Our July Author: Avi Steinberg

This month we are discussing Avi Steinberg's Running the Books, a memoir about the adventures of a prison librarian. Although I had some concern about being 'trapped' in a book about prisons in July, a month when I usually try to propose travel books, I really enjoyed this journey.  We've got a few links to get things rolling, starting with his personal website: avisteinberg.com.  Because the book contains quite a bit of the author's backstory, the usual interviews don't reveal a whole lot more than you learn in the book, but if you haven't read it yet and need a shortcut to prepare for the meeting, start here. I learned of the book from this NPR interview.  This profile from Harvard magazine is also a good introduction,

Any assumptions about the ease of book learning quickly disappeared. “As a prison librarian, you need to fight for the space, fight to purchase the books, fight to keep books on the shelves, fight for people to be able to come to the library, fight to keep people coming back to the library,” Steinberg says of his daily struggles. “It takes a lot of effort to bring books alive for people. To me, this was not obvious before.”

For those that have read the book and want more, Steinberg has been writing on a variety of (often amusing) subjects for publications like the Paris Review and The New Yorker. Check out this video if you want a preview of his next book. And you definitely want to check out this piece from Huffpo: Conversations with a Young Islamist in the Prison Library,

I can honestly say that if Akh did become a radical Islamist in prison it was despite the education he received in the prison library. It is just as likely that our conversations--simply the example of an open and respectful dialogue--planted a seed. It was, after all, a kind of tolerance that kept him coming back enthusiastically to the prison library and that kept our conversations honest and alive. In prison, and even in the balkanized world at large, this alone is a rare achievement.

Of course, we've covered some of this territory before. I was happy to see that Ted Conover's Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing got a nod from the author. We read the book a while back (along with two others by the author, making Conover Rights Readers' all-time favorite author) and recommend it if you enjoyed Running. You may be interested to learn that New Jack is still contraband in the New York prison system, but the author wrote recently about his first return visit to Sing Sing to see an inmate-produced play and he testifies to the role of theater in envisioning alternative roles as a part of rehabilitation. Huffpo also has a good interview with Conover. By the way, Ted Conover is not the only author we've read whose books have been banned behind bars. I linked to this once before, but I recommend this video of Toni Morrison and Angela Davis discussing the value of prison libraries and problems with censors.  The Austin Statesman has a fascinating report on books and authors banned in Texas prisons, including Edwidge Danticat. I also liked this article about a lawsuit filed by the always inspiring Bryan Stevenson of the Equal Justice Initiative on behalf of an Alabama inmate who was banned from reading the Pulitzer Prize winning book Slavery by Another Name. 

Take a look at this birds-eye view of the U.S. prison-industrial complex. There's a prison near you. If you've got some books you'd like to donate to a prison, this looks like a good place to start. If you want to learn more about prison issues, Slate has a round-up of some excellent investigative journalism on the subject. If you're in favor of more books, more dialog, better libraries, and better rehabilitation programs, you'll want to join the growing campaign to rethink the practice of solitary confinement.  Take action on behalf of the "Angola 3' here. See also the recent action against conditions at TAMMS Supermax prison in Illinois. More info/action from Solitary Watch. There's a lot of work to be done!

Love a Library for Ray

Although we never read Ray Bradbury in our group, I thought his passing deserved some acknowledgement here. His most famous book, Fahrenheit 451 captures so perfectly our commitment to the right to freedom of expression and concern for censorship and banned authors. Plus, Bradbury's passion for books and libraries is a great lead-in to next month's book, Running the Books the memoir of "accidental" prison librarian, Avi Steinberg. The dramatic video above is from a recent "flash theater" reading of Fahrenheit 451 that was produced at the West Hollywood library in conjunction with the National Enowment for the Arts The Big Read. NEA has produced the video below to enhance discussions of the book and allow us all to learn from Ray's passion for books and libraries (and admire his large, fluffy cat!). Love a library today for Ray.



And Bradbury's stories translate so well across cultures. At least one of our authors, Junot Diaz, was a great admirer of Bradbury and wrote this appreciation for the New Yorker,

When I was young, Bradbury was my man. I followed him to Mars, to the veldt, to the future, to the past, to the heart of America, I rode out with him on the Pequod, and on rockets.

I also highly recommend Tanjil Rashid's consideration of Bradbury's Middle Eastern inspirations and his on-going relevance to the cultural life of that region,

When writing Fahrenheit 451, he was in fact thinking of the Middle East all along: “I wasn’t thinking about McCarthy so much as I was thinking of the library of Alexandria 5,000 years [sic] before.” In the Egypt I inhabit “5,000 years” later, voters are currently faced with a choice between Islamist repression or repression of Islamism, two authoritarian candidates with little appreciation of freedom of expression. No one has advocated book-burnings, but book-bannings — a less gruesome cousin — remain the order of the day, many politicians even calling for the infliction of that fate on Egypt’s own greatest novelist, Naguib Mahfouz. No wonder that a few years ago a cultural exchange promoted by the National Endowment for the Arts picked  Fahrenheit 451as the focus of reading groups in Cairo and, unmissably, Alexandria.

Maybe a fitting memorial would be to take action on the Global Online Freedom Act. 

Finally, I had to include this little nod to our home base at Caltech with this clip from JPL. Thanks Ray!

 

Bombing of Iraqi Book Mart

This wasn't even the worst atrocity to happen in the last couple of days in Iraq, but I dare say its one Loyal Readers can relate to best: the BBC reports on the bombing of the Baghdad book mart. After all, we meet in a bookstore, we linger over the "New Arrivals" table on the way out, we visit the neighboring cafes and theaters in our own book district, looking for a bit of insight or escapism. We can put ourselves there. The BBC offers a little slideshow of Mutanabbi Street in better times and here's an NPR audio report from 2003 focusing on the dangers of selling banned books during the Saddam Hussein era. Then there is this Washington Post article from 2006 detailing the post-war deterioration of the market,

"It is the lungs that I breathe with," said Zaien Ahmad al-Nakshabandi, another bookseller. "I'm choked now."

Orion has pictures and description of the literary hangout, Sh'ah Bander Café, now destroyed according to the New York Times. Still, in all this tragedy, we find an optimist,

“Those terrorists do not represent Islam,” said Wissam Arif, 45, an engineer and eager browser of the book market. “They are fighting science. They hate the light of science and scientists. Haven’t they killed hundreds of prophets and intellectuals?

“Yesterday they killed the prophets and today they are killing the books. But hopefully the just, the science and the light will win. We’ll be patient until we achieve victory.”

For more courage resilience in the face of overwhelming odds, see the story of Alia Muhammad Baker, whose story is related in two children's books: The Librarian of Basra and Alia's Mission.

Child Soldiers / Child Testimony

So how about some real life child testimony to compare with the fictional version in Beasts of No Nation?

Here is a short film excerpt produced by WITNESS,

In the Democratic Republic of Congo (D.R.C.) children make up the majority of combatants in a war that has claimed over four million lives. Through the voices of child soldiers, A DUTY TO PROTECT explores the complexity of the war, the issues confronted by girl soldiers including rape and sexual exploitation, and the importance of the International Criminal Court to end the rampant impunity reigning in Eastern DRC.

(Sidenote: Witness just launched a partnership with Global Voices, featuring human rights video from around the world, some from people documenting human rights abuses with cellphones-- I'm going to try to remember that next time one rings at the wrong time! A recent post concerned Mohammed Abbou, a Tunisian writer featured in Amnesty's Banned Books Week appeals.)

In this film from Sierra Leone, a 14 year old boy, Sidibay, tells the story of how his family were killed and how he become a child soldier.



More stories, drawings and songs from former Sierra Leone child soldiers can be found atChildsoldiers.org. Sample excerpt,

I left about 8:00 pm to continue my journey. I walked for about an hour having nothing to eat ro drink then I suddenly saw a stream. I was drinking then I was surrounded by tall huge men and the one yield at me " What are you doing here you small boy you're a spy I'm going to kill you now." With these words Istarted trembling, then he said "Are going to join us or choose to die" then I say whatever you want to do with me I'm willing. I was then taken to their main base in that region and I was tied up for one week eating dry Cassava and drinking filthy water. One man who was living in my village and was one of them pleaded that they should let me go. and since that day I became a full childsoldier. I was injected with cocaine and then given an AK 47 riffle to carry. I started going to front lines killing people raping and do all sorts of bad things.

Tags: child soldiers

Banned Books Miscellany

Closing out Banned Books Week, a more traditional approach to the subject can be found at the American Library Association's site. All your questions answered about the most notorious books. For fun, you can order a banned books bracelet. (I found myself thinking about which Rights Readers books would look good around my wrist!)

Or here's one I think our Loyal Readers would surely enjoy: donate a banned book for a free empanada and coffee at the Banned Books Cafe.
Not only do we have a number of banned books on hand (the recently discussed banned-in-Belarus Voices from Chernobyl comes to mind), many of us have fond memories of meetings with homemade empanadas, made by a Cherished Former Reader. Too bad this deal can only be had in San Antonio.

Finally, for inspiration, The Nation offers profiles in courageous librarians.

Tags: banned books

Banned Books Week

For Rights Readers, Banned Books Week has a little twist-- its more like Banned Writers Week. Please check here for profiles and downloadable actions to take on behalf of jailed journalists, bloggers, poets, editors and publishers. As a bonus, the action for Shi Tao (a case we've touched on before) can also be done electronically. For inspiration, read (or watch on video) journalist and former prisoner of conscience Akbar Ganji's discussion of censorship in Iran.

Tags: banned books, censorship,

Turkish Writers on Trial

Maureen Freely, Orhan Pamuk's (Snow) translator writes in the  New York Times about another Turkish author facing trial,

In [Elif Shafak's] sixth and most recent novel, “The Bastard of Istanbul,” which is already a best seller in Turkey and will be published in the United States by Viking next year, one character declares: “My father is Barsam Tchakhmakhchian, my great-uncle is Dikran Stamboulian, his father is Varvant Istanboluian, my name is Armanoush Tchakhmakhchian, all my family tree has been Something Somethingian, and I am the grandchild of genocide survivors who lost all their relatives in the hands of Turkish butchers in 1915, but I myself have been brainwashed to deny the genocide because I was raised by some Turk named Mustapha!” These are strong words in a country whose official historians maintain that the Armenian genocide at the hands of Turks is itself a fiction... In September, she spoke at a conference at Bilgi University in Istanbul — the first Turkish conference ever to challenge the official line on the Ottoman Armenians — and though she went on to state her own position clearly and unequivocally in several newspapers, the censors left her alone. But early last month, Shafak learned that she was to be prosecuted for, among other things, allowing a character of partly Armenian heritage in “The Bastard of Istanbul” to utter the forbidden G-word. Her trial is scheduled for Sept. 21.

Hey that's just in time for Banned Book Week!  PEN urges you to take action.

Tags: Turkey, Armenia, genocide, censorship, banned books

Banned Books Week

We're a month or so late for this, but the actions listed on this page are still valid. I note in the "Updates section that Jamphel Jangchub, a member of the Drepung Printing Group was released, probably about the same time as Ngawang Gyaltsen, formerly Group 22's adopted prisoner of conscience and also a member of the group. The Drepung Printing Group received very lengthy sentences back around 1988-9 for the crime of translating and printing the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Tibetan. The note says that he was released "reportedly because of good work in the vegetable garden of Drapchi Prison in Lhasa." Who knew? Next campaign we need to send gardening tools!

Amnesty International Banned Books Week Page