News
KIDS Reading Across Rhode Island
KIDS Reading Across Rhode Island, Rhode Island's One Book, One State community read program for kids, is kicking off its 3rd year! This program, offered in partnership with the Rhode Island Office of Library and Information Services, encourages students across the state in grades 4 through 6 to read the same book, and engage in community discussions and programs.
The 2012 title will be Dave at Night by popular and acclaimed author Gail Carson Levine. Dave is a newly-arrived orphan at the strict and depressing Hebrew Home for Boys in Harlem, 1926. Over the course of the story, he develops a passion for art, creates a new family out of his fellow orphans, and discovers the mysterious nighttime world of fortune tellers, musicians and other artists of the Harlem Renaissance. This rich story has earned many awards including School Library Journal Best Book, ALA Notable Children’s Book, and ALA Best Book for Young Adults.
Mark your calendars: The Gail Carson Levine will visit Rhode Island on June 16, 2012 for the kick-off event at the State House. More details on the event to follow!
Nominate the next Reading Across Rhode Island book!
Deadline: May 15, 2012
The general criteria for book selection includes:
- A good story with a universal theme
- Appealing to a wide range of readers, from age 14 and up
- Accessible in language and content
- Available in different formats (i.e., paperback, audio, Braille)
- Written by an author who is available to visit and speak with Rhode Islanders about the book
- Over time, the titles selected should reflect diversity in content, culture and genre
To nominate a book, send the title and the author to: info@ribook.org
10th Annual Reading Across Rhode Island
May Breakfast with Author Geraldine Brooks
Saturday, May 5, 2012
9am – 12pm
Rhodes on the Pawtuxet, Cranston, RI
Registration Form: Click here to download the registration form for Reading Across Rhode Island 2012.
Resource Guide: Download a list of accompanying resources, including additional reading recommendations and student response suggestions, by clicking this link.
Join Co-Chairs Gale Eaton, Director of the URI Graduate School of Library and Information Studies and Robin Kall of Reading with Robin, as well as hundreds of Rhode Islanders as we celebrate the 10th year of Reading Across Rhode Island!
Enjoy breakfast, browse books for sale, bid on penny social items and hear Pulitzer Prize winning author Geraldine Brooks speak about the 2012 Reading Across Rhode Island book Caleb's Crossing. The author will also be available for book signing after the event.
Tickets are $30 for members of the RI Center for the Book and $40 for non-members. The $40 ticket price includes a one-year membership to the RI Center for the Book, as well as all the benefits of a Membership. Learn more about Membership Benefits here.
Click here to download the registration form for Reading Across Rhode Island 2012.
For more information, contact RI Center for the Book at sheala@rihumanities.org or (401) 273-2250.
Our thanks to our event sponsors: NewportFed, Penguin Books, and Reading with Robin!
And to our partner, Living Literature. Scroll down to the Living Literature listing to see full list of Caleb's Crossing performances at libraries across the State!
Journey With Caleb's Crossing
Join Rhode Island Center for the Book for a series of programs related to the 2012 selection Caleb's Crossing by Geraldine Brooks.
Weaver Library Presents: We Still Live Here – Âs Nutayuneân
Monday, February 13, 2012 at 6:30pm
41 Grove Avenue, East Providence, RI.
East Providence Public Library
Weaver Library invites you to a special film screening of We Still Live Here – Âs Nutayuneân, a new documentary by award-winning filmmaker Anne Makepeace. Associate Producer and Researcher Jennifer Weston will attend the screening, introduce the film, and open the floor for discussion after the screening.
We Still Live Here – Âs Nutayuneân tells the unprecedented story of the return of the Wampanoag language, a language silenced for more than a century. At the heart of the film is the brilliant, engaging, passionate Jessie Little Doe Baird. Indomitable, resolute, hilarious and humble, she is a marvel to watch as she finds her way from the tiny Indian enclave of Mashpee, Massachusetts, to becoming a celebrated linguist honored with a MacArthur 'genius' award in 2010 for her unprecedented work with her community to bring their long forgotten language back home.
We Still Live Here interweaves the present-day story of Jessie and other Wampanoags reclaiming their language with historical events that silenced the language and severely impacted their culture – epidemics, missionary pressures, land loss, and the enslavement and indenture of Native children. The film's powerful animation illuminates and deepens the emotional impact of these devastating events, even as the contemporary story brings a new and surprising conclusion to the story and a hopeful vision of the future.
This program is free, open to all. To learn more about the film and view the trailer, visit the Makepeace Productions site.
More Upcoming Events
Monday, March 12th at 7:00 at the Peace Dale Public Library -
The Great Awakening: Religion and the Shaping of Native American Cultures, a presentation by Linford Fisher, Assistant Professor of History at Brown University.
Tuesday, March 13th at 6:00pm at the Central Falls Public Library -
Through a combination of storytelling, song and dance along with a craft of a very popular corn husk action figure, presenter Annawon Weeden, a Mashpee Wampanoag, brings the history and culture of the Wampanoags to a family audience.
Monday, March 26th at 7:00 at the Newport Public Library -
Educating Women in New England from the Colonial Era through the Early 19th Century, a presentation by Kathryn Tomasek, Assistant Professor of History at Wheaton College.
Monday, April 9th at 7:00 at the Providence Public Library -
Caleb's Crossing: Indian and English Gods in Early New England, a presentation by William Simmons, Professor of Anthropology at Brown University.
Living Literature
Living Literature will perform selections from Caleb's Crossing at these locations:
North Kingstown Free Library
Wednesday, March 21 at 6:30pm
100 Boone St., North Kingstown, RI
Barrington Public Library
Monday, March 26 at 7:00pm
281 County Rd., Barrington, RI
Newport Public Library
Monday, April 9 at 7:00pm
300 Spring St., Newport, RI
Maury Loontjens Memorial Library
Thursday, April 12 at 7:00pm
35 Kingstown Rd. Narragansett, RI
Providence Public Library
Sunday, April 15 at 2:00pm
150 Empire St., Providence, RI
United Congregational Church
Sunday, April 22 at 2:00pm
4 South of Commons Rd., Little Compton, RI
Reading Across Rhode Island - Let the Journey Begin!
Reading Across Rhode Island, Rhode Island's One Book, One State community read program is kicking off its 10th year!
The 2012 title will be Caleb's Crossing by Pulitzer Prize winning author Geraldine Brooks. Join us in celebrating a decade of community reading on Sunday, January 22 with a panel discussion featuring Geraldine Brooks, Renee Hobbs, and William Simmons. The panel will be curated by the Providence Journal's Doug Riggs. Living Literature will present a scene from their Caleb's Crossing inspired performance series.
In Caleb's Crossing, skilled storyteller Geraldine Brooks has created a work of historical fiction laced with palpable research that illuminates 17th century repression intensified by the harshness of pioneer life but undermined by kindness and compassion. This vividly detailed journey of Caleb Cheeshahteaumuck, the first Native American to graduate from Harvard College in 1665, is a story about friendship, spiritual attitudes of faith and belief, of bigotry, prejudice---and hope.
Join us on May 5, 2012 for the annual author breakfast with Geraldine Brooks. To learn more about this and other events, send an email to sheala@rihumanities.org or call (401) 273-2250. Read more about the book and the author on Geraldine Brooks' website.
Letters About Literature
Now Accepting Submissions for State and National Writing Contest!
Deadline: January 6, 2012
Rhode Island students in grades 4 - 12 are invited to enter the national Letters About Literature contest, with the opportunity to win a $10,000 Reading Promotion grant for their local school or community library. The deadline for submissions is January 6, 2011. Letters About Literature is a national reading promotion program of the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress, presented in partnership with Target and affiliate state centers for the book. To enter the contest, young readers write a personal letter to a favorite author describing the impact of the author's book on his or her life, or explaining how the book helped them see an aspect of the world—large or small—through new eyes. The books can be from any genre, fiction or nonfiction, contemporary or classic. By encouraging personal reader response and reflective writing, Letters About Literature encourages meaningful reading and helps to create and celebrate successful writers. For more information and to enter the contest, visit the Letters About Literature website. Teaching materials, including lessons plans, writing samples, and assessment checklists, are also available at this site.
2011 National Book Festival
Washington, D.C.
An estimated 200,000 book-lovers gathered on the National Mall on September 24, 2011 for the National Book Festival in Washington, D.C. Rhode Island was represented at the Pavilion of the States by members of Rhode Island Center for the Book and RI Office of Library & Information Services (OLIS). Information on state-wide reading and literacy initiatives was distributed to a steady crowd of festival-goers that turned out (in spite of the rain) to show their support and enthusiasm for reading.
2011 Art of the Book Program
Poetry on the Page
On September 30, Rhode Island Center for the Book presented an evening of poetry with Forrest Gander, the 2011 Library of Congress Witter Bynner Poetry Fellow. Forrest performed a selection of his poetry to over a hundred attendees at the RISD Library. In addition to the reading, "Poetry on the Page" exhibitions were organized in September and October at RISD's Fleet Library, the Providence Athenaeum, and the Newport Historical Society. The Newport Historical Society also hosted letterpress artist, Kyle Durrie of Power & Light Press. Kyle is traveling across the country with her Movable Type Project - a truck turned letterpress studio where she offers letterpress printing demonstrations and workshops.
The 2011 Art of the Book program is presented by the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress, the Rhode Island Center for the Book, Rhode Island Council for the Humanities, the Providence Athenaeum, Newport Historical Society, Fleet Library at RISD, and American Printing History Association/NE Chapter.
RI Center for the Book is an affiliate of The Center for the Book at the Library of Congress