Tag: storytelling

A spatulate depression, part I – Speaking with the dead and distant

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Since my series of posts on Key 23 and the Nth Degree – really about personal commitment and library work – I’ve been digging a little deeper into my thoughts on these issues. If it all gets too heavy, jump back into my blog archive and read something fun about roller derby, or something about drinking your way to better librarianship. Ka pai?

One of my favourite novels is Vladimir Nabokov’s Bend Sinister. I guess it’s a pretty minor work of his, and I only ever picked it up because I liked the goofy, almost Hitchockian cover of the Penguin paperback.

Vladimir Nabokov, Bend Sinister
Vladimir Nabokov, Bend Sinister

The book’s about Adam Krug, a philosopher from an Eastern European country which is under a totalitarian regime. He fights the tyrannical dictator Paduk at great personal cost, building to a bizarre climax in which Krug is saved from a moment of grief and rage thru a bit of metafictional deus ex machina. It’s really not the best thng Nabokov ever wrote. It’s kind of M. Night Shyamalan for the Times Literary Supplement set, but I still love it – and partly for that cheat ending, which includes the narrator (Nabokov himself?) uttering the lines:

I could also distinguish the glint of a special puddle (the one Krug had somehow perceived through the layer of his own life), an oblong puddle invariably acquiring the same form after every shower because of the constant spatulate shape of a depression in the ground. Possibly something of the kind may be said to occur in regard to the imprint we leave in the intimate texture of space. Twang. A good night for mothing.

I love that whole paragraph. It’s so perfect, right down to that mad ‘twang’ and reference to Nabokov’s lepidoptery, it sets me on fire. [Pale Fire?] It’s something that you’d never, never say in real life – it’s the essence of wanky literary-speak – and yet, it has a poetry. The vision of the puddle, the imprint in the ground, filling with water – seeing this on the page, knowing it to be a trick of words – to me it’s the essence of why we read. To see that constant depression filled once again with a glint of life.

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City of Souls: Gaming and Augmented Reality in Auckland Libraries

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Auckland Libraries has just launched its first online game, City of Souls – an interactive zombie adventure for ages 14 and over.

City of Souls game
City of Souls – click the image to play!

Written by my colleague Danielle Carter using the free Twine game design software, City of Souls takes place in the same universe as both our Tupu Youth Library zombie siege and the recent Apocalypse Z interactive theatre event in Auckland’s CBD.

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From paints to puddings – Art and sensory play in Parkes Library, New South Wales

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Aussie kids become little Michelangelos in a Sistine Chapel library activity!
Aussie kids become little Michelangelos in a Sistine Chapel library activity!

“Libraries need to understand literacy in the broadest sense – exploring all of the senses in the way kids and teens relate to the diverse services they have to offer.”

There’s coverage of some amazing work from my colleagues in Parkes, New South Wales over at the Library as Incubator Project.

Library Chat Podcast – on Nerf guns, literacy and boisterous play

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This week you can find me talking about libraries, literacy, and immersive play on Corin Haines’ Library Chat podcast.

Corin is head of digital services with my current employers at Auckland Libraries in New Zealand, where I’ve been encouraging youth librarians to embrace play, performance, and forms of literacy which needn’t involve books on shelves.

One of the first things I did on arrival in Auckland is arrange for the library to purchase a number of Nerf guns – toys which shoot foam darts – with the aim of encouraging librarians to create activities which combined literacy with more boisterous forms of action and adventure.

The message I’ve been trying to get across is that roleplay and activities which immerse you in a story are just as valid for libraries as anything involving books on shelves.

UNESCO’s Missions of the Public Library don’t even use the word ‘book’ once – but they do mention providing access to cultural expressions of all performing arts, stimulating the imagination and creativity of children and young people, and providing opportunities for personal creative development – alongside reading!

Corin has been, to his credit, an early adopter of the Nerf gun in Auckland – that’s him in the final frame of this YouTube video, which shows staff getting to grips with the toys:

But Corin did ponder the moral implications in a blog post on gunplay and libraries at his own website, concerned that we were encouraging children to celebrate violence through this kind of activity.

This is the kind of problem that keeps a decent librarian awake at night – especially in the light of recent news from the US.

When creating Heroes and Villains activities for the school holidays, how scary should we dare to go?

Should we be allowing kids to identify with explicitly villainous figures? (Somewhere in my mum’s house there is a photo of me dressed as Darth Vader – but I alternated that costume with Spider-man pyjamas and my favourite hero outfit, Batman).

If kids use play to make sense of the world, do we have the right – or the power – to stop them thinking through violence and its consequences using play?

In the light of recent events, I’ll be following up on these questions after a pause for contemplation and acknowledgement of the tragedy in Massachusetts.

In the meantime, you can hear Corin and I chat about literacy and immersive play over at Library Chat.

Profile in Australian Books + Publishing

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Forgive the shameless self-promotion, but I’ve just been featured in the latest edition of Australian Books & Publishing, speaking about community outreach, daring to be different, and why rural Australia proved one of the most exciting places to create children’s and youth events for libraries.

It’s a subscriber-only link, but there is the option to sign up for a free trial.

You can read my profile piece in Australian Books & Publishing Online.

Respect, innovation, and cheeky pancakes: thoughts on the future of bookstores and libraries

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Central City Library, Auckland
Central City Library, Auckland

So, a big announcement has been in the works for some time: from 25th February I begin a six-month contract as adviser to Auckland Libraries, the largest public library network in the southern hemisphere. The mission is to extend and enhance Auckland’s already superlative library offerings for children and young people with creative, challenging, and sustainable activities for the future.

I feel confident that we’re entering an era of swashbuckling literacy adventure Down Under. Auckland is the city where kids play a Kiwi-themed version of Angry Birds in their libraries; the city whose librarians already talked Bryan Lee O’Malley into letting them use Scott Pilgrim as the face of their comic book events and wooed Amanda Palmer into giving an impromptu Get Loud In Libraries-style guerilla gig.

Before Auckland beckons, I’ve been looking at the latest developments in the UK and US. The Future Foyles workshop held on Monday of this week brought together publishing, retail, and literacy professionals seeking a vision for London’s next great flagship bookstore – you’ll see me quoted in The Bookseller’s report of the event –  and finding much food for thought from a wider community outreach perspective.

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Image gallery: September workshops from Australian libraries

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A selection of photographs from some of my recent workshops for children and young people in New South Wales.

These school holiday sessions in libraries offered high quality speaking and listening opportunities alongside exciting and unusual hands-on experience, with attendees also producing a range of narrative and non-fiction writing amid the fruit smashing and tower building!

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You can see more images from the spooky mining themed workshop “Mysteries Underground” at my Tumblr page.

Comics in the classroom guest post: Nick Sousanis of Teachers College, New York

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American artist and educator Nick Sousanis is one of the experts interviewed in this month’s education article on Comics in the Classroom. Nick made his name on the Detroit art scene before beginning a Ph.D. at Teachers College in New York.

Unusually, Nick’s own doctoral thesis takes the form of a comic book – putting into practice his belief that the medium can be a powerful tool for intellectual inquiry and the communication of complex arguments.

Possibilities comic by Nick Sousanis
A page from Nick Sousanis’ ‘Possibilities’, a philosophical and historical examination of games

Nick is currently speaking at the Rocky Mountain Conference on Comics and Graphic Novels. In today’s guest post, Nick shares his thoughts on making the most of comics in education.

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April update: Science tattoos, teen bloggers, copywriting, and comics

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It’s been a little quiet on the blog lately as I ploughed through a swathe of writing assignments and tried (only partly successfully) to stay clear of the Internet.

I have a couple of articles out later this year for the Australian science magazines ScienceWise and Australasian Science, profiling scientists who featured in Carl Zimmer’s book Science Ink. Carl uncovered the weird and wonderful world of researchers who have their work tattooed on their bodies after he spotted a DNA helix inked on the arm of a respected neurobiologist at a pool party in the States. This led to a great book collecting photos of striking, beautiful and downright bizarre science tattoos from around the world.

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NaNoWriMo in New South Wales: Australian Update from the Office of Letters and Light

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Stars from Tracy Dawson's NaNoWriMo project in Parkes, Australia
Stars from Tracy Dawson's NaNoWriMo project in Parkes, Australia

Last year, I ran a number of writing workshops for teenagers in Parkes, New South Wales. I had the privilege of working in a high school with an inspirational teacher librarian, Tracy Dawson. She was willing to let me try unconventional approaches for reluctant writers, like a 6-hour course on “How To Con Your Way to a Million Dollars.”

When I wasn’t light-heartedly promoting the grifter mentality among Australian youth, I encouraged the young writers to sign up for NaNoWriMo, the awesome challenge that sees contestants committing to write a complete first-draft novel in the month of November.

The Office of Letters and Light, organisers of NaNoWriMo, have just interviewed Tracy for their blog:

http://blog.lettersandlight.org/post/18151281043

You can also find Tracy’s recent guest post for my site here.