Brought to you by The Center for the Book in the Library of Congress
Books & Related Info for
(October 1, 2009- September 30, 2010)
During fiscal 2010, the Center for the Book maintained a full schedule of reading promotion and literary programs as well as its dynamic and catalytic network of 52 affiliated centers and more than 80 reading promotion partners. The center's varied programs for fiscal 2010, at the Library and nationwide on the web, successfully target readers of all ages. An increasing number of programs focus on young people. The Librarian of Congress presided over the Oct. 23, 2009, opening of the Young Readers Center, which the Center for the Book is proud to administer.
As it has since its founding through Public Law 95-129 in 1977, the center relies on private funding to support all its activities; only its staff positions are paid through appropriated funds.
Highlights
Focus on Young Readers
Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) and Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.) and their young children joined Librarian of Congress James H. Billington in opening the Young Readers Center (YRC), and special guest M.T. Anderson, a favorite writer for young people, spoke to the children who attended about the importance of reading. The Young Readers Center is the first space in the Library's history devoted to the special needs of young people under 16 years of age.
In April 2010, the YRC space was doubled in size with an expansion into an adjacent space on the Jefferson Building's ground floor. The popularity of the space – more than 15,000 have visited in the past 12 months – coupled with an expanded calendar of events made the expansion a necessity. The YRC offered 13 weeks of daily programming throughout the summer and hosted an increasing number of school groups, including three sessions for the House of Representatives camp for children of members and staff.
The second National Ambassador for Young People's Literature, Katherine Paterson, accepted her appointment at the Library on Jan. 5, 2010. The National Ambassador is named by the Librarian of Congress for a two-year term, based on recommendations from a selection committee representing many segments of the book community. The selection criteria include the candidate's contribution to young people's literature and ability to relate to children. The position was created to raise national awareness of the importance of young people's literature as it relates to lifelong literacy, education, and the development and betterment of the lives of young people.
The Center for the Book, the Children's Book Council (CBC) and Every Child a Reader, the CBC foundation, are the sponsors of the National Ambassador for Young People's Literature initiative (www.read.gov/cfb/ambassador). The CBC is one of the Center for the Book's more than 80 reading promotion partners. Financial support for the National Ambassador program is provided by Penguin Young Readers Group, Scholastic Inc., HarperCollins Children's Books, Random House Children's Books, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Macmillan Publishers, Holiday House, Charlesbridge, National Geographic Children's Books, Candlewick Press and Marshall Cavendish Publishers.
Katherine Paterson's international fame rests not only on her widely acclaimed novels but also on her efforts to promote literacy in the United States and abroad. A two-time winner of the Newbery Medal ("Bridge to Terabithia" and "Jacob Have I Loved") and the National Book Award ("The Great Gilly Hopkins" and "The Master Puppeteer"), she has received many other accolades for her body of work, including the Hans Christian Andersen Medal, the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award and the Governor's Award for Excellence in the Arts, given by her home state of Vermont. Paterson was also named a Living Legend by the Library of Congress in 2000.
The exclusive story "The Exquisite Corpse Adventure" concluded with its 27th episode, which was written by Paterson. Several of the more than 20 writers and illustrators who contributed biweekly episodes and art to this unpredictable story "acted out" the final episode in the Children's pavilion during the National Book Festival on Sept. 25, 2010. The previous National Ambassador for Young People's Literature, Jon Scieszka, penned the first episode, which debuted during the 2009 National Book Festival. Hundreds of thousands of students, parents and teachers worldwide took advantage of this free story, which is available only on the Center for the Book's website at www.Read.gov. "The Exquisite Corpse Adventure" was a project of the Center for the Book and one of its reading promotion partners, the National Children's Book and Literacy Alliance. PBS's Reading Rockets ran two very successful contests in association with "The Exquisite Corpse" to encourage young people to write their own stories or create their own videos.
The success of this initiative has led to "The Exquisite Corpse Adventure" book, which will be published by Candlewick Press in spring 2011.
The Center for the Book co-sponsors two important reading and writing programs for young people. A record-breaking 70,000 entries were submitted in the Letters About Literature contest (funded by Target), which represents a 25 percent increase over the previous year's entries. And the Center marked the 15th year it has co-sponsored the River of Words environmental poetry and art contest. An awards ceremony for River of Words was held at the Library, and Center for the Book staff attended several award ceremonies nationwide to honor Letters About Literature winners. Additionally, the Center organized a special Letters About Literature program in the Teens & Children pavilion of the National Book Festival. Katherine Paterson and Michael Buckley listened to local schoolchildren, who read their contest entry letters to these authors.
Read.gov
Read.gov, the website overseen by the Center for the Book, comprises four subsites tailored to Kids, Teens, Adults and Educators & Parents. The Center for the Book's website is also part of this overall site. A new National Ambassador for Young People's Literature subsite was added this year to focus on the current ambassador, Katherine Paterson. Read.gov is one of the few places on the Library of Congress's website that focuses on current events and literature. All Books & Beyond author programs are filmed for webcasting, which exponentially increases their reach, and an accompanying Books & Beyond Book Club on Facebook encourages further discussion of these authors' current works.
National Book Festival
- As it has done for the past 10 years, the Center for the Book played a major role in the organization and presentation of the 2010 National book Festival, including:
- Inviting and scheduling all authors
- Drafting of almost all text and oversight of the NBF website
- Drafting of almost all text and oversight of the NBF brochure
- Organization of Pavilion of the States – the NBF's most popular pavilion
- Overall planning of the festival
Outstanding writers and notable personalities this year included two Nobel Prize winners (Orhan Pamuk and Harold Varmus), Isabel Allende (who received the Library of Congress National Book Festival Creative Achievement Award), 2010 Newbery Medal winner Rebecca Stead, 2010 National Book Award winner Phillip M. Hoose, 2010 Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Rae Armantrout, 1993 Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Gordon S. Wood. international best-selling authors Ken Follett and Mem Fox, the renowned Katherine Paterson, PBS's Italian-cooking star Lidia Matticchio Bastianich, NPR's Michele Norris, Craig Robinson (brother of Michelle Obama), Diana Gabaldon (voted most popular Book Festival author of all time), legal thriller best-selling writer Scott Turow, New Yorker editor David Remnick, literary sensations Jonathan Franzen, Jane Smiley and Gail Godwin, and former first lady Laura Bush.
During National Book Festival week, the center inaugurated its Jonah S. Eskin Memorial lecture with a talk by Katherine Paterson to more than 250 young people (accompanied by adults) in the Coolidge Auditorium.
The Center also organizes the festival's most popular attraction, the Pavilion of the States. Here festivalgoers could learn about Center for the Book reading and literacy promotion projects as well as the literary traditions of the 50 states, the District of Columbia and the U.S. territories. Representatives from throughout the nation provided information and answered questions about their state's writers, libraries, book festivals, book awards and reading promotion activities. In addition, several festival authors and illustrators made scheduled visits to their state's table to greet fans and sign autographs.
A popular pavilion feature, especially among young readers and their families, was "Discover Great Places Through Reading" -- a free map of the United States that was presented at each table for an appropriate state sticker or stamp. The map included "52 Great Reads About Great Places," which is a reading list of books for young people compiled with a recommendation from each state.
The 14th edition of the Congressional Club Cookbook was sold in the pavilion. The cookbook offers recipes from around the world and includes inaugural ball portraits of presidents and first ladies, as well as photos of historic sites around Washington. Revenue generated from cookbook sales helped support contributions made by the Congressional Club to a variety of local charities.
The Pavilion of the States' major sponsor is the Institute of Museum and Library Services (a Center for the Book partner) with additional funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities (also a partner).
Libraries & the Cultural Record Publishes Volume in Honor of John Y. Cole
Over more than 30 years, John Y. Cole has led the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress as its founding director and has devoted his scholarly pursuits to the Library's history and influence on the culture of the nation. To recognize his achievements, the journal Libraries & the Cultural Record published a festschrift in honor of Cole by devoting the entire issue to his more than 40-year career at the Library of Congress.
"The Library of Congress and the Center for the Book: Historical Essays in Honor of John Y. Cole" is a special issue (2010, vol. 45, no. 1) of the University of Texas journal Libraries & the Cultural Record: Exploring the History of Collections of Recorded Knowledge. The nine invitational essays published in the volume address topics representing different aspects of John Cole's contributions and interests as a scholar and a librarian. In particular, they emphasize his dual roles and achievements as the sole director of the Center for the Book and as a scholar who is also known internationally as the foremost expert on the history of the Library of Congress.
Reading Promotion Networks
The annual "idea exchange" for national reading promotion partners took place on March 10 and was described in the January-March issue of the center's online Newsletter. More than 40 organizations participated. In 2010, approximately one-third of our 52 affiliated state centers (a number that includes the District of Columbia and the Virgin Islands) were renewed for the next three years. Representatives of 35 states participated in the June 28-29 annual "idea exchange" for affiliated state centers, which was described in the April-June Newsletter. During the year there were two changes in state center host institutions: The New York Center for the Book moved from the School of Information Studies at Syracuse University to the New York State Library Association, and the Alabama Center for the Book moved from the Center for the Arts & Humanities at Auburn University to the University of Alabama Libraries.
Publications
In cooperation with Oak Knoll Press, the Center for the Book published an illustrated and authoritative two-volume reference work by bibliographer and collector Carol Fitzgerald: "Series Americana: Post-Depression-Era Regional Literature, 1938-1980: A Descriptive Bibliography."
Event Highlights
The Center for the Book sponsored or co-sponsored approximately 40 events (see list below) in fiscal 2010 as part of its mission to promote reading and literacy. Most of the events were part of the Books & Beyond author series, which, since it was established in 1996, has brought nearly 200 authors to Washington to discuss and sign their work and tell how they used Library of Congress collections in their writings. To increase the effect of these events, all programs are recorded for later webcasting. Among the highlights of those events in fiscal 2010 were:
2009
Oct. 20
One of America's leading authorities on children's books, historian and critic Leonard S. Marcus discussed his new book, "Funny Business: Conversations with Writers of Comedy" with then National Ambassador for Young People's Literature Jon Scieszka.
Oct. 23
Four Library of Congress veterans -- John Y. Cole and Guy Lamolinara of the Center for the Book, Mark Dimunation of the Rare Book and Special Collections Division and Alice Birney of the Manuscript Division -- presented "Fiction at the Library of Congress," to recognize the Library's collections in this field as well as the section devoted to fiction on the Read.gov website.
Oct. 26
Carl Reiner, a giant of American comedy for nearly six decades, spoke about his extraordinary career as well as his new books, "Just Desserts," as well as his children's book "Tell Me a Scary Story, But Not TOO Scary."
Nov. 17
Noralee Frankel discussed her biography "Stripping Gypsy: The Life of Gypsy Rose Lee," in an event co-sponsored with the Humanities and Social Sciences Division.
2010
March 2
"Spies: The Rise and Fall of the KGB in America" was discussed by its author, the manuscript Division's John Haynes (who co-wrote "Spies" with Harvey Klehr and Alexander Vassiliev).
April 9
On behalf of the Librarian of Congress, the Center hosted and helped organize the semiannual meeting of the American Antiquarian Society, one of the Center for the Book's organizational partners.
April 12
"Baseball Americana: Treasures from the Library of Congress" was discussed by its authors, Harry Katz, Frank Ceresi, Phil Michel, Wilson McBee and Susan Reyburn. The Publishing Office co-sponsored this program.
May 7
With the National First Ladies Library and the Bibliographical Society of America, the Center for the Book sponsored "Reading in the White House." The all-day Library of Congress symposium marked the publication of "The First White House Library: A History and Annotated Catalogue."
May 10
Rosalynn Carter, the former first lady, discussed her new book, "Within Our Reach: Ending the Mental Health Crisis." She appeared with Rhode Island Rep. Patrick Kennedy.
Aug. 3
Published by the National Notary Association, "Why Coolidge Matters: How Civility in Politics Can Bring a Nation Together" is a compilation of essays by today's top influential political figures, scholars and historians that makes the compelling case for revisiting and learning from the moral tenor and style that defined the Coolidge presidency. The book was the subject of a Books & Beyond discussion and book signing that included Gov. James Douglas of Vermont and Milton G. Valera, president of the National Notary Association. Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) was a special guest.
Sept. 25
National Book Festival
