The source for Oberlin College Libraries staff news and announcements!
Check out the delectable photos in the Gallery of Entries in the 1st Annual Oberlin Edible Book Festival earlier this month. Over 175 participants/viewers/eaters. And thanks again to everyone who made it possible!
There will be two lunchtime sessions on how to play Speculation, the 18th-century card game that we will be playing at the upcoming Friends of the Library event on March 14 (7-9pm). the session will be held in Room 113 on March 1 and March 8 from noon to 1:00. Feel free to bring your lunch. Could be fun…..and then you’ll be an expert at the Friends event.
Two fun events–with volunteer opportunities–to keep in mind in March!
THING ONE: Thursday, March 14, 7-9pm in Terrell Academic Commons: “Jane’s Games: Playing Cards with Jane Austen” Short lecture and lessons followed by an evening of playing Speculation, a fun and easy card game popular in the Regency era.
Volunteer opportunity: Learn how to play Speculation beforehand and serve as experts at each table to town/gown guests. 1.5 time flex time for OCOPE folks if you come out to help (and have fun!). Let Valerie know if you are interested and we will have a Speculation lesson sometime in February during work hours.
THING TWO:
Friday, March 29, StudiOC, 8:30am-1:30pm: The First Annual Edible Book Festival! Co-sponsored with the Oberlin Public Library. I hope that your and/or your department will submit an entry (registration form here) and come by on your lunch hour from 11:30 to 12:30 to see and eat. But if you wish to volunteer for the event, we could use one or two more for the duration. Again, if OCOPE employees who volunteer to help out with the event can take 1.5 the time as flex time.
Please join in on Friday, September 29 from 3:30-4:30 in the new Contemplation Garden under the ramp for the official dedication of the “Oberlin Reader” sculpture
commissioned by the Friends of the Libraries. Carved from Indiana limestone by the artist
Nicholas Fairplay, the sculpture celebrates reading and Oberlin readers in particular.
Champagne toast at 4:00pm in the Contemplation Garden on the north side of the Mudd ramp.
Ohio author David Giffels will be the 2023 Friends of the Library speaker.
A former Akron Beacon Journal columnist, his writing has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, the Atlantic.com, Parade, The Wall Street Journal, Esquire.com, Grantland.com, The Iowa Review, and many other publications. He also wrote for the MTV series Beavis and Butt-Head. He is the author of several books, including Barnstorming Ohio, Furnishing Eternity, and his latest…on the Akron band Devo.
His awards include the Cleveland Arts Prize for literature, the Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award, and a General Excellence award from National Society of Newspaper Columnists. He was selected as the Cuyahoga County Public Library Writer in Residence for 2018-2019. Giffels is a professor of English at the University of Akron, where he teaches creative nonfiction in the Northeast Ohio Master of Fine Arts Program.
His title will be: “No Poor, Indifferent Place: Writing When You Have No Ideas”
This year’s event will be re-designed a bit. It’s a tapas affair and library staff will be honored invitees. I hope you will join us.
Deb Campana! Winner of the annual Perspectives cover art contest for her striking image “Late Summer View of the Conservatory Library.” Thank you to everyone who submitted an image. They were great and all runners up will appear on the back cover of Perspectives.
We will deliver your prize–a very mini womb chair–soon.
Tomorrow, Tuesday, July 18 at 7am, a new sculpture, commissioned by the Friends of Oberlin College, will be installed in the Contemplation Garden of the Mudd Center (148 W. College). “Oberlin Reader” is the work of renowned stone carver Nicholas Fairplay. Its engaging combination of text and image perfectly captures the spirit of Oberlin: serious and playful, studious and creative. The sculpture is done in the classical style of a stele and fashioned from Indiana limestone to match the brutalist building in front of which it will stand. The artist donated the stone and the Friends of Oberlin College commissioned the work as “a gift to all Oberlin readers.” A campus-wide outdoor sculpture committee worked with the artist and approved the design last year.
Good morning all,
Please see the attached invite for our open house event this Saturday, June 4. Please distribute this as you see fit!
Dear colleagues,
You are invited to join Oberlin College Libraries on Tuesday, April 12th at 4:30 PM in Craig Auditorium (Oberlin College Science Center) for A Writer & Her Reader: Featuring Robin McLean and Dion Graham*.
Highly-acclaimed author McLean and Hall of Fame Audible reader Graham will discuss McLean’s acclaimed new work, Pity the Beast. This mind-melting feminist Western pins a tale of sexual violence and vengeance to a canvas stretching back to prehistory, sideways into legend, and off into a lonesome future. As read by Dion Graham, it is also an audio performance tour de force.
CONTENT WARNING: This book contains scenes of violence and sexual assault.
The audiobook may be accessed free for a limited time.
You may attend in person or join via Zoom.
*You’ve seen Dion Graham on The Wire, The Goodwife, The Blacklist, and in The Secret Life of Walter Mitty–come meet him in person!
