more ego stroking, another #1 for our collective mantlepiece
The most painful part of the story proclaiming our bookishness: the USA Today stock photo shows the WSU flag flying above the Space Needle.
Oh, Minneapolis. It’s time to take that smug look off your face. Last year, the citizens of St. Paul’s twin city were crowned the most literate of us all. But we matched your icy cold winters and raised with months and months of grey skies and regular rainfall and raised them a fancy new library to claim the bragging rights as 2005’s Most Literate City [usat].
In yet another random ranking, this one took a look at the sixty-nine largest cities in the country and judged them not on whether their citizens could read, but if the actually do. The rankings were based on six factors: newspaper circulation, number of bookstores, library resources, periodical publishing resources, educational attainment and, Internet resources [ed: hey! that's us. way to go team!].
With all of our new [mb], recently prettified [mb], and high-tech featured [mb] libraries, the recent opening of 826 Seattle, bookstores like Elliott Bay and the University Bookstore with blockbuster reading schedules, a giant bookseller (amazon) perched above our city, and tons of specialty shops and newsstands, it looks like we might be on track to be two time literacy champions. I can’t wait for the t-shirts and bragging rights.
So, are we actually reading, or did we just pull the wool over the judges eyes by looking studious while sipping cappuccinos at our neighborhood cafes. What are you reading and where did you get it?
Related posts:
I’m currently reading “The Big Nowhere” by James Ellroy. I got the book at Twice Sold Tales on Capitol Hill.
Faust part 1 by Goethe — University Book Store UW
Raymond Carver’s “Call if You Need Me” from Elliott Bay, and, slowly, the second book of Proust’s “Remebrance of Things Past,” which was a gift.
Let’s see.. I just finished Beloved and picked up Country of My Skull. I’m also reading We Have Never Been Modern by Latour, Modernity at Large by Appadurai, On Liberty by Mill, and am nearly done with Linked by Barabasi.
…all bought at the UBookstore.
Made in America: An Informal History of the English Language in the United States. From the Koolhaas Li-barry.