The Library’s Blog

Thursday, December 6th, 3:45-5:00 p.m.  

Margi Rogal, Reference Librarian 

Tredway Library, 2nd floor, south end

Do you like to read?  Why?  Have you ever considered what it means to be “a reader,” or whether your personal relationship with the act of reading might differ from others’ experiences?

Please join Margi Rogal, Reference Librarian, for an examination of four poems by four female poets whose work spans more than a century.  Each poet describes an encounter with text that grips her, that won’t leave her alone in its intensity, that causes her to review and realign her ideas, emotions, and relationships; might you feel similarly as you read their poems? (Click below to read the four poems.)

four-poems.pdf

Refreshments and conversation will begin at 3:45. 

Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, In Prose: Being a Ghost Story of Christmas has become a holiday classic. The story of a miser who is shown the error of his ways through supernatural intervention has resonated with audiences since its publication in 1843. The popularity of the story of Scrooge and his spectral visitors has led to many different renderings of the text by various illustrators, movie adaptations, and other interpretations of Dickens’s original story.  On display in Special Collections are four editions of A Christmas Carol, all with illustrations by different artists. 

If you are planning to visit the library during Fall Break, please take note of our hours:

Fall Break Hours*

Regular Hours resume Mon, Dec. 3.

*Hours are subject to change. As an academic institution we reserve the right to change closing dates and/or times. Library patrons who wish to return materials when we are closed can do so by depositing items in the book return bins located beside our 2nd floor and 4th floor entrances.

Subtitled “Familiar Essays,” Anne Fadiman’s book At Large and At Small is a collection of short pieces on a wide variety of topics: the joys and perils of lepidoptery (butterfly collecting), the many delights of ice cream, Fadiman’s fascination with fellow essayist Charles Lamb, the struggles of Arctic exploration, and many others. Confiding, witty, passionate, and wide-ranging, Fadiman’s essays are a perfect companion for a lazy afternoon.

Fadiman is also the author of another wonderful collection of essays, Ex Libris, all on book-related topics.

- Sarah Horowitz

The Custodian of Paradise by Wayne Johnston A strange and wonderful novel narrated by the tallest woman in Newfoundland. Beautiful, but too tall and feisty to be acceptable, Sheilagh Fielding is taken advantage of early in her life by an equally beautiful but brutally careless boy who impregnates her with twins. In order to avoid a scandal, her divorced parents arrange for her mother, who abandoned Sheilagh when she was 6, to adopt the children as her own. Equally torturous but oddly comforting is the mysterious elusive presence of her Provider, a man who watches out for her welfare without disclosing his identity. Told in part through journal entries and letters, this is a slow and languorous book, all the better to savor. Johnston’s  previous book, the acclaimed The Colony of Unrequited Dreams, also features Sheilagh.  Margi Rogal

Make a page in Augustana’s Time Capsule Book, which will be stored in the Tredway Library’s Special Collections department to be enjoyed by future students, staff, faculty, and alumni!

Using FREE archival paper, create a page by yourself, or get together with friends, your athletic team, your department, your residence hall, your office, your club or group, etc. to create a page together that commemorates your year here at Augustana College.

Include whatever content you’d like on your page: prose, poetry, images, scanned photos, art…be creative!  Just be sure to follow the guidelines included in the links below to ensure that the materials you use will stand the test of time.

Pages may be submitted anytime during fall and winter term.  For more information–including how to get the FREE archival paper to create your page–please follow the appropriate link below:

Students                               Faculty                                Staff/Administration

If you have questions, contact me (Anne Earel, Reference Librarian) or Sherry Maurer, Director of the Augustana College Art Museum.  We can’t wait to see your pages!