One of the lovely things about being an online arts centre is that Notes can Xanadu can feature writing and literature alongside other art forms. With this in mind, we have created a reading challenge for 2021. Each month there will be a theme, with several sub-categories, and the challenge is to read one or more books each month to fit the topic. Feel free to add sub-categories, the only rule is that one book each month should be a new read. The entire challenge can be downloaded in pdf format here. We also have an Excel spreadsheet, thanks to Karin Hammarstrom, one of our participants, which you can also download, and use to track your progress.
Every month, we’ll introduce the theme and sub-categories in a post like this, and also give some reading suggestions. The sub-categories are only a guide, feel free to adapt and expand as you like. Please leave a comment and tell us what you are reading, and whether you are enjoying it, or any other information that you would like to share with your fellow readers.
For , the theme is Language.
Sub-categories:
• a book in a language with which you are familiar, but don’t read in very often, if at all.
• (if you are monolingual) a beginner’s “Teach Yourself” book in a language you are interested in.
• a coding manual in a programming language you don’t know, or in which you have more to learn
• a book about the history of language or linguistic
Reading suggestions:
. Le Petit Prince by Antoine de Saint Exúpery
. Harry Potter in any language
. Teach Yourself .. in 24 hours
I’m reading:
Teach Yourself Javascript in 24 hours
Come back next month for our July suggestions, and don’t forget to leave a comment below to tell us how you got on in May or June! Happy reading!
Our next Stitch ‘n’ Bitch takes place on Thursday, 17 June, at 6.30 pm BST, in one of the rooms of Xanadu Online Theatre. For those who haven’t heard the term before, a Stitch ‘n’ Bitch is when people get together to work on their various projects while having a natter and a bit of craic at the same time.
About our host: Aoife Flood’s knitting journey began on a trip to New Zealand in 2007, when she came across a book of designer knitting patterns while browsing in a shop. She decided that, if she wanted to have these designer clothes, the best way was to knit them herself. So that was it; she got the bug and has been hooked ever since. Aoife will sharing some of her wonderful work with us in a gallery exhibition in the coming weeks. She is wearing one of her own pieces in the photo.
The Song of the Lark by Willa Cather
Do you read on an e-reader? Do you buy electronic books? Do you buy paper books from stores that may or may not collate your purchases and share them with Amazon and the likes, anyway? Do you use apps like Goodreads to get recommendations, store read and want to read type lists, and to share read books with connections?
In the recent past, I may or may not have done work that may or may not have involved none or several public libraries. Whilst data protection and privacy were not the focus of that particular piece of work, the subject matter was a subset. Discussion centred around the usefulness of maintaining user reading history versus the expectation of privacy. Librarians like to have access to the list to recommend, when asked, however, the potential to profile (via the electronic management system) the individual using their reading list exists. Librarians generally voted in favour of not retaining the user history and rather discussing with the user asking for recommendations at the time. With the ability to shape the thoughts of a community, librarians are far more powerful than I think they realise.**
The Phantom Tollbooth by Norman Juster
I’m reading:
Sub-categories:
The Other Bennet Sister
In another first for us in 2021, we will be holding a Stitch ‘n’ Bitch on Thursday, 18 February, at 7.30 pm, in one of the rooms of Xanadu Online Theatre. For those who haven’t heard the term before, a Stitch ‘n’ Bitch is when people get together to work on their various projects while having a natter and a bit of craic at the same time.
I’m reading:
