There are occasions when an award or prize should not be proudly embraced by the recipient. These tongue-in-cheek “honors” supplement the ones listed in this article, highlighting developments in these areas in […]
A good writer knows how to grip the imagination of the reader in such a way that the words leap from the page and burn themselves in the reader’s mind. Reading the […]
Librarians have long fought against three primary antagonists: people who talk too loudly, those who do not return their books on time, and book-eating bugs. Stern words and fines can take care […]
As if assassinating President John F. Kennedy weren’t offensive enough, Lee Harvey Oswald has yet another black mark against his name. According to the records of the Dallas Public Library, Oswald checked […]
Theodor Geisel, better known by his pen name, Dr. Seuss, wrote more than 40 beloved children’s books. With such classics as The Cat in the Hat, Green Eggs and Ham, and How […]
“Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog it’s too dark to read.”—Groucho Marx
For many years, James Joyce’s novel Ulysses held the record for the longest sentence in the English language. The 4,391-word monstrosity contained in Molly Bloom’s soliloquy seemed destined to hold the record […]
It would be an understatement to say that Mark Twain was not a fan of Jane Austen. “She makes me detest all her people, without reserve. Is that her intention? It is […]
The Lyttle Lytton Contest honors the author who writes the worst opening line to his or her novel. It is named in honor of Edward George Bullwer-Lytton, who opened his 1830 novel Paul […]
Horatio Alger, Jr. (1832 – 1899) was a prolific 19th-century American author, best known for his many novels about impoverished boys and their rise from humble backgrounds to lives of middle-class security […]
Bennett Cerf, co-founder of Random House, one of the biggest publishing companies in the world, bet a client of his that he couldn’t write a book with fifty or fewer distinct words. […]
Commonplace Fun Facts 