Posts Tagged ‘Fahrenheit 451’
Monday, July 12th, 2010
July 12, 2010
Washington, DC
Over the last year people across the country have been inspired by The Big Read to put down their books (but only temporarily, we hope) and take up their paintbrushes, cameras, and even duct tape to create works of art inspired by their communities’ Big Read book. Here are a few of my favorites from the past year:
During the month of March work by 38 of art teacher Linda Stewart’s students was on display in the Caldwell Public Library as part of the community’s Big Read of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. “It was all, ‘Oh, Mrs. Stewart,’ rolling their eyes, and whining, ‘This is hard…,’”said Stewart about telling her students at Mount St. Dominic Academy in Caldwell, New Jersey, that they would be creating photographs inspired by the 19th-century poet for The Big Read. Elisabeth Lembo’s photograph (above) was inspired by “The Tide Rises, the Tide Falls.” (Read the full post here.)
Arizona artist-writer Quinn McDonald took part in West Valley Arts Council’s Big Read of Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. Several local artists were invited by the council to create altered books reflecting the novel’s themes for display in local library branches. (Read the full post here.)
The Bluebonnet Regional Branch of the East Baton Rouge Parish Library hosted a Blue Tarp/Duct Tape Fashion Show on March 20th as part of their community’s The Great Gatsby Big Read. To prepare for the show, teens consulted the library’s catalogs and books of flapper fashions from the Roaring ‘20s. Then the contestants created their own looks, Big Read-style. Photo by Mary Stein (Read the full post here.)
School’s out for the summer, and so are we! Expect to see The Big Read blog back in action around the end of August as we kick off the 2010-2011 Big Read!
Tags: Caldwell Public Library, East Baton Rouge Parish Library, Fahrenheit 451, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, The Big Read, The Great Gatsby, West Valley Arts Council
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Monday, May 24th, 2010
May 24, 2010
Washington, DC
During one of the very first Big Reads on Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury himself “beamed in” to join a (filled-to-the-rafters) book discussion. Photo courtesy of the Florida Center for the Literary Arts/Florida Center for the Book Big Read
Today in the TimesOnline, award-winning writer Neil Gaiman (3 Hugos, 2 Nebulas, and 4 Bram Stokers just to name a few . . . . ) has published a beautiful appreciation of (my perpetual crush) Ray Bradbury. Here are the opening lines . . . .
“I can imagine all sorts of worlds and places, but I cannot imagine one without Ray Bradbury. Not Bradbury the man (I have met him. Each time I have spent any time with him I have been left the happier for it), but Bradbury the builder of dreams. The man who took an idea of the American Midwest and made it magical and tangible, who took his own childhood and all the people and things in it and used it to shape the world. . . .”
Read the complete article here. And since it’s sort of impossible to have too much Ray Bradbury, check out The Big Read educational materials here and our film A Conversation with Ray Bradbury here.
Tags: Fahrenheit 451, Neil Gaiman, Ray Bradbury, The Big Read
Posted in Fahrenheit 451 | 3 Comments »
Monday, April 5th, 2010
April 5, 2010
Washington, DC
Congratulations to three-time Big Read grantee, University of Massachusetts Boston’s public radio station WUMB, the recipient of a My Source Education Innovation Award from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. WUMB was recognized for its work encouraging Boston residents to get back to recreational reading through The Big Read. As part of this award, WUMB will receive a $3,000 grant to further support the project.
For its Spring 2010 Big Read: Boston project, WUMB has partnered with more than two dozen Boston organizations, schools, and libraries to present more than 100 activities and events around Fahrenheit 451, including book clubs, movie showings, art contests, and lectures. More information can be found at www.wumb.org/thebigread/
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WUMB Radio General Manager Patricia Monteith (right) accepts a My Source Education Innovation Award from Corporation for Public Broadcasting President Pat Harrison at a Washington D.C. summit on March 25.
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Tags: Boston, Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Fahrenheit 451, My Source Education Innovation Award, public radio, Ray Bradbury
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Monday, March 15th, 2010
March 15, 2010
Fresno, California
A pioneer of The Big Read, California’s Fresno County Public Library has hosted multiple Big Read projects since receiving a 2006 pilot phase grant to read, discuss, and celebrate Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. This time around, the library’s tackling Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. Here’s an update from Roberta Barton, the library’s public information officer, on how Fahrenheit’s faring in Fresno.
Here are a few photos from Fresno County’s costume rehearsal of the theatrical staging of Fahrenheit 451 as adapted by Bradbury in the 1970s. The performance is directed by S. Eric Day and presented by the California Public Theater and the Woodward Shakespeare Festival (WSF). The festival has a longstanding partnership with the library to present reader’s theater productions at our branches for all of our Big Reads. In the off-Big Read season, WSF brings the Bard’s works (of course!) to our branches. Reader’s theater is a dramatic presentation of a written work in script form. Set design is very mininal. The actors read their lines aloud from the script and focus on reading with expressive gestures and voices. Our patrons have turned out in impressive numbers to enjoy these performances.
Pictured in the photos are Luis Ramentas (right) as Chief Beatty, Matt Otstot (left) as Guy Montag, and Jessica Knotts as Mildred Montag. (Photo by J. Bedford Productions)
Luis is a producer at our local ABC-30 affililate (which is also our Big Read television sponsor), and Matt has also been a reporter for local television stations. Luis produced our wonderful Big Read PSA last year too. (Photo by J. Bedford Productions)
Visit The Big Read calendar to learn more about Big Read activities taking place in Fresno and in other cities and towns across the country.
Tags: California library, California Public Theater, Fahrenheit 451, Fresno County Public Library, Fresno Library, Jessica Knotts, Luis Ramentas, Matt Otstot, Readers Theater, Roberta Barton, The Big Read, Woodward Shakespeare Festival
Posted in Fahrenheit 451 | 1 Comment »
Thursday, February 4th, 2010
February 4, 2010
Washington, DC
Winning writer Derrick Jones at the essay contest award ceremony with Tom Messner, NSU Broken Arrow Library Director, and Jennifer Kilgore, Muskogee High School Head Librarian. Photo courtesy of Northeastern State University
As part of its Big Read celebration of Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, Oklahoma’s Northeastern State University sponsored an essay writing contest for local high school students. Here’s an excerpt from the winning essay by Derrick Jones, a sophomore at Muskogee High School.
Fahrenheit 451 is a fiction, but in it is a multitude of universal truths and lessons. Ignorance is bliss . . . for a time. Then it becomes emptiness, transforming people into vacuous ghosts of who they used to be. Sometimes the truth is cruel . . . but does that make a difference? If we never know pain, we can never know pleasure. By removing all the bad things, you erase the good as well. The novel is a warning: find a balance between the two, or you will forever be lost.
Want to find a Fahrenheit 451 Big Read near you? Just visit The Big Read calendar.
Tags: essay contest, Fahrenheit 451, Muskogee High School, Northeastern State University, The Big Read, The Big Read in Oklahoma
Posted in Fahrenheit 451, Report from the Field | 2 Comments »
Monday, September 21st, 2009
September 21, 2009
Canton, Illinois
Spoon River College Foundation—a three-time Big Read grantee—is tackling Ray Bradbury’s (eerily prescient) Fahrenheit 451 for its Big Read, which launched last week. Thanks to Jenny and Carol and Loren and all the folks in Canton for submitting these pictures.
Making an appearance at The Big Read kickoff dinner: (from top) the novel’s mechanical hound; “Fired Up in Spoon River County” Big Read display; “parlor walls” broadcasting episodes from The Twilight Zone; the Lewiston High School “Tube Band” featuring insruments created from PVC piping and played with kitchen spatulas. (All photos by Bruce Beal and Loren Blackfelner courtesy of Spoon River College Foundation.)
Here’s a story on the kickoff from The Daily Ledger.
Check out Spoon River’s full calendar of Big Read events!
Tags: Canton, Fahrenheit 451, mechanical hound, Spoon River College, The Big Read, The Big Read kickoff
Posted in Fahrenheit 451 | 1 Comment »
Wednesday, September 9th, 2009
Sam Weller poses with his biography on Ray Bradbury during a visit to San Antonio Public Library’s Big Read of Fahrenheit 451 this past February.
Here’s my not-so-secret literary crush Ray Bradbury on why we should read novels (from an interview with the NEA).
Because we are trying to solve the mystery of our loves, no matter what kind you have. Quite often there’s an end to it and you have to find a new love. We move from novel to novel. Ray Bradbury
Check The Big Read calendar to find a Big Read near you.
Tags: Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury, Sam Weller, San Antonio Public Library, The Big Read
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Wednesday, August 5th, 2009
August 5, 2009
Washington, DC
A display from San Antonio Public Library’s Big Read of Fahrenheit 451.
Not surprisingly, I’m not the only writer that has a huge crush on Ray Bradbury. The admirably prolific Alice Hoffman recently spoke on NPR’s All Things Considered about the significant impact Bradbury has had on her writing life.
Here’s just a snippet:
I have always believed that the books of youth stay with us in a unique way. The fairy tales, nursery rhymes and novels we read when we’re young become part of our DNA. Perhaps that is why I was led back to Fahrenheit 451 after 9/11. It was a brilliant remedy for restoring my faith.
Read and/or listen to Hoffman’s paean to Fahrenheit 451 and Bradbury in its entirety on NPR’s Web site.
Tags: Alice Hoffman, Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury, San Antonio Public Library, The Big Read
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Tuesday, June 30th, 2009
June 30, 2009
Washington, DC
I admit it: I have a huge crush on Ray Bradbury. Not only is he a superfan of the public library system, but I hear he’s written a classic book or two (or nearly 100 and counting!), like Fahrenheit 451, one of the four novels that helped us launch The Big Read back in 2006.
Maestro Bradbury’s on my mind for a few reasons: I recently saw a vintage episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour based on Bradbury’s short story ”The Life and Work of Juan Diaz” (Note to self: There’s a reason you don’t go to scary movies, remember?), the NEA and the City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs just announced that Bradbury is one of the featured authors for the 2009 Guadalajara International Book Fair, and Jennifer Steinhauer just wrote a great piece about Bradbury and his support of the Ventura County Public Libraries in the June 20 issue of The New York Times.
More than two dozen fan clubs—better known around here as Big Read projects—will be launching on Fahrenheit 451 between this September and next June. Can’t wait till then to get your Bradbury fix? Stop by The Big Read Web site to check out the great man himself in our Big Read Conversation with Ray Bradbury before heading to your local library to frontload your summer reading list with a Bradbury book or two or 100!
Tags: Big Read film, Conversation with Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451, Guadalajara Book Festival, Jennifer Steinhauer, Los Angeles, Ray Bradbury, The Big Read
Posted in Fahrenheit 451 | 7 Comments »
