Wordwork|play

Donkey Library to Spread Literacy

I stumbled across this video today. Though I feel bad for the poor donkey carrying such a heavy load, it is so inspiring to see someone working so hard (I'm talking about the teacher here, though the donkey should be thanked too) to bring literacy to poor rural kids as a vehicle for the knowledge and self-confidence required to resist war.

Take a look at the video and see if you can help out:

Very Clever Ad Promoting Reading and the Book

The paper book...

Makes me want to read a book right now instead of going to work :-)}}}

Long time no write...

I feel almost embarrassed that my blogs -- all three of them -- have been neglected for so long now. This one especially!

Work is still crazy, staffing levels and the consequent demands of the job being such that I am quite exhausted when I get home, so I just don't have the energy to write. So, while I have been doing a little reading again of late, the latest book having been read with the intention of reviewing it this weekend, I just can't seem to get enough head space to organize my thoughts and actually write the review. And I really did enjoy the book!

Hopefully soon, little by little, I'll manage to write meaningfully and more substantially again. What I have been doing in preparation, however, as I really want to get back into writing again, and learn to do so professionally, and get into editing as well, is to build my LinkedIn network.

The motivation is there, just not the time and energy. Wish me luck! And sorry about the lack of reviews, especially to those who sent me books for review over the past year or so.

Reading Satire

The ONION features a neat satire on reading entitled "Area Eccentric Reads Entire Book." It's quite funny on the surface, but points to a disturbing move away from books, especially among the younger generations. Many young people no longer have the requisite attention span to read books. They seem to need a continuous stream of stimuli, of sound bytes and visual flickers. In our always-on, plugged-in, virtually networked and technologically connected culture, there is no shortage thereof. There's lots of money to be made from a generation trained to be in constant 'need' of fresh stimuli and new, or newly packaged, products.

On the topic of books, here's another sad commentary. And here yet another. We laugh at all of them for the same reason that we laugh when poked in the ribs (I'll leave that analogy for you to think about for now).

On Old Books, Fungus, and Inspiration

What's not to love about books? I have always loved books. I love the feel of books, the look of books, and yes, the smell of books. Particularly old books. The older the better--old books look, feel and smell better than modern ones.

Oh how I love hanging out in and walking through library stacks (read about the long history of libraries here), inhaling deeply the musty smell of old books. For that, and the intellectually stimulating atmosphere of course, I miss university life. I used to think I liked the smell of books for psychological reasons--I love the idea of books, therefore I like the smell of books. But an article I came across recently suggests something more physical.

Ellen Warren writes, in the Chicago Tribune, that there may well be more to getting high on great literature than the love of literature or learning itself. In "Book Fungus Can Get You High," Warren writes that "[e]xperts on the various fungi that feed on the pages and on the covers of books are increasingly convinced that you can get high - or at least a little wacky-by sniffing old books. Fungus on books, they say, is a likely source of hallucinogenic spores." Hmm. So that could explain some of the great works of literature--the authors, spending hours upon hours in dank libraries full of old books, especially in the days before high-tech humidity control, got high off fungus spores. Their inspiration may have come from what they were inspiring (breathing in).

I really need to surround myself with more old books. Take a good whiff of old book, then get back to the computer to write. That may be another downside of digital literature--no hallucinogenic fungus to inspire.

The Life of a Creative Offering: Independent and yet Dependent

I was doing some research on Ecotecture (word-blend of ecology and architecture) and came across the following quote from Picasso that can be equally well applied to literature--to poetry, short stories, and novels.

A picture is not thought out and settled before hand. While it is being done, it changes as one's thoughts change. And when it is finished, it still goes on changing, according to the state of mind of whoever is looking at it. A picture lives a life like a living creature, undergoing the changes imposed on us by our life from day to day. This is natural enough, as the picture lives only through the man who is looking at it.

Picasso from a 1935 interview with Christian Zervos. (found at Ecotecture Canada)

A work of fiction is the same way. No matter how much thought and effort a writer may have put into a story-- perhaps growing it out of, and around, an overarching concept or leitmotif, forming and refining characters, laying out plot elements, and then revising, refining, focusing, clarifying, culling, and polishing--to bring it to life, as soon as it is published and out of the author's hands, out of the author's control, it begins a life of its own. It is an independent, living creature. As long as it has a reader, it is alive. But it grows and changes.

People change from childhood into adulthood, and continue to change and grow and be modified by the impact of life experience. People change when they cross national, cultural, religious, linguistic and political borders, even if certain core elements remain relatively fixed. And so it is also with the work of fiction. Even if unchanged in a literal sense, an ancient Arabic, Greek, Indian, Persian, or Roman story, an Old English or Norse poem, or for that matter a Victorian, or even modernist novel, is a different creature now. It no longer means what it did in its own time and place. It has a life of its own, but is utterly dependent upon the reader. The author gives it birth, but it is the reader alone who keeps it alive, the reader alone who nurtures it, changes it, and sometimes revives it.

Ipsos Reid Study on Readers in Canada: 31% Read Not a Single Book in Past Year

I was alerted by the Literary Saloon to an Ipsos Reid survey commissioned by CanWest News Service and Global Television. According to the study which surveyed 1001 people across Canada, 31% of adults across Canada had not read a single book in the past year. A similar poll conducted in the U.S. found 27% of adults there had not picked up a book in the past year. I don't like to get too much into Canada/U.S. rivalries, but I am a bit surprised that Canada was behind the U.S. in this regard. I suppose I thought of Canadians, on the whole, as a bit more educated, literate and, well, reading, than this study reveals.

Interestingly, as Misty Harris reports in Canadian book readers fall behind the U.S.: poll at canada.com, the 69% of Canadians who said they did read in 2007, did so voraciously, reading an average of 20 books a year. And what I find even more interesting is the regional variations across Canada: B.C. residents read about 33 books a year, Atlantic Canada 22, Ontario 19, Alberta 18, Quebec 16, and Manitoba/Saskatchewan 15 books. What I find disturbing is that, at least as reported in Harris' article, the Eastern provinces are lumped all together, instead of being listed separately (Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island), and the Territories (Yukon, Northwest Territories, and Nunavut) are not included at all.

We seem to be surprised, and perhaps embarrassed, every time such a report comes out. There is much talk of declining literacy, especially among members of a generation increasingly caught up in the pop culture world of the internet (facebook, MySpace, YouTube, etc.), and gadgets like iPods and cell phones, a world often shallow, consumer-driven, and wetterwendisch.

Educators certainly notice (I was one, briefly, and have also had many conversations with professors on the matter), from elementary school through university, a deterioration of language, critical thinking, and research skills. Information has become easily accessible, but is spread out wide and shallow like manure, and many young people no longer learn how to separate the wheat from the chaff. Some of the available and frequently accessed and referenced information is packaged as democratized knowledge (see Wikipedia), a dangerous concept that sounds good on the surface but can easily slide down the slippery slope towards truthiness (1 : "truth that comes from the gut, not books" (Stephen Colbert, Comedy Central's "The Colbert Report," October 2005); 2 : "the quality of preferring concepts or facts one wishes to be true, rather than concepts or facts known to be true" (American Dialect Society, January 2006).

But according to Janet Eger, a spokeswoman for Indigo Books, "readership in the Canadian market is remaining steady." A much more interesting and revealing question, I think, is what it is people are reading, and the quality of what is being read. According to the Ipsos Reid survey, fiction was the most popular genre among Canadians last year, at 56% of those who had read at least one book. Mysteries and thrillers were also at 56%, while non-fiction books were at 46%. (Is there something odd about these percentages?) How much, I wonder, of the fiction being read is formulaic fluff. That is certainly the bulk of what I see people reading on buses, trains and waiting rooms. Literacy may well be on the decline, even if readership isn't. Maybe people are reading just as much as they have for generations, but are reading less of quality and substance, reaching instead for the easy, escapist, entertaining fluff that kills time and tickles the mind but doesn't require much independent thought and engagement with the text. There is, of course, a place for genre fiction, and some of it does tackle more substantive issues that demand engagement and stimulate deeper thought.

Holiday Productivity

I haven't posted or published anything in a few days, aside from NODs. My day job has kept me rather busy the past week in preparation for the holidays, leaving little time or energy for reading or writing. Though I will spend some time with family over the holidays, I hope to get at least one review written and published, that of Mobs, Messiahs, and Markets, and get some reading done as well.

I don't celebrate Christmas. And I don't accept the oft-advanced argument that Christmas -- a holiday imposed on all of us through the audiovisual pollution of flashing lights and tinseled trees, Christmas carols, product pushing and the cheery-fake 'Merry Christmas' -- is merely a cultural affair. It is not. It is a Christian affair and should not, in a society that claims to have secular government and continues to welcome new immigrants from all parts of the world with the promise of religious freedom, equality and multiculturalism, be State-sanctioned. A secular government in a multicultural society should hold no religious event above any other. Either institute official holidays for the significant events and celebrations of all religions or stay out of it altogether!

Since the State is involved in pushing Christianity by making Christmas an official holiday, I choose to take advantage of the extra time to withdraw, as much as possible, from all things Christmas-y to get some reading and writing done. Of course I take advantage of any holiday to relax a little with good food, drink and company. However, the list of upcoming books for review is getting longer than I like to see it and there is some exciting reading (and listening) ahead. After Mobs, Messiahs, and Markets I get to immerse myself in Al Young's Something About the Blues.

Time, Money & Medieval Literature: A New Translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: A New Verse Translation

As mentioned in the lead-in to a recent post, "Texts in Translation: Kalima and Translation into Arabic," I have more than a passing interest in, and fascination with, medieval literature, as also with translation. But because I am overburdened with student debt, still, I have neither the time nor money to pursue this interest in earnest. Certainly not by way of another university degree--my three have nearly buried me in debt. But on to the matter of this post.

I came across a review of a new translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight in the "Sunday Book Review" of the New York Times a few days ago--"A Stranger in Camelot." Though I prefer to read such texts in the original, in this case Middle English, I do understand the need for modern English translations that render the text intelligible to readers who struggle overmuch with older forms of English. Many, perhaps most, high school and university students today struggle even with Shakespearean English, so one cannot really expect them to tackle even earlier stuff.

I haven't read this translation yet, though I hope to do so in the near future. Apparently Armitage presents the Middle English original in a parallel text, much like Seamus Heaney did in Beowulf: A New Verse Translation, a copy of which I have and treasure in my personal library. When a new translation reproduces, as nearly as possible, the spirit and cadence of the original text, it is a joy to read and gives the modern reader a feel for the original. Especially important, as pointed out by Edward Hirsch, is an adequate reproduction of alliteration, the poetic device of choice in early English writing. I, personally, much prefer alliteration and assonance to rhyme as a poetic constraint.

The linguistically adventurous can read the new translation, then work their way through the original. Fun, fun, fun!

Slow Reading, the Book, and New Media

I came across an interesting article, again at Inside Higher Ed, entitled "Blind, Deaf and Dumb." I read the beginning with great interest. I also feel that too much of our lives is sped up too much, and that this also applies to higher education, something I've touched on before (see Research: taking the time to read thoroughly). Students often have little time to truly engage with their reading materials, to read deliberately, thoroughly, and widely. They often feel compelled, when doing research for a research paper, for example, to use tables of contents and indices to find only what they feel is immediately relevant to their argument. This obviously leaves them open to taking things out of context. It also makes for an impoverished reading and learning experience.

I think I understand what Musgrove was getting at when discussing certain students' inability to relate to the text--to see, hear and speak about the text meaningfully. But that is, I think, little different from the blank stare and incoherent stammer exhibited by some (generally older) people when confronted with a computer, cellphone, or iPod. It has to do with familiarity and literacy. His choice of words were, however, rather unfortunate.

Though I also have a certain attachment to the physical book, I think we must be open to new media. The book was, just a few hundred years ago, a new medium. What we need to do is to continue tinkering with the medium to make it as useful as we can (the use of electronic paper helps), and make enough use of it to forget the medium and engage the text. Who gives any thought to the physical book when truly engrossed in the text?