- One City One Book
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One City One Book (also One Book One City, [City] Reads, On the Same Page and other variations) is a generic name for a community reading program that attempts to get everyone in a city to read and discuss the same book. The name of the program is often reversed to One Book One City, or is customized to name the city where it occurs. Popular book picks have been Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, Ernest Gaines's A Lesson Before Dying, and Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. [1]
Contents
History
One City One Book programs take the idea of a localized book discussion club and expand it to cover a whole city.[2] The first such program was "If All of Seattle Read the Same Book" in 1998, started by Nancy Pearl at Seattle Public Library's Washington Center for the Book.[3] The book chosen for the program was 'The Sweet Hereafter' by Russell Banks, written in 1991.[4] Other cities copied the idea, and the Library of Congress listed 404 programs occurring in 2007. [1]
Each city's program has its own goals; these typically include building a sense of community and promoting literacy.[5]:5 Nancy Pearl warns against expecting too much from a program: "Keep in mind that this is a library program, it's not an exercise in civics, it's not intended to have literature cure the racial divide. This is about a work of literature."[2]
Programs typically involve more than having everyone read the same book. Some other activities that have been included are: book discussion sessions, scholarly lectures on the book or related topics, a visit by the author, exhibits, related arts programming (especially showing a movie of the book if there is one), and integration into school curricula. [5]:20-23 In Boston the "One City One Story" program used shorter stories and distributed tens of thousands of free copies of the story over the course of a month.
American Library Association puts out a detailed step-by-step guide[5] on how to organize a local program, including the critical step of picking the one book. The Center for the Book at the Library of Congress tracks all known programs and the books they have used.[1]
Significant "One Book" programs
Most listed are in the United States, perhaps because the meme started there and similar programs elsewhere have a different name.
Programs sponsored by public libraries are tracked each year by the Library of Congress.[6] Most programs maintain their own websites devoted to the annual effort.
USA
The Library of Congress maintains a website with resources for cities that want to run One Book programs, including a partial list of authors and list of past programs. Some states and the ALA maintain their own resources to help cities get started. [7]
- National
- The National Endowment for the Arts has run a "Big Read" program since 2006, and gives grants to hundreds of communities each year to run reading programs based on a small set of books chosen for that year. Unlike single-city programs, the Big Read centrally chooses a list of a few books, and each city selects from that list. [8]
- By State
Since City State Sponsoring library or org Program name 2005 Yuma Arizona Yuma libraries One Book Yuma 2003 Santa Monica California Santa Monica Public Library Santa Monica Reads 2002 Connecticut Eastern Connecticut Libraries One Book One Region 2003 Gwinnett County Georgia Gwinnett County Libraries Gwinnett Reads 2004 Winnetka-Northfield Illinois Winnetka-Northfield libraries One Book, Two Villages - separate selection for children and adults 2004 South Bend Indiania Indiana University South Bend One Book One Campus 2003 Iowa Iowa Center for the Book All Iowa Reads 2006 Kentucky Northern Kentucky One Book One Community 2008 Maryland Maryland Humanities Council One Maryland One Book 2004 Brookline Massachusetts Public Library of Brookline Brookline Reads 2002 Falmouth Massachusetts Falmouth Public Library What's Falmouth Reading 2010 Boston Massachusetts Boston Book Festival One City One Story - distributes 30,000 free copies to area residents 2004 Cambridge Massachusetts Cambridge Public Library Cambridge READS 2002 East Lansing Michigan City of East Lansing One Book East Lansing 2004 Rochester Minnesota Rochester Reads 2002 Boone Missouri Daniel Boone Regional Library One Read Bozeman Montana One Book One Bozeman Omaha Nebraska Millard Public Schools Foundation One Disney One Book 2005 New Paltz New York One Book One New Paltz 2003 Western New York New York A Tale for Three Counties 2006 Schenectady New York Schenectady County Public Library "One County One Book" 2001 Syracuse, Onondaga County New York Onondaga County Public Library "Central New York Reads" 2002 Cincinnati Ohio On the Same Page Cincinnati 2003 Findlay Ohio Findlay-Hancock Community Foundation CommunityREAD 2007 Lake Oswego Oregon Lake Oswego Library Lake Oswego Reads 2003 Multonmah County Oregon Multnomah County Library Everybody Reads 2003 Centre County Pennsylvania Centre County Reads 2003 Philadelphia Pennsylvania Free Library of Philadelphia One Book One Philadelphia 2002 Lancaster County Pennsylvania One Book One Community [9] 2004 Mansfield Texas One City One Book 2002 Austin Texas City of Austin Mayor's Book Club 2004 Logan Utah Utah State University Common Literature Experience 2003 Vermont Vermont Humanities Council Vermont Reads 2004 Lodoun County Virginia 1 Book, 1 Community 2011 Red Bank New Jersey One Book One Community: Honk! The Musical Tale of the Ugly Duckling Alternate programs
Some cities that have run independent One Book programs have later joined Big Read instead. An annual "One World, Many Stories" summer reading campaign for children, which has a single selection for the country, has become popular as well. [10]
Critical responses
For some, the mere idea of reading as a communal activity is repellent. The literary critic Harold Bloom said, "I don't like these mass reading bees.... It is rather like the idea that we are all going to pop out and eat Chicken McNuggets or something else horrid at once." [11]
Others are concerned about the temptation to use such a program to promote social values. Phillip Lopate fears a promotion of groupthink, saying "It is a little like a science fiction plot -- 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers' or something." [11]
In New York City in 2002 the effort foundered when the selectors split into two rival groups, each with its own favorite: Chang-Rae Lee's Native Speaker and James McBride's The Color of Water. Both books were considered to be offensive to some of New York's ethnic groups. [2] [12] Nancy Pearl said, "It's turned into something not to do with literature but to do with curing the ills in society, and while there is a role for that, to ask a book to fit everybody's agenda in talking about particular issues just does a disservice to literature." [13]
Governments are sometimes concerned that their endorsement of reading a book will be viewed as endorsing the ideas or language of the book. In Texas in 2006, the Galveston County Reads committee recommended Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time as the choice for their county-wide read. There was much criticism of the choice from the Mayor and Council of Friendswood, who objected to obscenity in the novel, and said that it contained ideas that should not be promoted to kids and that taxpayer money should not be used to promote and purchase a book the community wouldn't approve of. [14]
References
- ^ a b c ""One Book" Reading Promotion Projects". Library of Congress - Center for the Book. http://www.loc.gov/loc/cfbook/one-book.html. Retrieved 2008-05-02.[dead link]
- ^ a b c Rogers, Michael (April 1, 2002), "Libraries offer chapter and verse on citywide book clubs; in Seattle, Chicago, Syracuse, and even some states, the concepts and tactics vary, but collective reading grows. (News)", Library Journal 127 (6): 16–18, ISSN 03630277, http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA201851.html, retrieved 2008-05-02
- ^ ""One Book" programs span the nation", American Libraries 36 (5): 19, May 2005, ISSN 00029769
- ^ De Leon, Ferdinand M. (November 5, 1998). "Getting On The Same Page -- Library's 'If All Of Seattle Read The Same Book' Program Hopes To Get The City Reading - And Talking - Together". Seattle TImes. http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19981105&slug=2781661.
- ^ a b c "Planning Your Community-Wide Read" (PDF). American Library Association. http://publicprograms.ala.org/orc/pdfs/onebookguide.pdf. Retrieved 2008-05-02.
- ^ At Read.gov. Retrieved Jun 28, 2011
- ^ See for instance the ALA's One Book guide, and Michigan state's list of related resources.
- ^ "The Big Read: Frequently Asked Questions". National Endowment for the Arts. http://www.neabigread.org/faq.php. Retrieved 2008-05-02.
- ^ 2010 announcement of the program (pdf)
- ^ See for instance Los Angeles, Huntsville, and Idaho libraries.
- ^ a b Kirkpatrick, David D. (February 19, 2002), "Want a Fight? Pick One Book for All New Yorkers.(Metropolitan Desk)", New York Times 151: B1(L), ISSN 03624331, http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9401E7D91F3FF93AA25751C0A9649C8B63, retrieved 2008-05-02
- ^ Kirkpatrick, David D. (May 10, 2002), "One City Reading One Book? Not if the City Is New York. (Metropolitan Desk)", New York Times 151: B2(L), ISSN 03624331, http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9500E3DC1130F933A25756C0A9649C8B63, retrieved 2008-05-02
- ^ Burkeman, Oliver (February 27, 2002), "It's a novel idea, but nothing can get New York reading from the same page: One Book, One City sweeps the US. But the Big Apple can't even pick a winner", The Guardian (London, England): 3, ISSN 02613077, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/feb/27/books.booksnews, retrieved 2008-05-02
- ^ Lerner, Mason (January 28, 2006), "Reading group book creates controversy", The Daily News (Galveston, TX), http://galvestondailynews.com/story.lasso?ewcd=20bcbeec45a0a633ca9a98f9b5830fd0, retrieved 2008-05-02
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