Regardless of our individual politics, one thing about new President Barack Obama that's a real treat for all librarians is that he is a writer and a READER, and he makes no secret that books have profoundly influenced his personal growth and political understandings. Monday's New York Times ran a story on Obama's reading life that sums up what teachers and librarians hope for everyone, and why we work so hard to encourage all young people to become lifelong readers:... throughout his life he has turned to books as a way of acquiring insights and information from others -- as a means of breaking out of the bubble of self-hood and, more recently, the bubble of power and fame.Recent articles and blog posts have called for more male reading role models for boys. Back in 2006, the READ@Skokie Public Library poster series featured then-Senator Obama (the poster is copyright-protected, so you'll have to view it on Flickr instead of right here). Guess we're getting what we asked for! (in a good way :-)
Read Like President Barack H. Obama
(from the Paideia Library collection)
- James Baldwin - novelist
- Langston Hughes - poet, essayist
- Parting the Waters and Pillar of Fire --Taylor Branch's 2 volume biography of Martin Luther King, Jr.
- William Shakespeare's tragedies - Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello, King Lear and others (too many to link, search the catalog here)
- Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon
- The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
and the President's own books:- Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance
- The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream
Here's to Four Years of Reading!
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