A Library : My Home As A Library

In Ray Bradbury’s fictional novel about the horrifying future, he discusses topics that, politically and socially, can relate to Judith Ortiz Cofer’s short story; The Paterson Public Library. These two pertain to each other because both Bradbury’s and Cofer’s characters are afraid of situations that involve books. Though they do compare in many ways, there are also differences between the stories.

There I was. An undersized 3rd grader, meeting with the school librarian, who was probing at my ability to read and comprehend the book I chose for that week. It was during this particular week in which I refused to join the class in their sticky hand raid, but rather, shift through my new library at home. It was the weekend prior in which my grandmother purchased a white box from a garage sale.

On the first week of school in second grade, my teacher, Ms. Byrd, took us to the library to check out a book. I wasn’t very excited at the time because reading used to bore me. I viewed reading to be a hassle rather than a way to gain knowledge. As our class marched up the ramp leading into the library, we were immediately greeted by a fragile old woman with hair as grey as a pack of Alaskan wolves. The old lady turned out to be the school librarian. She was extremely enthusiastic about reading and asked the class “who is excited to pick out a book today?” All of my classmates swung

Marilynne K. Roach is a resident of Watertown, Massachusetts. She went on to graduate with a BFA from MCA (Massachusetts College of Art) but she uniquely gives credit to the public library systems for the rest of her education. This is very interesting to me because she says that libraries are what she owes to her education to. Because of all the books she reads she later turns out to be a great book writer herself. The library system really did impact Marilynne’s life drastically. But besides illustrating other writers work in history she also has written and illustrated many books of her own, this including “Six Women of Salem”.

Author and writer, Eudora Welty once stated, “The only fear was that of books coming to an end” (Welty 53-54). In her autobiography, One Writer’s Beginnings, Welty writes about her childhood, which revolved around books and reading. Despite the fact that her childhood librarian, Mrs. Calloway, was infamous for intimidating every student that entered the library, Welty never feared. With the help of her mother, Welty unearths a genuine passion books, ultimately discovering her first step toward a lifelong career as a writer and an author. In Eudora Welty’s autobiography, One Writer’s Beginnings, she utilizes figurative language and loaded words to express vehemence her toward reading.

Anytime she reads an innovative book, she wants everybody else to experience the same story she adored. As a result, she is always lending out her books to her friends. Anyone who needs a dystopian or romantic book could probably find it at her house; she is identical to a miniature library. Many people her age despise reading because they think it is just uninteresting, or extra work. Hannah’s acts of sharing her books have turned people from book haters to avid readers.

A critical issue facing public libraries is how to stay relevant in the community to prevent closures or budget cuts. In “Looking at the Future of Libraries,” R. Toby Greenwalt asserts that the future of libraries is as a community connector providing users with the means to enable their creativity (Greenwalt). Greenwalt, the director of Digital Strategy and Technology Integration at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, believes libraries should disrupt conventional wisdom of what it can provide for patrons. One example of disrupting conventional wisdom, Greenwalt describes the library as a “firestarter,” the beginning steps of “something big” (Greenwalt).

The thin rustic pages scrape past my loose fingers as I sit engaged. My heart pounds harder and faster with every word my eyes pass over. My ears hear nothing, even within booming noise. My complete focus is on the book that lays in my hand with a laminated cover, and I have no choice but to submit to the content. My breath tastes of spearmint and the aroma of fresh paper floats past my nose. I couldn’t resist but delve into the worlds and mysteries that books hold. Once opened, everything around me becomes a distant blur. I am hooked. Books have always created an escape for creativity and fancies to run free. Books are used as a medium for reason. Books are formative to the development of human beings. In my instance, books changed my life.

Ones passion will always be stopped by a tyrant or hardship, but one has to put in the best effort to overcome as well as gain support. Eudora’s explanations of her mother, librarian, and herself emanates her enjoyment along with attachment to reading. Eudora correlates her librarian to a monster who brings

This has brought controversy to many for the fact that on one side books can be full of information and from the other side it can create the wrong image towards another person. In the kids book “The LIbrarian from the Black Lagoon” written by Mike Thaler a librarian is described as a kid laminator “they say she laminates you if you talk in the library” (5). or when they say “She also has rubber stamps on the soles of her shoes. And whenever she steps...it says OVERDUE” (7).

My mom signed me up for the community library when I just turned 6 years old. Even if I did not know how to properly read at the time, I had to go there every afternoon to keep myself busy as an only child. Being opened to books at such an early clearly has had a major impact on my life and personality. From the local tales of my beloved Senegalese society to the deep and sophisticated French literature, I have traveled through cultures and generations. Whether it is Emile Zola’s collection of novels or Albert Camus’s philosophical texts, these books raised me and taught me about life, love, and resilience. As times went by, reading was no more a regular pastime but a detrimental part of my existence. The lessons and morality I gained from each story always pushed me to challenge the status quo, to be curious, to be adventurous but most importantly to be a problem solver.

I viewed reading as a chore, was often unenthused, and would mostly annotate on the overarching themes without gathering any meaning from them. Books were merely a series of words printed on paper. This school year, however, I began to understand the allure reading has to offer. I have grown to appreciate reading and the insights a book can offer. When reading our numerous texts, I was able to live vicariously through the characters of the books and relate aspects of their lives to my own. Because all of the books from English I pertain to coming of age, I was able to not only learn about maturation as a process, but understand how it pertains to my own life. Through protagonists such as Holden Caulfield from The Catcher in the Rye or Esperanza from The House on Mango Street, I learned about my “misguided desire to preserve childhood innocence” and to empower feminism similar to Holden and Esperanza respectively (Heart of Gold, Raghuram). Gradually, I have finally developed the ability to relate to novels and its characters amidst writing my own story.Whether it be thematic elements or the details of a case I am working on, I have become more observant to even the most trivial details. Now when I read, I not only look at the themes, motifs, and symbols, but also repeated phrases or situations that parallel each others as well as the symbolic meaning behind some ambiguous phrases or scenes. Reading now, in contrast to last summer, is a

It may be cliché, but books have always held a spot close to my heart. When I was three I had a book called Bitsy Witch that went wherever I did. When I was seven, my mom read a chapter of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone every night. In middle school, I worked my way through the entire children’s section at my local library. In high school, I took every English class offered, and when I entered college I to compromise with my family that I would also pursue a pre-professional program. My time outside of class was spent on my pre-professional degree until, my senior year in college. I took two classes that focused on children’s and young adult texts. Before those classes, I hadn’t realized that specializing in Children’s literature was

A great author once said,“A good library will never be too neat, or too dusty, because somebody will always be in it, taking books off the shelves and staying up late reading them.” If we were to judge our library with this quote in mind, we can conclude our local library is awful. Why? Because of the lack of variety. The books our library has are either plain, predictable children's’ book or adult books with themes and storylines too complex for us to comprehend.

Since their establishment, libraries have served as a gateway to knowledge and services that revolutionized the way the public attains information. Unlike many other institutions, public libraries have grown and evolved along with society by adopting new technology and offering resources tailored to the needs of their local community.