Dazed and Confused: Two Great Writers on Boomer Angst

Arlington Reads 2014 takes on a complicated generation with “Dazed and Confused: Two Great Writers on Boomer Angst,” featuring two authors noted for an economy of words and a keen realism.

This spring Arlington Public Library’s annual one-theme, one-community initiative will focus on novels by Ann Beattie and Richard Ford, authors who explore seemingly unremarkable situations with characters who share an underlying ambivalence about commitments, careers, relationships and themselves.

Irony and disappointment may never be far off but the storytelling is always compassionate, always intelligent, always inspiring.

• Thursday, April 10, 7:00 p.m. – Ann Beattie will speak at Central Library
• Thursday, April 24, 7:00 p.m. – Richard Ford will speak at Central Library

 

New Yorker Stories

Ann Beattie’s “The New Yorker Stories” collects legendary works from the previous four decades for which she won the PEN/Malamud Award for achievement in the short story form and the Rea Award for the Short Story.

The New York Times Book Review calls Beattie “a national treasure, the author of short stories that will endure and continue to inspire.”

She will be on stage for a conversation with Library Director Diane Kresh at Central Library Auditorium the evening of April 10 at 7 p.m.

 

 

The Sportwriter

Richard Ford has published seven novels and four collections of stories. His “Independence Day” was the first book ever awarded both the Pulitzer Prize and the Pen/Faulkner Award for Fiction. His Arlington Reads featured title, “The Sportswriter,” established and shared with “Independence Day” the yearning, anguished “everyman” character Frank Bascombe for an eventual trilogy. Time named “The Sportswriter” one of the 100 best novels published since the magazine’s founding.

Richard Ford will be interviewed at Central Library Auditorium by Jeffrey Brown of the “PBS NewsHour” the evening of April 24 at 7 p.m.

 

 

Arlington Reads is made possible through the generous support of the Friends of the Arlington Public Library.

 

Pulitzer Prize winner Junot Díaz captivated not one but two packed audiences as he brought Arlington Reads 2013 to a close with frank, vibrant talk of his life as a writer and immigrant in 21st century America.

In the afternoon, Díaz spoke to Marymount University and Arlington high school students:

That evening, he filled the Central Library Auditorium, inviting members of the overflow crowd to find space on the stage with him:

Díaz, who compared his success to winning a lottery, said the best art can only be created for itself and not as a commodity and he told admiring readers that he is willing to spend years refining an unpublished work if that’s what it deserves.

At Mr. Díaz’s request, his appearances in Arlington were not recorded and will not be available on the Library website. We do have a number of photographs available.

 

Now With Video!

[youtube]http://youtu.be/afEj_SJwj9w[/youtube]

Recorded by Arlington TV.

 

Central Library hosted a full house when Dinaw Mengestu sat down with Library Director Diane Kresh on April 9, 2013.

Mengestu was the first author to join us for Arlington Reads 2013.

 

The following morning, students from Arlington’s New Directions high school program spent a unique hour in class with Mengestu, and gained new insight into the process of writing from personal experience.

 

Arlington Reads continues! Don’t miss Pulitzer Prize winner Junot Díaz, April 29.

 

Exploring the Newcomer’s Story

One of the most heralded young novelists of his generation and a Pulitzer Prize winner will be on-hand guides as Arlington Reads 2013 goes “Out of Bounds: The Immigrant Experience.”

This spring Arlington Public Library’s annual one-theme, one-community initiative will look at two powerful works of fiction that echo with the searing isolation, loneliness and hope felt by millions who have gone searching far from home as migrants to America.

• Tuesday, April 9, 7 p.m. – Dinaw Mengestu will speak at Central Library
• Monday, April 29, 7 p.m. – Junot Díaz will speak at Central Library

 

The Beautiful Things that Heaven Bears

Dinaw Mengestu came to the United States from Ethiopia at the age of two. His first novel, The Beautiful Things that Heaven Bears, tells the story of an Ethiopian survivor escaping communist revolution only to struggle for acceptance behind the counter of a shabby Washington grocery store.

The New York Time says Mengestu has created a “great African novel, a great Washington novel and a great American novel.” He is the winner of a 2012 MacArthur Foundation “genius grant” fellowship and has been named a top author under 40 by the New Yorker and the National Book Award Foundation. Mengestu’s journalism has appeared in Harper’s, Rolling Stone and the Wall Street Journal.

 

 

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

Dominican immigrant Junot Díaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao weaves shifting narration and a tragic family backstory with the longings of a fatherless, overweight teen transplanted in New Jersey with only science fiction as an escape.

A best-selling first novel, “Oscar Wao” won Díaz the Pulitzer Prize in 2007. Time magazine called it the best novel of the year, “a massive, heaving, sparking tragicomedy.” Díaz is another 2012 MacArthur fellowship winner and a 2012 National Book Award finalist.

 

 

Arlington Reads is made possible through the generous support of the Friends of the Arlington Public Library.

Do you have an immigrant story to tell? Please share in our comments section.

 

Wacky, Collaborative Creativity

On Friday, Dec. 7, Michael Northrop, author of the YA novels Trapped, Plunked, and Gentlemen, spoke with almost 200 middle school students at Thomas Jefferson Middle School for All TAB 2012.

During the talk, students and Mr. Northrop created a story about a Polish girl named Katya, held captive by Santa at the North Pole…

When a hobbit enters the room (but is secretly Wolverine in disguise), he defeats the other elves, and then takes on Santa in a giant battle. When only Wolverine and Rudolph are left standing, suddenly Blitzen enters the battle… But, oh no! Blitzen double crosses Rudolph and comes to Wolverine’s aid!

The event was very silly and lots of fun, and we still can’t decide whether the students were more entertained by Mr. Northrop, or vice versa.

Don’t know anything about Michael Northrop?

Check out our interview on the Teen Blog: Author Michael Northrop Talks Snow, The Red Sox and Waterskiing Squirrels. Then read our reviews of Gentlemen, Trapped and Plunked.

 

TAB is a reading program for Arlington’s middle and high schoolers, in which students meet during their school lunch periods to discuss new books, and vote on their top books of each year. All TAB is an annual gathering where middle school students get to meet and speak with an author.

TAB is a partnership between Arlington Public School’s middle school librarians, and the Arlington Public Library Youth Services librarians.

 

Arlington Reads 2012 Update

Because of health concerns, author and essayist Joan Didion will not appear at the Arlington Public Library.

Following an injury this past spring, Ms. Didion was forced to postpone a visit to Arlington and a book tour, and we had hoped she would be able to join us this fall instead.

 

Our best wishes go to Ms. Didion, one of America’s great writers.

 

 

 

 

Master science fiction author Ray Bradbury has died at the age of 91.

Besides his impressive body of work, we remember him for his love of libraries, as reported by the New York Times in 2009:

“Libraries raised me,” Mr. Bradbury said. “I don’t believe in colleges and universities. I believe in libraries because most students don’t have any money. When I graduated from high school, it was  during the Depression and we had no money. I couldn’t go to college, so I went to the library three days a week for 10 years.”

Thank you Mr. Bradbury. Rest in peace.

 

It may be the most mysterious and brutal place on Earth.

North Korea, the regime created following World War II, remains a totalitarian dictatorship controlled by one family holding nuclear weapons and hundreds of thousands of political prisoners locked away.

Never far from the headlines, North Korea’s future grew even more clouded with Kim Jong-un’s sudden rise last December following the death of his father.

Malnutrition across the country is the norm, while the cult of personality now focuses on a 29-year-old, Kim Jong-un, the youngest head of state in the world.

 

This month, Arlington Public Library presents two critically acclaimed authors who have recently pulled back some of the heavy veil that hangs over the “Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.”

 

June 14
Friends of Arlington Public Library feature author Adam Johnson, whose novel The Orphan Master’s Son, opens a window to everyday life under the North Korean propaganda machine.
Event details

 

June 20 
PBS Frontline correspondent Blaine Harden discusses the story of Shin Dong-hyuk, the only person to escape North Korea after being born and bred inside one of its horrific slave labor camps. Escape from Camp 14 is currently on the New York Times bestseller list.
Event details

 

 

Arlington Public Library takes you inside North Korea this June to explore the volatility of a nation lost to time and fear.

 

 

 

 

In honor of Arlington Reads 2012

The Westover Branch Library’s Midweek Movies for April and May feature tales of life, love, loss and strong women:

• April 11 – Eat, Pray, Love; PG-13
• April 18 – The Color Purple; PG
• April 25 – Fried Green Tomatoes; PG-13
• May 2 – Songcatcher; PG-13
• May 9 – Steel Magnolias; PG
• May 16 – Mona Lisa Smile; PG-13

Movies are shown in the Westover Meeting Room on Wednesdays at 6:30 p.m.

BYOP (Bring Your Own Popcorn)