Everyday Author

Dr. Barber just sent this note updating the reference number on The Dioscuri:

Actually, the Library has been stored in Burlington, Vermont, and is now on its way to Vancouver, Washington, where it will become and permanent, interactive exhibit in the Clark County Historical Museum.

Ahead of the collection's arrival we have received an inventory and your book is listed as part of the collection. The Mayonnaise System Catalog Number is different, however. Here is the listing as it appears in our inventory:

Michaele Benedict

(Montara, CA)

THE DIOSCURI

Love: LOV 1990.004

This is a novel set in Greece which incorporates myth, magic and music into a contemporary story. Madeline and Yanni, daughter and adopted son of an American Quaker doctor, are the “twins" who are inseparable as children, and who, as adults, try in vain to live separate lives.

The Library Lives!

The Brautigan Library is alive and well in Vancouver, Washington, after traveling from Vermont to San Francisco, where it reposed in storage for four years. This collection of unpublished manuscripts written by "everyday authors" will becomea permanent collection of the Clark County Historical Museum, the former 1909 Andrew Carnegie library building in downtown Vancouver.

As one of the "everyday authors", I am gratified to learn that this funny bunch of writing, about 400 manuscripts inspired by a fictional library in a 1971 novel by Richard Brautigan, will be preserved.

The Digital Technology and Culture Program at Washington State University, headed by Dr. John F. Barber, is working with students and a team of local and international volunteers to reopen the Brautigan library and to "continue its original mission of connecting writers and readers of personal narratives".

According to the Library's web page (http://www.thebrautiganlibrary.org/) plans call for the organization to collect and circulate unpublished digital manuscripts and to "provide opportunities for research, conferences, exhibits, and creative activities."

Dr. Barber says "The Brautigan Library is not about publishing, or even about literature. It's about people telling their stories in a democratic way. It is a public home for personal narratives in a digital age."

I'm not sure how I feel about The Dioscuri's being called non-literary or about being called an "everyday author" (whatever that means), but I'm glad the Library is coming out of the basement.