The Watertown Free Public Library revealed the title for this year’s One Book, One Watertown. See the announcement below.
What happens when we study delight? This year’s One Book, One Watertown selection, Ross Gay’s The Book of Delights, invites us to do just that. We hope you’ll take part in the Watertown Free Public Library’s annual community read!
Ross Gay is many things – a New York Times bestselling poet and writer, a winner of prestigious awards, a teacher, a gardener, a skateboarder, a Midwesterner, a partner, a friend, a son, a pick up basketball player, a loiterer, a lover of high-fives, and a student of delight. In The Book of Delights, he set out to document a delight every day for a turbulent year, and the resulting essays demonstrate how wondrous the ordinary can be, if we pay attention. Still susceptible to mourning, racism, heartache, and despair, Gay navigates the complexities of daily life with delight as his teacher and invites us to tag along.
The Watertown Free Public Library encourages all community members to check out The Book of Delights from the Library, and join in themed programs during the month of March. Ross Gay will join the library virtually for “An Evening of Delight” on TUESDAY, March 18! Join from home, or, join us in the Library with Ross Gay up on the big screen. CART Services and ASL will be provided on Zoom.
In March, WFPL will host a slate of free programs inspired by the themes of The Book of Delights, and there’s something for everyone! Create your own journal to document delights, enjoy a free concert with local folk and indie rock musician Grace Givertz, spread joy through drawing with local artist Bren Bataclan, gather with fellow plant lovers for a workshop with Emerald City Plant Shop, and more!
The Book of Delights can be reserved in the Library catalog at watertownlib.org. Extra paperback copies circulate quickly and will be displayed on the Library second floor, across from the Reference Desk, as they are available. You can listen to the eAudiobook instantly through the Library’s free Hoopla app.
For more information, and to view a list of programs, visit: watertownlib.org/onebook
About One Book, One Watertown
Each year, the Watertown Free Public Library chooses a book, encourages everyone in the community to read it along with us, and hosts a variety of programs related to the book, its setting, and its themes. This program is known as One Book, One Watertown. Selected titles are usually announced in January. Programs take place in March.
About WFPL
The Watertown Free Public Library provides access to a wide variety of popular materials, resources, services, and programs that fulfill the informational, cultural, and recreational needs of Watertown and surrounding communities. Our Library works to create an environment that attracts and welcomes users of all ages and abilities.
This sounds terrific. I hope everybody enjoys reading this book together. It got me thinking of books I would recommend everyone in town read to understand where we are now, particularly as we transition from one President to another. At the very least these would break from a certain sameness among previous selections to deal with difficult truths.
First, two by columnist Miranda Devine: “Laptop From Hell: Hunter Biden, Big Tech, and the Dirty Secrets the President Tried to Hide” and “The Big Guy: How a President and His Son Sold Out America”. Both deal with the shady dealings of the Biden family, particularly Hunter’s ventures in Ukraine and China in which President Biden denies any role—photographs recently released from the National Archives to the contrary. First dismissed as disinformation, both stories daily grow closer to gospel truth.
On the issue of the late, unlamented pandemic, I suggest Alex Berenson’s “Pandemia: How Coronavirus Hysteria Took Over Our Government, Rights, and Lives”. The title says it all. Those with deeper interest in the subject might enjoy (if that’s the word) “The Real Anthony Fauci: Bill Gates, Big Pharma, and the Global War on Democracy and Public Health”, by RFK, Jr., soon to be the President’s Secretary of HHS. Argue with him by all means, but he argues back, forcefully. Related is “The Twitter Files”, which claims “In this explosive exposé, we uncover the disturbing truth about the FBI’s collusion with the Biden administration to control freedom of speech at Twitter.”
Last, for a fascinating experiment, how about reading Coleman Hughes’s “The End of Race Politics: Arguments for a Colorblind America” in tandem with Ibram X. Kendi’s “How to Be an Antiracist” or “Between the World and Me”, by Ta-Nehisi Coates?
Watertown is an intellectual powerhouse. Residents could handle these polemics, and be better educated for having read with them together.
Below is a modest sample of Mr. Gay’s intellectual ability. Warning: profane and disturbing language.
Not quite read-it-along material.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71UmOiU7yDL.jpg
The selection looks interesting. People should read more and whatever they choose. With the MAGA movement across the nation to normalize book bans, it’s more important than ever.
I hope not, Paul. As the last four years have proven, free speech has never been more vital. On a wide range of subjects, only one narrative was approved and allowed. A lot of democracy died in the darkness of that censorship.
Nice try. MAGA despises free speech. They are now planning to go after the leaders who dared to investigate the attempted insurrection that happened four years ago today. The “Day of Love” and the “legitimate political dissent”, in case you forgot. And now Musk and his beloved “X” are canceling anyone who dares to dissent. The darkness was lifted for four years but it’s coming back.