin's purges, the brutality of World War II, and the onset of the Cold War? Will he ever get to leave the Metropol?


This novel as an absolute joy to read. It's not just that Count Rostov is such a likable character, or that Towles captures Rostov's inner life and the workings of the hotel so beautifully, or fun little details like the chapter titles all beginning with the letter "A." The book is so elegantly written, and with such warm humor and a light touch, that it feels just about perfect. It's one of those novels that's so well-written that it seems effortless, as if the text just came to be in its final form through some sort of magic.

Friday Reads: Have I Told You This Already?

This week's Friday Reads is a Friday Listen! Kelly has been listening to the audiobook of Lauren Graham's Have I Told You This Already?: Stories I Don't Want to Forget to Remember, which is read by the fast-talking author.

Most people would probably recognize Lauren Graham, though where they know her from may depend on how old they are. Some people would recognize her as one of Jerry's many brief girlfriends from Seinfeld; others know her best from Parenthood. She's been in a few movies and currently stars in The Mighty Ducks: Game Changers on Disney+. I, personally, will always think of her as Lorelai Gilmore.

Before she hit the small and silver screens, Graham majored in English, and it shows in her writing. (She also has an MFA in acting.) She's written both a novel and a previous book of memoir-ish essays. For the first 45 minutes or so of this audiobook, I couldn't help comparing this installment unfavorably to Talking as Fast as I Can, but it has now definitely hit its stride. Graham tells us more stories of how she worked her way up through small theatre productions, commercial gigs, and bit parts to achieve her current semi-celebrity status.

Because the sense you get from this book is that she is a "semi-celebrity." She shops and dines in the same places as Gwen Stefani and Ryan Reynolds, but she never loses her sense of wonder that she is there. She is also happy to be our informant "on the inside," spilling secrets about awards-shows arrival times and Hollywood hierarchies. She may not move in the same circles as the A-listers, but she's an old hand in the industry and seems to genuinely enjoy her job -- and to view it as just that, a job, though one with unusual and often really cool benefits.

I'd recommend reading or listening to her first book of essays, Talking as Fast as I Can, before this one. Each can stand alone, but Have I Told You This Already often assumes that the reader is familiar with stories and bits from the first book.

Friday Reads: Babylon's Ashes

Happy Friday! If you've had quite enough of Earth for the time being, why not escape into "The Expanse" with Adam's Friday Reads, Babylon's Ashes by James S. A. Corey?

Babylon's Ashes is the sixth book in the sci-fi adventure series The Expanse, the source material for the recent SYFY/Prime original series of the same title. The series is set a few centuries in the future, after humans have settled throughout the solar system, having colonized the Moon, Mars, and the Asteroid belt. By this point in the series, alien technology has also allowed humans to journey to the far reaches of the galaxy through interstellar ring gates, colonizing planets in distant solar systems and discovering new sources of vital resources. Militant citizens of the Asteroid belt (so-called "Belters"), tired of being exploited by the "Inners" of Earth and Mars, have launched a devastating attack against Earth, leading to an all-out war for survival and control of our solar system's dwindling resources. And right in the middle, as always, is Captain James Holden and his crew, the central characters in the series, who must navigate the perilous space between all of these warring factions.

The series is exciting and superbly written, with storylines touching on science, politics, medicine, religion, philosophy, business, and many other areas. One of the things I appreciate most about the series is how clearly the authors (Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck writing together under a joint pen name) define the stakes for each of the warring groups, especially the Belters. They've been exploited and marginalized for generations by Earth and Mars, and now that humans have begun colonizing other solar systems, the resources from the Belt may no longer be needed, potentially leaving the Belters without an economic base. And Belters can't pack up and find a new home on a distant planet, because most of them can't survive in the gravity of a planetary surface when their bodies have adapted physiologically to Belter life in low or no gravity. Even if you don't agree with the actions of their charismatic leader, Marco Inaros, you can't help but feel sympathy for their cause.

Library Newsletter, Spring 2023

 The Spring 2023 Library Newsletter for faculty and staff is available now!

Check it out here. 

Have a great weekend -- we'll see you on Tuesday!