DC Public Library Reads Reading Lolita in Tehran

Blogger Priya Dadlani Wraps DCPL's 2012 City-Wide Read

By Priya Dadlani

This year, the DC Public Library city-wide reading program, DC READS, showcased the novel Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi. Published in 2003, this novel was on the New York Times bestseller list for 100 weeks and was later translated into thirty-two languages. It is a memoir of the author who travelled back to Iran, her birth place, during the height of the 1979 Revolution where she routinely faced cultural conflicts. Nafisi reflects on how she taught at the University of Tehran, but was later expelled due to her refusal to wear the veil at work. She also lived in Iran through the Iran-Iraq war and later returned to teaching at the University of Allameh Tabatabei. Her personal story is beautifully woven together with the stories of her book club members, seven of her female students, who met weekly at her house to discuss forbidden works of Western literature including the controversial Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov.

The DC Public Library DC Reads program kicked off on October 15th and offered an array of exciting public programs through November 15th.  Programs included book club discussions on Reading Lolita in Tehran at the Chevy Chase Library, and Carver 2000 Senior Mansion, located at 4800 East Capitol Street NE. On November 13th, at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library in the Great Hall, Elisabeth Mehl Greene's chamber opera brought a musical perspective to Azar Nafisi's novel with performances by Natalie Barrens, Carolyn Black-Sotir and Michael Langlois.

On November 15th the Takoma Park Library held an Adult Book Group for a discussion on Reading Lolita in Tehran, followed by another discussion on the novel Lolita by Nabokov. There were no shortage of opportunities to discuss Nafisi’s work, but Takoma Park offered participants the chance to have a conversation about the novel that inspired it.

 Nafisi’s novel is famous for its captivating portrait of the Iran-Iraq war viewed from the perspective of a woman scholar in Tehran; a rare glimpse of extraordinary courage in an extraordinary situation. 

The Humanities Council will sponsor DC’s next city-wide read, Live to Read, this Spring! This year’s selection will be Christopher Paul Curtis’ The Watsons Go to Birmingham! 

Who Lived Here?

Houses in DC Live Many Lives. Research the History of Your Home or Another Intriguing Property.

The most important history lessons are deeply personal, and invoke an emotional response. This explains the popularity of documentary film, with its flair for the dramatic, and genealogy with its immediate personal connections. It also explains why some people are so willing to passionately defend a community's architectural look and feel, and the unique intangible identities their neighborhoods develop through tradition and memory. 

On Saturday, February 18, the Humanities Council, in partnership with the DC Public Library, the DC Historic Preservation Office, and the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, will host a House History Day during which DC residents will learn how to research the past lives of their homes. House history research is powerful because it provides that personal connection to the past that few other types of historical research can; it allows anyone to forge a strong sense of connection with their neighborhood and their community whether they have called DC home for years, or just moved in last month. 

Next month's workshop will feature hands on instruction from expert archivists and historians; researchers will have time to practice their new skills as well, and are encouraged to bring along as much information about their house's history as they can. 

Sessions include: DC Maps, Historic Building Permit Database, Photo Archives, Microfilm, and DC Digital Museum/Neighborhood Context. The day will consist of two identical workshops in which participants will rotate to each of the sessions. The morning workshop lasts from 10am-12pm and the afternoon workshop from 1pm-3pm.  Lunch will be served between the morning and afternoon workshops. 

To register please visit http://dchousehistory.eventbrite.com. 

Please register for only one of the two workshops. House History Day is free, but we ask that you only register if you are sure you will be able to attend. The workshops are very popular and space is extremely limited. For more information please email info[at]wdchumanities[dot]org.

Today in the Humanities... Igloos; Internets; and Cultural Tourism's Top 12 of 2011

Catch the Latest Humanities Stories and Check Out Some You Might Have Missed

The Kiplingers, a prominent Washington business dynasty, started collecting rare photographs and prints of Washington in the 1920s. They assembled work dating back to 1791, added the work of Civil War photographers Mathew Brady and Alexander Gardner, and then gathered examples of Washington history through the mid-20th century.

- "Kiplinger family donates its rare depictions of Washington to the Historical Society", Jacqueline Trescott (Washington Post)

The prestigious Carnegie Corporation of New York and New York Times "I Love My Librarian" award goes to D.C. public librarian Venetia V. Demson.  Demson is one of 10 librarians in the country and the first in this region to receive this annual award.

- "Prestigious National Award Goes to DC Librarian," (DC Public Library)

Most of us leave breadcrumbs behind us online. Say you’re shopping online and a pair of leather boots catches your eye. You zoom in, reading reviews. Finally, you refocus and click a link to a Washington Post article. There, in an ad box to the right, are those boots. It’s like they are meant for you, calling out to you.

- "Who Runs the Internet?," Sarah Stankorb (American University, American Today)

One of the few things that we can be sure about in this period of accelerating change is that the monumental advances in communications technology spawned by the invention of the computer and the chip have epochal implications for human learning. A revolution has commenced where science and technology are melding with the humanities.

- “The Revolutionary Implications of the Digital Humanities,” Jim Leach (National Endowment for the Humanities)

Students from the Arts & Technology Academy, a public charter school in Washington, recite portions of Frederick Douglass’s 19th-century speeches in annual contest.

- "D.C.area students compete in Frederick Douglass Oratorical Contest,"  (The Washington Post)

Although there may be extremely cold temperatures outside an igloo, amazingly the inside can be as warm as sixty degrees due to the natural insulation properties of the snow. But igloos aren’t the only type of snow buildings. From hotels to castles to entire villages, people are building all sorts of snow structures around the world. 

- "Buildings Made of Snow," (National Building Museum)

The Top 12 of 2011 DC Insiders list gives you a sample of some of the many different activities there are in the city.

- "Insider's Guide Top 12 of 2011," Sam Edelstein (Cultural Tourism DC Blog)

Live to Read Selection to be Distributed Free at Local Libraries

Don't Miss the Chance to Pick Up a Copy

The first annual Live to Read is coming to a close, but don't let that stop you from picking up a copy of this year's selection, Ruined by Lynn Nottage, a Pulitzer Prize winning play about life in the war-ravaged  Democratic Republic of the Congo. The play, based on Nottage's own travels through the region, is an eye-opening and often brutal account of the atrocities that can occur when corruption and violence rule in place of law and reason. Despite the suffering of her characters and the weight of her subject, Nottage manages to weave humor and familiarity into the narrative, making for an engrossing read, and a stunning theatrical production. The memory of the story lingers long after leaving the theater or putting down the book.

Copies of the Dramatist Play Service version of the book will be available throughout the week (first come first served) at the Anacostia Neighborhood Library, the Dorothy I. Height/Benning Library, the MLK Memorial Library, the Southwest Neighborhood Library, and the Tenley-Friendship Library.

Live to Read is Washington, DC's city-wide celebration of literature. This year's selected work of literature is Ruined, a Pulitzer Prize-winning play written by Lynn Nottage. The play is currently running at Arena Stage.