Roundtable: Books and Blogging (Part 1)

Recently, I asked for interested readers to participate in a roundtable discussion about books and blogging. What follows is the first of three installments of that discussion. I hope that you will want to continue this discussion in the comments.

The Participants:

Imani, The Books of My Numberless Dreams: Imani is a 23 year old, newly minted grad student who haunts book stores, art galleries, indie cinemas, libraries and the park in her spare time. The Books of My Numberless Dreams is where she records her reading experiences and waves her moleskin, in a threatening manner, at insecure print reviewers.

Emily, Telecommuter Talk: I'm an editor, a recent resident of Lancaster County, PA where my husband has taken his first job as a new Presbyterian minister. I'm passionate about books, music, writing, cooking, and math education. I love a good debate. My blog's title doesn't at all reflect the contents of my blog, although it did in the beginning. I just find it much more fun to write about almost everything other than telecommuting, although occasionally, a post about telecommuting still manages to sneak its way onto the screen.

Litlove, Tales from the Reading Room: I’m a 38-year-old UK academic and my blog is about exploring the fiction and the theory that I love and that I want to share with others who love reading too.

The eponymous Smithereens: I’m a French professional who loves reading and writing as a side. Or maybe the other way round: A passionate reader, dabbling writer who happens to have a very serious job.


How would you define your blog?

Imani: My blog is a journal or notebook of sorts. I share my thoughts on the books I read, provide links I find interesting (not always book-related), and occasionally post a fun rant.

Emily: An attempt to be funny while dabbling in psychology and rhapsodizing about books and other life passions.

Litlove: It’s a blog about ideas, which I explore through the medium of books.

Smithereens: A private place where I can express myself about writing and reading, and also a jumping board to read and discover other blogs and to participate in ongoing discussions in the lit-blog world.

What objectives did you have when you first started blogging? Have these changed over time?

Imani: When I started I thought I might post more personal musings about my adjustment to Canadian life, but I passed that over to focus on book talk. In my quest about reading Jamaican novels, I've found another outlet for that. Other than that, I've done what I intended which was to write about books, reveal my literary insecurities, and find like-minded individuals to converse with, since I wasn't getting that kind of intercourse off-line.

Emily: My objective was to write every day, which is one of the reasons I started my blog. I did in the very beginning (for, maybe something like a week). Unfortunately, I didn't realize that starting a blog would mean I'd find all these other blogs I wanted to read, and it's very hard to write every day and to read and comment on all the other blogs I want to read every day as well, without making it all a full-time job.

Smithereens: Mainly keep track of what I loved in all the books I read – this has not changed. I also had the idea that “going public” about my writing (how well or bad it goes) would give me some confidence or motivation to write more… I’m not too sure this works. I don’t write posts of (my) writing that much, but I do try to write on how writers write.

Emily: Smithereens, I didn’t think about this much before I started my blog, but I’ve come to rely in the confidence it’s given me. I still don’t always believe those who comment on my writing, but I tend to believe them more than I do friends in real life, because I figure they don’t really know me and have nothing to lose by not telling me they like what I write. It’s very interesting to get feedback from strangers. Of course, most of my commenters I’ve now come to think of as friends (something else I didn’t expect would happen when I started blogging).

Litlove: I just wanted to experiment when I started with a different, more informal mode of writing, and to compile a kind of database of concepts and texts that I was keen to discuss. I also intended to talk a lot more about having ME, but that always sounded like whining to my own ears and it wasn’t long before I mostly abandoned that topic. Now I think of it as a practicing ground for a way of writing I’d like to spend a great deal more of my career producing.

Emily: Litlove: you NEVER whine.

Cam: Litlove, do you think that blogging has or will have in the future a legitimate place in academia?

Litlove: I don’t think it will, because academics is slow to embrace change and quite rigid about its preferred formats. What we do see a lot of now, however, is online journals. That market is going to grow and grow. I think, though, that academic blogs will become important for networking purposes, where those are necessary to the research field. I also fear they may become places of one-upmanship and competition, and places to carry on pedantic arguments. Mind you, academics will never be without those elements in one form or another!

Emily: Cam, I’m convinced blogging will in the future be a legitimate place for academia, especially as those who are, say, twelve now, become the academics of the future

Cam: Imani, regarding your comment about not finding the book discussions that you wanted off-line: Do you think that by its nature, online discussion is more focused as opposed to just more prevalent in real life? What I’m wondering about is that most people don’t talk about books often IRL, except in a few circumstances. But, if they did, would it be different than what you experience on line?

Imani: I have one or two friends with whom I can discuss books and I enjoy it as much, if not more often than on-line. Simply having a person in front of you with whom you can react instantly is pleasurable, but the conversation is also more spontaneous. The chance that the other has different tastes is also higher in person, than on-line where you can narrow it down, and that can often lead to spirited arguments, which I enjoy.

Emily: Imani, I agree that it’s much easier to find like-minded individuals to converse with about books online than I was finding in real life, despite working in publishing. That’s another cool thing I meant to say about blogging, which is that, statistically, those of us who read are in a small minority, so having this outlet allows us to connect with others all over the world, people we’d never “meet” in real life. Cam, I think the discourse is different, too, because people take the time to really discuss a book, to think a lot about it and what they want to say, rather than just saying, “I loved this one; you’ve got to read it.”

Smithereens: It’s interesting that you mention this point. If I ever discuss books in real life, that would be with friends, in that case I try to adapt to the friend’s taste and not impose my opinion. Also, it’s rather awkward to mention among friends or colleagues that you read a 19C classics when they hardly ever read a novel.

Cam: Do you keep to a certain posting schedule? Writing some days, commenting on others?

Emily: For a while, I was posting one day, commenting the next, etc., but I’ve been out of that pattern for some time. I’d like to get back into it, though.

Do you have any self-imposed limitations on your blog -- things you would/would not post.

Imani: I do not write a lot of words on current events, or reveal much about my personal life. I prefer to keep things tidy. :)

Emily: My blog is pretty much like me in real life. I don't ever get too personal about bad things in my life except with very, very close friends and family members. I do the same with my blog. I'll take you up to a certain point, but won't cross that point. For instance, if I were to find out my husband was cheating on me or if I were to be fired from my job, I doubt I'd post about it while going through it. If it all turned out well in the end, I might then write about it, turning my experiences into something that others going through something similar might read to help them feel they're not alone, which makes me realize one of the things I think about blogs: they are a place for people to go where they kind find like-minded souls or those who are having similar experiences.

Litlove: I try to keep my personal life out of it, mostly, although sometimes I let it intrude. I try as well not to rant, although occasionally that goes out the window, too.

Smithereens: I try to stay focused on books and writing. I don’t want my blog to become a diary, so I try to limit the disclosure of too much personal information. Anything about my job and family life is clearly off limits, but sometimes I can allude to it sideways when reviewing a book that touches me in a particular way. I feel more free to slip personal stuff in my comments to other people’s “life” blogs

Do you write anonymously/pseudonymously? Why or why not?

Imani: I use my middle name on-line and there are pictures of me in archives as well as on a few book/social sites. So I don't put too many obvious bits of personal identification out there, but anyone who knows me would be able to pick up on the details easily enough. I'm instinctively a private person.

Emily: I sort of write pseudonymously, using my unmarried middle name as my last name, but if someone really wanted to find out who I am, they could. I think it's prudent for me, both for my career as an editor and for the fact that I'm a pastor's wife not to be extremely easy to find.

Litlove: I am mostly anonymous, if one can claim such a thing. There are people who know who I am, but on the whole I’ve retained anonymity because I would hate to upset the college I work at by any careless or critical remarks. However, recently I’ve joined Facebook, and for some reason I’m longing to publicise my blog on it, in order to keep in touch with former students of mine. That would completely ruin anonymity, though, so I’m restraining myself at the moment.

Smithereens: Yes, although I’m not sure if Smithereens is anonymous or pseudonymous… Anyway, I don’t want other parts of my life to get mixed with my blog (namely professional, social parts), I wouldn’t feel as free. Also, I don’t blog in my own language because I prefer the international community and I read most books in English.

Cam: Emily, you’ve written in your blog about your husband's career change, his job search, your fears about moving, and your new home. Do you think that as you and your husband become more settled in your new life that you will write more about it, or that, because of the nature of his job, you will need to filter out some of that? I think that there are few professions other than a church ministry – politics being another – where the actions of a spouse can have a direct influence on a person’s professional life. That said, I think that there are other professional reasons (and other professions) where anonymity may be preferable. In my case, my blogging is so distant from what I do professionally, that it is unlikely that anyone would happen upon my blog or care if they did. Still, I like that fact that I’m not Google-able. Working in high tech, it isn’t unheard of to use search engines while considering someone for a job. What do the others think?

Emily: Cam, I’m still trying to figure out that one. I, obviously, can’t write about our parishioners, no matter how much I may want to do so, because that would be a breech of confidence, and my conscience wouldn’t let me do it. However, I do feel I can probably blog about some things in a broad sense that I might want to get off my chest. I actually toyed with the idea of doing a new blog for clergy spouses called “The Pastor’s Spouse Speaks,” because I’m finding that all of us need support, but I just can’t see doing another blog at this point. I don’t know about others’ jobs, but the parent company of the company for which I work has all kinds of rules for blogging (both personal as well as work blogs. Who says corporate America isn’t a kingdom in which nobody is truly free, especially since many of us are owned by foreign corporations in the countries from which our forebears all escaped in order to get away from that kind of government?) I think I’m pretty safe, because I’ve never mentioned the name of the company for which I work, and blogging about my job is not something I’m very interested in doing. After all, I have colleagues for those types of discussions.

Smithereens: I too like not being Google-able, I’m kind of paranoid for my job. Also, it probably has to do with the bookish/nerdy reputation you get when people know you like to read books.

Cam: Litlove: Do you think that if there was a careless or critical remark made towards the college – intentional or not – that it could jeopardize your position? Do you think that it would open you up to more criticism (probably not of the constructive kind) from disappointed students. It may be a US thing, but I’m thinking about sites like ‘Rate your Professor’ where students don’t tend to give legitimate feedback, but rather appear to be rather complaining.

Litlove: Oh yes, my university is completely paranoid about adverse publicity, and if I said anything that was detrimental in an attention-grabbing way (if I said admissions interviews were unfair or something – and I hasten to add that they are not) and that got into the press (and they are always looking to cause trouble on sensitive issues) I would be in hot water. There’s a lot of ‘ifs’ however, and I’m pretty sure my blog is not going to be read by mainstream journalists! On the question of the students, I do talk about my private life a bit, and I wouldn’t want them to read that. Teachers should be mysterious, it adds to our allure. Ratings-wise, the students have lots of opportunity for giving anonymous feedback within the university and in my experience they have only ever used it to say nice things. The consumer culture is beginning to make itself felt here, but it’s not a big deal – yet!

Cam: Smithereens: Maybe pseudonymous is when your cover is blown, but you continue to write under that name anyway? I’m not sure that there is a difference, although if you read the ‘about’ page on Hobgoblin’s blog, he seems to think that there is. Quoting from his site: “I am making an important distinction between pseudonymity and anonymity. The latter is, I think, completely hiding yourself, while the former is more akin to wearing a mask.”

I think that when I first started blogging I didn’t want myself to be known, but the longer I blog, the more I realize that I couldn’t extricate myself from my blog – it’s very much me even if there weren’t any details about my daily life. Agree or not?

Smithereens: It is very much me, but not all of me. I think sometimes I may come out differently than the way I usually am IRL: maybe less shy, more argumentative, more positive. (I do censor the grumbling part of me!)

Emily: If those are the distinctions, then I’m definitely blogging pseudonymously rather than anonymously. And, yes, I also found it was very difficult to extricate myself from my blog. This was verified when my brother told me, “Your blog is SO you, Emily.”

Imani: I would definitely agree with that. The book blog is as “me”, it’s simply amplified a specific part of my character.



Tomorrow: Part II. Writing, Audience and Blogs.

Wednesday: Part III: Blogging about books.

Sunday odds and ends

Today was a quiet day. Spent much of it reading an ARC (via LibraryThing's Early Reviewer program), Identical Strangers: A Memoir of Twins Separated and Reunited. I started to read this a few months ago, but set it aside. The authors, Elyse Schein and Paula Bernstein were interviewed on the Today Show yesterday. I only caught the last few sentences of the interview, but it reminded me that I hadn't finished the book.

I'm the child of an identical twin and can attest to many of the odd similarities between twin siblings. At the same time, I realize that there could have been no mistaking either for the other except during a quick glance. They were alike, but could be so different and distinct. So, I thought that I'd find this book interesting.

There are those sorts of twin oddities throughout the book. And, as you read Schein's and Bernstein's book, it's hard not to understand both the curiosity and the anxiety that must come from finding out as an adult that you have a twin. The book is written in diary form, alternating between twins. While this does give the reader a sense of reading both sides of the story, I found it confusing after awhile. The voice of both authors is too similar. At the same time, that similarity is an oddity -- is it because they are twins? I have a few more chapters to finish the book. I'll have to think for awhile whether this ultimately takes away or adds to the the work.

-----Other things----

- It has turned cold here this week, and despite some rain, the leaves are still on the trees. It has been a pretty fall. In the last few days I've seen a few trees that have more than one color leaf on them. I took the photograph below at a school near my home. Green, yellow, gold, orange, red, gold, and purple leaves were all on the same tree. I'm not sure that the picture does the tree's glorious color scheme justice. This is the first year that I remember seeing multi-colored trees, like this one. Maybe it has to do with the milder weather we've had recently.

- For the second time in less than a week, someone has recommended the book Three Cups of Tea. I think I will need to go to the store tomorrow to find this one. Repeat recommendations always prompt me to consider buying the book (unless it's something like The Davinci Code).

- Thanksgiving is just around the corner. Here is all I need to know about cooking a turkey: I am the middle daughter of a large family; I have plenty of sisters who will dry out a large bird in the oven for hours. I don't need to know how to carve either. I'm not bringing pies this year. I'm responsible for sweet potatoes. Not the mushy, sickening sweet marshmallow-y kind. I have three recipes to choose from:

1) sliced sweet potatoes with a lemon glaze. Good mixture of sweet and sour.

2) sliced and baked with apples, cranberries and pecans, topped with a small amount of cinnamon and brown sugar. If I feel exotic, I'll have a little bit of nutmeg and cloves too. Walnuts or pecans are optional -- which means I usually forget to add them to the baking dish.

3) baked, then mashed with cilantro and butter.

I like #3 the best, but I think #2 is best for the company on Thursday.

- Someone I used to be friends with recently published a first novel. I'm pleased for her for accomplishing her goal. And a bit jealous too. I hope that I'm not one of the evil characters in the book -- or a dead corpse.

- Philosopher Henri Frederick Amiel said: Life is short and we have never too much time for gladdening the hearts of those who are travelling the dark journey with us. Oh be swift to love, make haste to be kind..

- Maybe it is time that I make amends and call my old friend to congratulate her on her book.

- The blogging roundtable should be posted in 1 - 2 days. Please check back for some lively discussion by some interesting bloggers: Litlove, Imani, Emily & Smithereens.

In My Library....

I drafted this meme more than a year ago, but never published it. Five questions on my library:

1. The oldest book in my library: Myths of the Northern Lands, published 1895.

2. The book in my library I've owned the longest: St. Exupery's The Little Prince. I own the copy I read in grade school 38 years ago. I own a copy in French I bought in Paris 28 years ago.

3. The book in my library I've read the most : Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. I read this book as an assignment in Jr. High, High School, and two college courses. I taught this book many times too. I've lost count how many times I've read it. While I wouldn't say that I know it by heart, I can open to almost any page and by reading a sentence or two, know exactly where in the book I am reading, what action has taken place, understand the tone and nuances of the specific scene, as if I had just re-read all of the preceding pages.

4. The most unusual book in my library: A musty-smelling book with a beautiful hand-painted front cover, a copy of Hawthorne's Mosses from an Old Manse, found at a garage sale. While I've read stranger pieces of writing, the care that went into painting the book, and the neglect that let it molder intrigues me and earns it the 'most unusual' nomination.

5. A book everyone should read: whatever informs their lives, enriches their soul, forces them to think, or makes them smile.

No tag; you're it. If you want to do this, feel free.

Thoughts On Experimenting With Blogging Every Day

Halfway through the month and I've managed to write a post everyday. I didn't think I'd make it past the first week. I was so skeptical in fact, that I didn't officially sign up for NaBloPoMo until Nov 1 and I didn't post any badge or statement that I was doing so. Nothing is more likely to kill my participation than publicly announcing that I will participate. Just how many challenges or group blogs have I pledged to be a part of, only to bow out quickly? I don't want to know.

But I've been at this now for 16 days straight. Although I've had a few moments of anxiety where I thought I couldn't possibly think of anything to write about, I've pulled through in the end. A few evenings, I've logged in way too close to midnight, typed a placeholder for a title and some gibberish for a first paragraph so that I could hit 'save' before turning into a pumpkin, the clock chimed. I realize that I could change the date, but I felt that if I had saved a draft and timestamped it, it would qualify. Although I'm not trying to qualify for anything -- just to push myself to write more.

I seem to have great ideas for posts when I'm nowhere near a computer, or sitting just opposite one but at work. Something about auditing project budgets and doing financial forecasts for next year seems to cause my mind to wander ..... But when I sit down, I do struggle for awhile about what to write. I am in awe of people who post regularly several days a week and sustain that for a long period of time.

I've thought of having themes for each week or a scheduled rotation of topics (reading, writing, poetry, book review, art, language) but that hasn't seemed to work. I have a tendency, especially late at night which is when I usually write, to forget what day it is. So while this theoretical schedule was great, it was wholly impractical.

Two of the shortest posts I've written represent both the longest and shortest amounts of time to create. The Yeats poem post, while not intended as something to just get me through meeting my quota, was the quickest. Posted so hastily, I did not notice until the next day that the font formatting was messed up. This post, regarding my 2007 Favorite Books and Blogs Survey took me the longest as I had to write the survey and set up the questionnaire and figure out the links, before posting. And it received the fewest number of hits. That's funny! While this is meant as an analysis of my daily posting endeavor, I realize that perhaps I might drive some more visitors to my little survey. However, maybe it wasn't that much fun last year and my annual survey will only live for 2 years. That's okay. I like the experiment. Experimenting was one of the reasons I started blogging in the first place. Not to experiment with forms of writing, but to experiment with writing for an audience, even if you don't know whether an audience exists or not.

My latest experiment is with a blogging 'roundtable'. Off-line, Litlove, Emily, Smithereens and Imani have been having an email conversation about blogging and books. Each of these bloggers has had interesting comments to share. I'm doing my final edits today and will be posting the results here soon. It has been a great experiment in trying to get a sustained dialog among bloggers on a specific topic. It's been lots of fun. I'm considering doing this again, perhaps on a regular basis. We'll see how it goes when I post. One thing I learned: I asked too many questions initially and the material I have is lengthy. I think I will be posting this conversation over a couple of days. I hope to have the first installment available by Sunday. I hope you will return to read it.

Fireworks

Indianapolis boasts of the largest Children's Museum in the world. While this is true, I find no value in its size; I dislike self-reported claims of being the biggest, tallest, largest anything, because these terms have nothing to do with quality. But, the Children's Museum of Indianapolis is a worthwhile place, with great quality learning experiences for kids and their adult guides. It is a fantastic environment for children, one that presents learning experiences in a fun way.

Several years ago, when my son was in grade school, we went to an exhibit of Alexander Calder works at the Children's Museum. I loved this idea of bringing art to a place dedicated to children. Not only did Calder's whimsical works seem at home in the exhibit space, but the way in which the artist's work was presented -- on the level of a child and in a hands-on way -- was outstanding. The words "Hands-on" and "art" used together may frighten a curator with visions of chocolate and peanut-butter hand prints leaving greasy marks on once priceless, now ruined canvas. But hands-on for this exhibit meant activities like jumping under a mobile to generate air currents to set the sculpture in motion, or being given the materials to make one's own mobile inspired by Calder's work. Over the years other exhibits dealing with art have been at the museum. A few years ago, for example, there was an exhibit of Norman Rockwell paintings and his Saturday Evening Post magazine covers. Incorporating child's play with art is something that isn't done often enough.

Then, last year, the museum did something else: the installation of a 43-foot glass sculpture by Dale Chihuly in the main staircase of the museum. The sculpture, Fireworks of Glass is playful. It is composed of thousands of pieces of primary-colored glass curlicues. It sits upon a glass ceiling.

I visited the museum recently and saw Fireworks of Glass for the first time. This was not the first Chihuly exhibit I had seen; in fact, I've seen several previously. While his glass chandeliers that I have seen (like this one at the V&A in London) are composed of translucent glass that catch the light, the sculpture at the Childrens' Museum is made up of opaque pieces of glass. The pieces of glass seem to swirl around the main column, as if caught in a vortex by tornadic winds. The tower is capped by a starburst. Looking at it from either the top or bottom floors of the museum, it does resemble a fireworks explosion, suspending in air, just before the burning embers tumble towards the ground and disappear as they cool. The tower is in the middle of an enormous staircase -- a ramp system actually -- that takes the visitor to each of the 5 floors of the museum. The piece seems to fit so perfectly in the space, you would think that the ramp was designed around the sculpture. Despite all of the times that I have been to the Children's Museum over the years, I cannot tell you anything about the central staircase before the glass tower was added. The sculpture not only fills the space, but it defines it as well.

Visitors to the museum can sit under the sculpture, on the basement floor, and look upwards through the glass ceiling to the sculpture. The museum is currently featuring a short movie about the artist and there are hands-on exhibits for children to learn about the art of glassmaking. Very cool. There is even a rotating bench that you can sit upon, reclining slightly, to look up through the ceiling at the sculpture and the lights sparkling off of it. When I was last at the museum, I was there for a benefit. Dressed in formal wear, I couldn't bring myself to recline on the bench and look up at the tower. Nor did I see anyone else doing that. An evening dress and heels are not exactly conducive to rotating reclining benches. Plus, I wasn't certain that I would have been able to return to a vertical position after sitting on that bench -- at least not in any sort of graceful manner.

Later I realized how sad this was that we didn't say 'screw decorum', sit upon the bench and gaze up in child-like wonder. After all, isn't art suppose to spur you to think and to feel? Ah, apparently only if you let it take its full effect.

In a Bee-Loud Glade

The problem with living in the city, amongst all of the hectic busy-ness of contemporary life, is that we do not live in a bee-loud glade.

The Lake Isle of Innisfree

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee;
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.
 
I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.

Hear here:  Yeats' own recording of his poem.

Take a minute, take an hour:  Hear the song in your deep heart's 
core and you'll understand that there is no reason for a in-depth 
reading of Yeats' poem