Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Library Summer Reading Club Finale




One World Many Stories, the Summer Reading theme at the Bernardsville Public Library, will come to a close with a finale program on Friday, September 9th at 6:30 pm. Magician Jim Vagais will wow the audience with his magic tricks and entertainment. A magician for over thirty years, Magic Jim has performed numerous times on television and has recently been a magic consultant to a Broadway musical. This amazing show is free for all attendees and is sponsored by the Friends of the Bernardsville Public Library. Seating for Magic Jim’s performance is limited and registration is required. Register online at www.bernardsvillelibrary.org and follow the link under Kid Stuff, or call the library at 908-766-0118 to sign up.

This year, 388 readers (Kindergarten through Grade 12) joined the library’s Reading Club and read more than 317,000 minutes in the course of ten weeks. Over the summer, the library’s Youth Services staff led many activities about different countries and cultures around the world including chop stick relays, international hop scotch, creating Samurai hats, worry dolls, African masks, dream catchers and origami. Participants attended special Friday Explorations where they learned about the cultures of Mexico, Italy and Japan; they met animals from around the world like the Wallaby with the Eyes of the Wild; and many children volunteered to be a book buddy to a younger child. Enjoy Explore India LLC conducted wonderful programs on Indian culture including a Mehndi workshop, for students in Grades 4-6 to learn about the art of Mehndi, or henna, and a Bollywood dancing program where Grades 4 and up learned how to move to the music “Bollywood” style. Bernardsville Library patron Lori Garth, a naturalist, volunteered her time and knowledge to do a wonderful program on worm composting, and she donated two black swallowtail caterpillars to the Youth Services Department so that patrons could observe them in change into butterflies. Bernardsville Library’s Youth Services Department had over sixty student volunteers to assist with programs, help patrons collect prizes and log their reading times.


One World Many Stories brought tales from cultures around the world to the Bernardsville Public Library through story time programs, crafts, games, food, and special family events. For more about Bernardsville Public Library, go to library website: www.bernardsvillelibrary.org.

9/11 Remembrance at Bernardsville Library

Members of the public are invited to attend the tenth anniversary remembrance for the two Bernardsville residents who were lost on September 11, 2001. A short ceremony honoring Allison Horstmann Jones and Thomas Barnes Reinig will take place at the flagpole outside Bernardsville Public Library starting at 6:30 pm on Sunday, September 11. Community members and a United States Marines Corps Color Guard will participate in the ceremony which will also include remarks by Mayor Lee Honecker.

Friday, August 19, 2011

Tea & Conversation with Award-Winning Poet Dorianne Laux



Join us for tea and conversation as Julie Maloney, Director of WOMEN READING ALOUD, conducts an up-close and personal interview with award-winning poet Dorianne Laux at Bernardsville Public Library on Saturday, September 10 at 2:00 pm. At the library, audience members will have a rare opportunity to ask the author questions about her work and her writing process. A short reading of new and selected poems as well as a book signing will follow the interview.

Dorianne Laux is the recipient of two Best American Poetry Prizes, a Pushcart Prize, two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Widely anthologized, her work has appeared in the Best of American Poetry Review, The Norton Anthology of Contemporary Poetry, and The Best of the Net. In 2001, she was invited by the late poet Stanley Kunitz to read at the Library of Congress. Her fifth book of poetry, The Book of Men, (W.W. Norton) was released in February 2011. She teaches poetry at North Carolina State University.

The renowned poet Jane Hirshfield said of Ms. Laux, "Dorianne Laux has created an ever-expanding body of work in which the examined life is the common one, recognizable and shared, yet also transformed—each statement, feeling, fact set down with accuracy, original vision, and an unerring musicality and alertness. Facts about the Moon continually surprises and enriches. In its rhetorical clarity, emotional honesty, lyric beauty, attention to detail, and moral encounter with the world, this volume is a rewarding and powerful achievement."

Interviewer Julie Maloney has worked in the arts as a performer and educator her entire life. She is a poet and writer, photographer and teacher who has taught writing on both the high school and college levels. She is founder and director of Women Reading Aloud (WRA), a not-for-profit organization that promotes women writers in New Jersey and beyond. WRA holds special events, weekend writing retreats, conferences and on-going writing workshops in spring and fall during which women writers of all genres hone their work in a salon type setting. She recently led a writer's retreat in Greece and will return in June 2012 to lead another.

There is no charge to attend the program at the library, but advance sign-up is requested. Register online at http://www.bernardsvillelibrary.org/ and follow the link under Adult Programs, or call the library at 908-766-0118 to sign up.

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

The Power of Words: Workshop with Andrea Mastrobattista

Inspirational speaker Andrea Mastrobattista will host a new workshop, “The Power of Words,” at Bernardsville Public Library on Wednesday, August 31 at 7:00 pm. “Whether they are said to us or used by us, words have the ability to tear us down or build us up, said Ms. Mastrobattista, “While our tendency is often to speak negatively, using positive, encouraging words is definitely the healthiest option. Come to this workshop to discover how to put a consistently positive tone to what you say about yourself and others.”

There is no charge to attend the library workshop, but advance registration is requested. Register online at http://www.bernardsvillelibrary.org/, and follow the link under Adult Programs, or call the library at 908-766-0118 to sign up.